The Sound of a Scent
The Perfumer is a portrait of Merle Bergers, who experienced the interconnectedness of plants and trees, insects and bigger animals firsthand by growing up in a small forest in the east of the Netherlands. Her field of interest? The possible reality of plant communication.
Score
Lingua Planta translates the volatiles plants use to communicate into fragrance — rooted deep in scientific research but expressed through an aesthetic language. For the soundtrack, we took that same idea of translation as our starting point: how do you give a voice to a form of communication that's invisible and silent to us? We approached the composition as our own act of "listening in" on that hidden plant dialogue, translating chemical signals and unseen exchanges into sound and texture.
Implementation
With this soundtrack and sound design we especially focused on the theme of nature. We worked with the contrast between silence and sound — like the moment when you get a spark of inspiration. Contrast is big in this one. By using Analog synths to counter the nature sounds and acoustic instruments we created a dynamic soundscape that reflects the film's narrative arc.
