boom, clap, bang

Action for audio. Despite the masses of sounds in the world you don’t realise how many fill your everyday life until you have to force your mind to pay attention. But when it comes to writing an action scene for radio, it’s important to use sounds that are comprehendible to the listener and does not make the scene too confusing to understand.

creating the space in your audience mind

If you are struggling to gather an idea of sounds that, for a start, set up a location, perhaps as a warm up exercise for yourself before writing, watch- for example- an episode of Coronation Street.

But with your eyes closed.

Pay attention to the sounds that give you an idea of the location: quiet background chatter, sound of a register opening etc. Although with the soaps well-known reputation, by now it’s easy to associate characters to locations, if we hear these sounds and hear the voice of Roy it’s clear the scene is in the café. Whereas, if the voice of characters who linger in the pub are heard then the scene would most likely be at The Rovers. In your script you may have to use dialogue to make the location more clear, but subtly rather than on-the-nose.

voice and tone

Once the location has been put into place, a tone should be created in order to set the atmosphere for the action. This can be done through the dialogue, again, take note from the Coronation Street exercise… are the characters using a soft tone of voice while speaking to each other? Or do they sound less patient?

craft your plot through dialogue

Dialogue may be the most useful way to make an action scene effective for an audio script. Up the pace with short, quick-fire sentences between two characters to increase the intensity. Sure, you can’t see them, but your mind can envision the fuse shortening between them.

the sixth sense

I’ve probably said many a time in other articles that having the use of aesthetic and observation taken from you when writing a script is very restricting, so you have to use the remaining senses you have to the best of your advantage!

silence is golden

This at times can include, the use of silence. Perhaps when the drama in your scene has peaked, add a moment of silence. Still intense, and gives the listener a chance to absorb what has just happened and stay in time with the story.