The effects of synchronization of temporal structures of sound and motion picture on the impression of audio-visual contents

To clarify the effects of the temporal structure of sound and motion pictures on the impression of audio-visual contents, the impression of various kinds of audio-visual combinations was measured by a semantic differential method. The experimental variables of audio-visual stimuli are the speed of the motion picture, the tempo of the auditory stimulus and the temporal relationship between the visual and auditory accents. The synchronization of visual and auditory accents raises the subjective congruency of the audio-visual contents. The matching of auditory tempo and visual speed also affects the subjective congruency. The subjective impact is stronger as the speed of the motion picture becomes faster. The accent synchronization also contributes to the strong impact of the audio-visual contents. The subjective “lightness” is determined by the musical tempo. Faster music causes a lighter impression of the audio-visual contents. The subjective complexity is based on an imbalance between the visual and auditory speeds. The mismatching of musical tempo and visual speed evokes a complex feeling of audiovisual contents