What Is Room Tone, and Does My Company Video Need It?
We’ve all heard the saying “read the room”; take in the vibe, understand what’s going on around you, and act accordingly. But have you ever thought about hearing the room? Room tone is an important definition you should familiarize yourself with if you’re looking into producing a company video. Unless you’re a professional, it’s not a term most people know. Room tone refers to every sound picked up on a recording, outside of your voice or the voices of your team. The actual walls of your set will mix with background noise to create an overall atmosphere of sound. If you listen intently, you’ll notice every single whisper, flick of paper, or movement of a chair will make it into the recording.
Room tone is an incredibly important part of any piece of media, but especially a company video. When you’re launching content that’s intended to introduce yourself to an audience, or continue to build trust with existing clients, you need to make it feel real. You might have assumed background noise in a recording is a bad thing, but it’s actually quite the opposite. Having a purposefully crafted room tone allows your company video to feel real, to have some believability behind it. Without it, the recording will feel forced and overly-edited, which tends to make the finished product seem cheap.
Create Room Tone for Your Video
Unless you’ve done some research on audio recording, it’s likely you would never pick up on the subtleties of room tone. You might notice, when listening to two different recordings, that something feels “off” or “phony,” and that could be because the video team didn’t take tone into account. Professionals use room tone as a sound bed to complement any new bits that are added to a video in the editing process.
Location is also vital when it comes to room tone, as the small differences in acoustics, echoes, or background noise will break the fluidity of a video. A professional video team will add a pre-recorded sound bed under any additions or edits to ensure your finished video has continuity and the dialogue appears seamless. The overall goal is to smooth out possible cuts and make sure any distracting audio is kept at bay. If your location doesn’t have a natural tone, it can be created. Adding an ambient sound or even music to the recording allows listeners and viewers to have the natural amount of background noise the brain is used to processing, making your message come through even clearer.
UniMedia Productions Knows the Nuances
Our creative team is made up of individuals who are extremely knowledgeable in their fields. Not only are they good at what they do, but they understand the little parts of media that can make things magic. Something that might be subtle (or even completely unnoticeable) to you might be a giant red flag for a media professional. They’ve put in the hours to know what works and what doesn’t, plus the why behind it all.
As digital trends continue to shift, and consumers get more savvy, it’s imperative to put some marketing dollars behind video content. Creating in-house video for organic social is a great way to connect with your audience on some levels. However, producing a company video should be left to the pros. Unimedia works diligently to understand our client’s brands as if we worked there ourselves, taking on their voice and telling their story from their perspective. Creativity is key, but production value takes the cake. We know what it takes to nail your company video, and we can’t wait for the opportunity to work with you. Check out some of our featured videos to see what we mean. If you’d like to test out your new knowledge, listen for the room tone while you’re at it.