Distinguishing spoken dialogue from inner monologue and telepathy without dialogue tags

Hello,

I’m writing science fiction that includes three distinct forms of conversation:

  1. Spoken dialogue that has normal dialogue tags and is enclosed in double quote marks in the text.

  2. Inner monologue that is Deep POV, so there are no tags nor quotation marks. It flows with the narration.
    Example:
    Calmly competent and world-weary for her age, she says, “We’re in Homes’ traffic control system. They couldn’t run over us if they tried.” Not entirely true I admit, but being a courier involves some risks.

  3. Technology-assisted telepathy via a mindnet connection to the cloud. I’m using single quotation marks and a specific dialogue tag.
    Example:
    A pitch black quiet.
    Homes mindnets, ‘Hello Kendra, can you hear me?’
    Kendra nets back, ‘Homes?’
    ‘Yes. How are you feeling?’

I’m using Amazon’s Polly synthetic voices to make the audio versions of the chapters that I’m posting to my website and social media as a form of relatively easy content to create. I know I can’t sell these, that’s okay.

However, I’d like to distinguish the three types of conversation in the audio track so a listener can keep them separate. I’ve tried pitch changes and adding reverb, which are okay, and may be enough.

One technique I haven’t tried yet, and this is why I’m asking here, would be to add a second track of room tone under the soundtrack from Polly, which is dead quiet between soundwaves. For the inner monologue, I’m thinking that dropping out the room tone there would help make it seem internal. For the mindnet, I could do that plus add the reverb to the dialogue. The regular dialogue and narration would simply have the room tone under it.

What kind of ‘noise’ would work for room tone?

Is there a better way to do what I want?

Thanks!

What kind of ‘noise’ would work for room tone?

Where are they supposed to be? I can think of ways to live record dialog to sell the ideas. Inner Voice can be done by getting really close to the microphone and speak in a low volume. The Room Tone segments can simply be backing away from the microphone with your normal voice and sound like someone trying to do a podcast from their echoey living room or office. Record some traffic noises?

The technology voice can be highly processed with extreme Noise Reduction and/or Noise Gate. Occasionally throw in echo word tails—but not always.

You can get some shifting by using your laptop internal microphone instead of a formal production microphone.

Some of this stuff is not going to be available to you if you’re using Text To Speech instead of live recording.

Koz

Some of this stuff is not going to be available to you if you’re using Text To Speech instead of live recording.

All of it is text to speech.

I’m thinking that I could add some ‘pink’ or ‘white’ noise under everything. The scenes take place in a wide variety of settings, so changing the room tone for each scene isn’t viable. That’s more akin to ambience, and is not what I’m trying to do.

You may have The Impossible Show.

Distinguishing spoken dialogue from inner monologue and telepathy

My first thought on reading that header was you have reached the limit. On videos you can do a wide-ish variety of locations and settings by changing the pictures and backgrounds, but the limit still hovers around three or four. In sound, you’re stuck with the number of chapters or scenes that someone can keep in their head, and that’s assuming the scene changes are memorable.

I can’t envision shifting back and forth between general theatrical dialog and internal voice without pictures. If you make too much of a shift between those two, the listener will assume a scene change.

Also, many theatrical tricks work because of common environments and experiences. Shifting between the restaurant and the living room is a lot easier than shifting between the bridge and the transporter room (to throw Star Trek in there).

We’ll see what others think.

Koz

For the internal monologue, I’m trying some pitch change lower, plus some echo. For the telepathy, I think I’ll go with a pitch change higher and reverb. Those two seldom occur next to each other, so they are almost always in contrast to regular dialogue.

It does force me to think about the audio when writing. There’s even a book about that called Writing for Audiobooks: Audio-First by Jules Horne. She has some good tips!

Thanks!

Possibly Reverse reverb ?: reverse it , apply reverb, then reverse again so it’s the right way around.

Writing for Audiobooks: Audio-First by Jules Horne.

Writing that down. I know my written sentences are almost always longer than my lung capacity.

How are you dealing with expression? I’m pretty sure I can tell automated YouTube explainers because they’re flat with no human emotion. I’m also pretty sure that’s why ACX will not accept software voices for audiobooks.

For the internal monologue, I’m trying some pitch change lower, plus some echo.

Do you always wait until natural dialog stops before you cut to the internal voice? I’d be awfully tempted to write some unimportant natural dialog that fades under as the internal dialog starts. Don’t you ever have your intuition kick in while somebody is talking?

Nobody wrote the internal voice has to be the same sex as the hero. I’m trying to think of any productions which did that.

There’s Greek Chorus. Several people speaking in unison that comment on the action from off-stage.

Koz

I’m trying to think of any productions which did that.

“My Mother The Car” was a TV show where the hero had conversations with an old car which was his mum reincarnated.

Koz

Here’s the final (for now) version. I think the text-to-speech works well enough as a free giveaway to generate some interest in the books.

https://soundcloud.com/user-185903816/story-teller-scene-1

ETA: I did try placing some brown noise under the entire track, and dropping it out at the internal monologue. It was too subtle unless I made the brown noise too loud for everywhere else.