Diegetic and Non-diegetic sound

In our Media lesson today, we were looking at sound in film.
We read about two specific types of sound: Diegetic sound and Non-diegetic sound.

Diegetic sound - This refers to sounds that happen within the film that the characters can hear. This could be dialogue and all the noises made by objects.

In this clip from 'Top Gun', the main character is sitting in a bar listening to a juke box. A background character changes the song on the juke box which carries on playing at the same volume which could be an example of diegetic sound as it is an object from within the film emitting a sound the characters can hear.

As the volume grows, the sound is no longer coming from the juke box alone, but turns into Non-Diegetic sound gradually during the rest of the clip until the credits where the song continues at the loudest it's been.




Non-diegetic sound - This refers to the sound the characters can't hear, such as voiceovers, sound effects and overlayed music.

There was an example of both of these in the clip we watched in the lesson. The clip was an extract from 'Hunger', a film about PIRA volunteer Bobby Sands who died from a hunger strike whilst in prison. An example of Diegetic sound could be the sound the trolly made as they wheeled him out of the building or the crying of birds as they flew overhead in a flashback he experienced. An example of Non-Diegetic sound could have been the faint music that had been overlayed to set the tone in his dying moment as he stares unblinkingly up at the camera.