Last night I was playing a show with one of my bands and completely zoned out throughout the entire performance. I didn’t play anything wrong or make any big mistakes. In fact I’ve found in the past that when I start thinking about what I had to play next I’m more likely to make a mistake. But at this gig in particular I noticed that I had no recollection of the specific things I was doing on the drum kit. It was like I went into autopilot mode and just played everything out of muscle memory.

Recently I’ve been thinking less and less about what I’m doing on stage and more about personal things in my life such as friends, relationships, what I’m going to do when I get home, what my favourite movies are; completely random things that have nothing to do with my drumming. I was so immersed in my drumming that I wasn’t even thinking about it. It had become the same as breathing; It wasn’t something I had to think about, it was just something I did.

This got me thinking about what immersion really is, and how in certain circumstances the less aware you are of the situation you’re in, the more immersive it really is. Another example of this that I can think of is driving long distances and becoming hypnotised by the road. You stop actively being aware of your control over the car, and it just becomes an extension of your body. I’m sure other people experience this through different means such as painting, writing or exercising. I think that immersion doesn’t necessarily mean you have to be immersed in the specifics of the activity itself. I think in some ways it means becoming unaware of what’s happening, and becoming oblivious to distractions around you.

Catch Thirtythree is a concept album by the Swedish progressive metal band Meshuggah. I chose to talk about this album as an immersive project because of the way it was constructed. The entire album is one 47 minute long piece; The entire thing is one continuous song from start to finish. While the album itself is split into 13 individual tracks like in conventional albums, Catch Thirtythree (with the exception of the final track) doesn’t feature a single song that ends in silence. Every song feeds into the next to create the illusion that it never ends, and it does so very effectively.

I listened to this album while driving, and there were many instances of me being caught by surprise when I looked at what track was playing, as I often didn’t notice that the song had changed. The only instance where my immersion was disrupted was when I noticed that many of the songs on the album were only a minute and a half long. After listening to the album again and actively paying attention to what songs were playing, I found that my attention was constantly being shifted to the tracklist of the album, because it changed so often. However, this is something that you won’t be an issue if you are able to ignore the frequent song changes and just treat the album as one big song.

The music itself is also very immersive. Meshuggah’s music is very mechanical sounding, and they often make use of repetitive riffs and overlapping rhythms to create a somewhat hypnotic sound. This album in particular achieves this well, as there is never an interruption between songs, and everything remains continuous from start to finish. Like many other concept albums, Catch Thirtythree is at its most effective when listened to from start to finish. There are many songs on the album that just don’t successfully grab me when I listen to them individually, yet when listened to in the context of the album they are seamless and transition perfectly from the past song to the next.

For this part of the project I added audio and sound design to another student’s visual composition. I responded to the initial feelings I felt from watching their video, and created a soundscape accordingly. The visuals were eerie but also beautiful, and I decided to reflect this with the sounds and music I added to the piece. I composed a piano arrangement that I think complemented and flowed well with the footage. It features a slew of flowing melodies and dramatic chords that are timed to occur at the same time as significant moments in the footage such as cuts and effects. The majority of the piece I wrote was very melodic and flowing, but I also used some chords and melodies that were dissonant, meaning that the notes seem to clash with each other and create a stressful sound. I did this to punctuate the creepiness of the location shown in the footage. In the last half of the short film, the visual takes become longer and less frantic, so I decided to make the music change to a slower and more emotional tone to emphasise the change in pace of the visuals.

In the beginning of the sound design you can hear distant murmurs of people in some kind of industrial environment, which I think matches the aesthetic of the location in the video. There is also a dull humming throughout the majority of the audio, which I added to give the soundscape more depth, and acts as another element to contrast the pretty piano parts. The piano parts themselves are extremely ambient, and have a slight delay applied to them to give them a sort of cold and isolated feel. In the quiet resolution of the piece, subtle wind chimes were implemented into the piano to add to the icy feel, and were my attempt punctuate the sense of awe you feel when watching the footage.

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Baby Driver has one of the best sound designs in a movie I have ever heard. Music is constantly playing throughout the movie due to the protagonist using it to combat a constant ringing in his ears, and the music both dictates and compliments the pace and feel of the movie. Many of the films other sound elements are designed so that they are in time with whatever music is playing; gunshots happen in tandem with drum beats, car beeps pulse with the tempo of the music, and character’s actions land on emphasised moments in the songs.

The film itself was very enjoyable for me, mainly because of the creative sound design, but also because of the fun approach director Edgar Wright has when it comes to editing together a sequence. His past films all have a very rhythmic feel to them when it comes to cutting between shots, and it makes total sense that he’d make a movie that takes that technique and puts it as its focus. Having a main character that constantly listens to music is a very clever way of making this possible. The music is often so immersive that when it disappears, it’s jarring and unexpected, and the film almost feels eerie without it.

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Dunkirk was extremely successful in immersing me in the world and events that it took place within. The film was able to keep my attention despite lacking strong character development or plot points. The movie isn’t a typical Hollywood movie; it feels more like a cinematic documentary than a narrative film. It doesn’t rely on character development, defined plot points or story arcs. Instead it focuses on recreating the look and feel of the events that took place with utmost detail. Despite lacking these elements, I was constantly engaged throughout the entirety of the film. Because of its focus on the atmosphere of the world it takes place in, the film never lost my attention, and I constantly felt like I was experiencing the events of Dunkirk first hand.

After researching the film after seeing it, I discovered that the reason I was probably immersed so much was because of how much content was shot for real. Real Spitfire planes were brought out of retirement to film the aerial scenes, and IMAX cameras were strapped to them to get footage that encapsulated all of the planes’ view.

Seeing the film in IMAX definitely helped the immersiveness of Dunkirk. The screen took up my entire field of view, and I couldn’t escape the movie even if I tried. The sound was the best part for me. The sound design of the film coupled with the quality of IMAX’s speaker system meant that I really felt as though I was in the moment. Gunfire had an impact that it wouldn’t have in regular cinemas, and the sounds of fighter planes’ blades spinning made me feel as though I was in the cockpit. The only issue I have when viewing Nolan’s films in IMAX is that the aspect ratio changes between scenes depending on whether or not the scene was shot using IMAX cameras.
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