24:
Graeme Holmes went to film school in Bristol, England [the same place that produced John Boorman, Alex Cox and Michael Winterbottom]. He has had more than a decade in British TV documentaries working variously as offline editor, director or producer. Currently he is working with stand up comedians and “trying to make [his] own films which always seem to be twisted, dark comedies.” The current film, ‘Suggestive’ is a fast paced, motor-mouthed, “pitch gone wrong” set in the notoriously corrupt world of biscuit industry executives. His website is Flick Factory Productions and you can view ‘Suggestive’ here and read more about the film at http://www.flickfactory.co.uk/html/FFNews.htm
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. I didn’t think too much about audio design or sweetening upfront, but I totally value getting the best, cleanest possible location sound. That’s the foundation of your audio. So I hired a brilliant sound recordist and chose my location very carefully. We had 5 cast members around a large table and they were all individually radio mic’ed. Left to my own devices I’d have thought about trying to double boom this set up, but my sound recordist rode all five mic channels live (his fingers were a blur!) and he did an amazing job. All tracks were laid to a hard drive, and in the offline I could access a “master guide” which was all the channels as a continuous track. I could also then use the time of day timecode from that master guide, to find and use all the individual actor channels.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. I’m a director/editor, but I’ve always thought I’d be totally happy being a mad sound designer in the Skip Lievsay mould [‘Barton Fink’ ‘The Big Lebowski’ ‘Goodfellas’ ‘No Country For old Men’ etc], so I worked hard in the offline adding sound effects. I’ve had 10 years in documentaries where you spend all your time trying to get rid of extraneous sound, and now with drama you spent time trying to add sounds in to build a convincing or compelling world. Especially as the radio mics job was to get the vocal clean and exclude any other sound. Once I’d track laid, I went into a post facility, Bubble TV [London] and let them polish what I’d done. I have the kit to do a lot of audio work myself, but when it comes to frequency “notching” and compression, I always find, if budget allows, it’s better to let the pros do it.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. I’m pretty happy. I didn’t get any big shocks. I got clean bedrock location sound. I added fx. I pushed an eight minute film through mixing and sweetening in two hours which was what my budget allowed. Because we weren’t “fixing” problems, we could focus on the small “creative” decisions – “Can we find a better leather chair creak?” “How loud is a splash relative to other sounds?” etc… The little details that make a film, and especially a comedy work.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. I belong to some online fx libraries so I pulled a few things in from there, but I love doing foley, so I was holed up for a while in my bathroom [my quietest room] recording splash sounds, grinding up biscuits etc. There are more ways than ever now for the offline to become a totally rich sound environment.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. With foley you have to be experimental and dogged. All the tiny details make a huge difference to the sound and things don’t always sound to the mic as they do to the ear! Some things I recorded and put them into the offline, didn’t work at all, so I had to go back again and get more imaginative.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. I had edited a small promo film for a jazz group and I approached Jimmy Cannon, the singer/drummer [in the classic Phil Collins mode!] and persuaded him to do a score for me. I had imagined a simple sax and piano score that would take about a week to get together. In the end Jimmy not only worked on the music [on and off] for three months, but he also ended up taking a major role in the film!
Q. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
A. Jimmy and his composing partner, Sean Hargreaves were the most painstaking, fastidious people I’d ever met. They totally sculpted the score frame by frame. I tried to sit in with them as much as possible, so we could discuss ideas and find a consensus. Initially I was hugely frustrated. Sometimes we’d only get abut 30 seconds of screentime covered in a day. But after a few days you have a style and character themes that you can start to repeat and vary motifs and make some headway. But their level of detail meant I ended up with something that works like an old ‘Tom and Jerry’s score, wrapping itself around every little nuance of the character and the comedy. These guys play jazz live for a living, so they pulled in some friends on bass, sax etc. I never knew you could spend four hours mic’ing up a drumkit! And I got an even bigger shock when I got feature film composer, Michael Edwards [‘The Frontline’ ‘Layer Cake’ ‘Whalerider’] in to help me with the music mix. He was “side-chaining” and effecting the attack etc on snare mics, compressing every little nuance of the sound from drum, bass etc… It totally opened my eyes and ears to what is involved in excellent music production. In terms of the overall film, I always think there are no set rules for what music works with comedies. Some comedies are played like dramas and it’s the situation, the context that creates the laughs, so sometimes you want “straight” dramatic music, sometimes you want to point up some in your face comic aspect of the action. I think I got a bit of both, but it’s the attention to detail that definitely makes it a funnier film.
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Robin Fuller is a filmmaker whose work can be found at www.robin-fuller.com
The answers in the following interview relates most specifically to the films “The Ballad of Mary Slade,” and “Mammon.”
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. In different projects, I have approached things in different ways. On some projects, I have been guilty of leaving sound design, mixing and mastering to the last minute, but generally I try to keep it in mind from the start. On other projects, such as my film Mammon, the sound track was one of the first things that we did. If I’m animating any lipsynch, then obviously the vocals need to be recorded before I can start working. I like to get music started at least in my mind before I’m putting visuals together as I find that it helps to create an overall feel and atmosphere.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. In several cases, I’ve been lucky enough to be able to rope people into helping me out for free. I do some mixing myself, but always try to get somebody who really know what they’re doing to take care of mastering. It seems to be something that some people just have the right ear for.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. Well, leaving things to the last minute is never a good idea and I think some projects that I’ve worked on in the past could have really benefited from more work on the soundtrack. Other than that, I’m pretty happy with the methods that I’ve used. I like to be very hands on with creating and processing audio for my films
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. I’ve used a combination of all the above techniques. I try not to rely on sound libraries, not least because I can never find sounds that I’m really happy with. I would much rather create sounds from scratch, either using a foley artist or manipulation of other sounds…. or both.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. As I mentioned, although there are plenty of sound effects libraries around, I seem to never find sounds that I’m completely happy with. From an artistic point of view, I prefer to use original sounds too.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. I’m lucky enough to be friends with a great musician, Jeremy Eaves who I work with to create original music for my films.
Q. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
A. Only pros! working with Jem is always a pleasure, he is able to take my ideas and interpret them into music that always surpasses what I originally had in mind.
18:
Vince Parenti has worked in many facets of the film and television industry over the last 20 years as a writer, shooter, producer and director. To learn more about Parenti and his multi-facted creative work please visit his production company Reverie Pictures, and his award winning TV pilot Green Room.
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on?
A. Yes, planning how I can use audio, or music to help tell the story is just as important as planning the visuals. Actually, sound dictates what the visuals should be, in many cases. For instance, if I’m trying to create a sense of ‘fear’ and I find a really good sound track, or music FX that’s starts off muddy, so to speak, and gets clearer as the track progresses, then I would begin the visuals as a muddy or blurred image that gets clearer as the movie progresses… if that makes sense. So finding the music or sound first is a catalyst that inspires me to make better storytelling choices.
But first and foremost, I remove all obstacles to recording quality sound on set. I do this in 2 ways; first by making sure the locations I choose will be sound friendly, and if I cannot find a sound-friendly location I then control my environment by creating a digital set and shooting in front of a green screen. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I hate watching low-budget indie films that don’t consider sound quality. It ruins the experience far more often then bad visuals do. Anyway, after figuring out how to make sure the overall sound quality isn’t an issue, I then look over the story to find ways to tell the story through sound and/or music. For my TV pilot GREEN ROOM, I was fortunate to have a good friend who is a super-talented rap artist. Once I found the music I felt tells the story, I came up with ways to shoot the visuals.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. The “pros” are directly connected to knowing what to do, which saves time. The “cons” are the opposite.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. For my first project, I hired someone who didn’t do a good job recording sound, I hate to say since he has died recently, and then hired another guy to do the sound design, and he didn’t do a good job either, which made me want to kill him. However, this experience led me to learning how to do it myself. And since I work with editing software that has sound editing tools, I have everything I need to do as good a job as any non-pro can do, so there’s no excuses for anyone else to have crappy sound… unless you don’t have editing software… but then again maybe you shouldn’t be making a movie. In the future though, I would love to pass this task off to someone with more experience than I.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. My belief is everyone should at least have a strategy. If you don’t then you’re not giving the respect your audience deserves and they will hate you for it.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. Most sound FX I find through the various libraries I’ve purchased throughout my career. But occasionally I will have to create the sounds myself, or find them on the web. It’s a fun process unless I’m under the gun to get it done fast.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. Early on I had a tough time getting music because I didn’t realize using little known songs from little known artists would involve lawyers, and agents, and it was such an extravagant process for my lowly-budgeted project. That’s when I went to my friends Gabriel Alaverdashvili, Dimitri Diatchenko, and more recently Mr. Rief Rawyal. Today there are these great royalty-free websites popping up everywhere and the talent pool has gotten much deeper, so my next project will include extensively searching their Db’s as part of my project creation routine.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. As I mentioned above, I have been very fortunate to have friends talented enough to create music for my projects, or already have the right music that they let me borrow. And with all the royalty free music available on the web today, it makes it considerably easier than it was just 5 years ago to get the right sounds or music for projects. But eventually I would love to find a talented composer to work with. My friends are great song creators/writers/performers, and their music is fantastic, but a good composer can take a project to the next level.
06:
The following is joint interview with filmmaker Courtney Hope and sound designer Gillian Arthur and their production of “Wildbirds.” Visit Wild Birds to view the trailer and for more info.
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
Courtney: I worked with my sound designer Gillian Arthur from pre-production. Once the script was locked, she and I discussed creating a soundscape for “Wild Birds.” We coordinated with my sound mixer as to which sounds we needed from set vs. foley. Post-production went smoothly for sound, mostly because we had already started on the sound design before shooting. And we were able to avoid ADR – which is always great for a director!
Gillian: I remember having discussions with Courtney in pre-pro about how she wanted the film to sound. Because we knew ahead of time there would be no music we discussed how to form a soundscape that was really dynamic. I think we kept that in mind and brought it all the way to the mix. The two most important elements remained the woods and the birds.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
Gillian: I would say that most of the process of sound design for this film went smoothly. We had a month to design and mix, and with my assistant Anthony Jones on board handling foley recording and editing, I was able to focus on all the FX gathering necessary and take care of the dialogue edit. Also, having a team that I’ve worked with several times before helped us all be on the same page. Overall, it worked out with no crazy incidents.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
Gillian: Most of the sound effects we worked with came from a variety of sound libraries in addition to collections online. The bird calls we used in the film were the most difficult as we tried to blend into the BGs more specific calls from birds of the North Eastern region and Pennsylvania specifically. Luckily, speaking with the production sound mixer ahead of time we were able to record some specific effects on location, which helped.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
Courtney: There was a foley artist, but we also recorded a lot of sound effects on set (since we had discussed what was needed so early on). My production designer also helped my sound designer with some of the nature sounds - as she had done research on the wild life of the region during pre-production.
24:
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. The film I’m making at the moment has no dialogue apart from one word in its 2mins 20secs. Sound is up there with the pictures to tell a story. Not much is needed but it has to be perfect. Morning birdsong, a kettle boiling, a bath running, the sound of a wet fist hitting a wall. What can be recorded live is and I think always should be using the best skill and equipment available, because it’s as important to me as the picture I’m directing. Even if it isn’t used I want to hear it, because if I have to or intend to use something else I want to know what was there really, just so that I know. I’m not into post production on this project yet, we film the last scene this Sunday. Though two thirds of the film have been shot and two thirds of the film’s sound is in place. On days we’re not filming I’m recording birdsong or the sound of tears falling into a bath – at the same location the footage was shot in. How many times must I squeeze a face towel to get the right noise from a single drop of water that sings? Many don’t.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. I did it myself. This film is me with a camera and two actors + extras. I’m sending it to virgin media shorts in the hope of becoming world famous and rich and all that. I wrote it with no dialogue not in an attempt to use background sound more, but that is what has happened and is part of the process for this film. I wrote it this way because only one word was needed in the script, and that led me to having to focus more on the sound. The film opens with a close up on the face of a sleeping cat, we hear the cat breathing, purring. I’ve been back to that very same cat twice and held different mics at his sometimes annoyed face.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. I’ll tell you when it’s done if you like but so far we’re ok.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. The reason I’m filling in (I’m in the UK) this questionnaire is because I wrote to the chap who owns the site to comment on one of his samples. A cat purring, that inspired me to go back to the cat in the film and try again. The sample held something I hadn’t heard the first time and I wanted it. But I want it live from that cat in the picture. If the sound I now have doesn’t match the quality of the sound I found on this site then I will buy it from the site.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. So far we’re ok with sound.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. I want to recreate 13 notes on a violin, the copyright for the 13 notes belongs to Nokia and it’s their popular ringtone. I’m not sure where I stand legally on plucking a tune on my violin that is the world’s most popular ringtone, but the occurrence of the tune (Gran Vals) in the film is key to the story. So I’m writing to them to ask for permission. There is no other music.
Q. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
A. I’m sure there will be plenty I’ll do different next time. Cons – picking a tune owned by Nokia? Might not be though, we’ll see.
Tony O’Reilly. www.avow.info www.theatom.org
21:
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. The Sound Manifesto is a group of filmmakers that specialise in providing sound department services to filmmakers in the UK. We typically work by heading up the sound department in preproduction with a Director of Audiography (see Wikipedia). Since we’re present at the very start of a production, we get the chance to plan for sound early-on. It also gives us a chance to feed back to the production office about locations and costs, as well as creative ideas and a full work breakdown.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. On the last two shorts (”The Last Time I Saw You” and “Mike”) we did the sound editing ourselves and coordinated with a rerecording mixer at Pinewood Studios in England. In one case I was involved in preproduction as the Director of Audiography; in the other case I joined later in postproduction as Supervising Sound Editor. My colleague, Yang Xu, was Sound Editor on “Mike”.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. Of course, using OMF or AAF files to pass work from the Sound Editor to the Rerecording Mixer and Picture Editor suffers some loss of information, for example, if you use plugins then they get lost in translation. You have to decide whether or not to conform your processing. There are several technical issues that can arise in addition. But the greatest pro in using a Rerecording Mixer is to be able to hear sound at the correct level in a proper Dolby 5.1 environment.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. We used a mixture of library CDs and recording our own sound effects. There’s usually time to do this for shorts since the number of effects is usually small compared to a feature. Sometimes we used effects recorded by Production Sound, but they can be noisy.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. The sound effects CD library we used was a well-known one, with generally good samples but since we’re in the UK, some of the effects were too US based (you can tell the difference between a UK crown and a US one. Same goes for traffic sounds). Sometimes, the effects just weren’t as good as they should be (just how difficult is it to get a good sound for glasses or bottles chinking?). There’s never enough samples to satisfy your needs in a library of 2500 effects. Looking at many web sites was disappointing – many of the sound effects were fewer and more disappointing. Some sounded synthesized! Others were just too amateurish. It just goes to show that it’s difficult making good sound effects.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. A professional composer was used in both cases, although the music in “The Last Time I Saw You” could easily have been created by a Sound Designer or Sound Editor.
Q. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
A. The more I get to know about the art of filmmaking, the more I realise there should be no “out of the box” solutions. Besides, neither of the films I worked on would have been able to afford the copyright fees for recorded music. What little money there was went to a local talented composer.
If you’re a filmmaker interested in achieving great sound visit The Sound Manifesto for tons of great information and practical tips on these pages, with more to come.
“The Last Time I Saw You” (2010) is about a paedophile father who meets his estranged son in order to explain why he left the family.
“Mike” (2010) is about a woman street artist who protects a boy from her money-grabbing boyfriend. Written by Prodromos Papadopoulos and Henry Lloyd-Baker, this short film was made for the London Film School as a graduation project; I don’t expect it to be released anytime soon.
16:
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. With all my films I consider post-production sound. It is very often overlooked on tight budgets and filmmakers usually regret this when they listen to their film on a professional sound system if they’ve been mixing on the cheap. With regards to my last film, The Killers, I had my regular composer Stuart Briner on board from the script stage and Oli Whitworth, who is based up in Oxford, on board before we started shooting. I shot a test sequence as well and Stuart gave me a flavour of what we had been discussing which was very film noir inspired with a Ealing Comedy flavour.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. I hired the very talented Oli Whitworth.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. I would like to expand but it was a very straighforward process. I had a good sound recordist, Michele Caruso which is very important, I’d discussed with Oli what we needed and what he thought we needed and everyone just got on with it.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. The sound mixer, Oli Whitworth has an Aladdin’s cave of sound effects. We also recorded some specific effects we would need on the shoot itself like the police raid at the end.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. No not really. We went through several sound versions for the ending and made some more tweaks after the cast and crew screening which was in a cinema and very unforgiving. Sound effects (of the kind I needed) are easy to source these days with so much variety. It wasn’t a problem at all. Oli had pretty much everything we needed and like I said we also recorded some specific sounds we would need on the shoot itself.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. I always use Stuart Briner who I’ve known since University.
Q. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
A. I’ve been working with Stuart Briner for about twelve years. He’s a very talented composer and we’re making another film together this summer. I have listened to other composers of course but nothing seems to match Stuart. We are very honest with each other and both come to the table with ideas which makes it a very productive and enjoyable partnership with respect to the music for my films.
Carlo Ortu has written and directed a number of short films and one feature film “The Killers,” which is signed to IndieMoviesOnline and available to buy or rent on DVD., as well as worked on and scripted television, corporate and commercial projects and his credits include BBC, Channel Four, and ITV. His last short entitled ‘Safe Zone’ was one of the Top 20 Highly Commended films in the 2007 TCM Classic Shorts Competition, was selected for a special screening at the Palais at the 2008 Cannes International Film Festival, nominated for the UK Film Council Award for Best Film at the 2008 London Short Film Festival, nominated for Best Drama at the NPA 2008 Film Awards, and won the Audience Award at a 2008 Shortwave Films screening.
14:
"Death and Beauty" by Ezra Peace released through Red Horse Cinema
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to being considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. I got a post production audio supervisor involved, Nathaniel Chambers, from the very first production meeting. It was important to me to not fall into the very common trap of laying off the planning of our audio strategy until after photography.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. We hired a guy out of Connecticut named Bob Kessler. He was absolutely amazing in his artistry of foley/sound design and basic sound mixing. He did instruct us that he was not a mixer but he did basic separation on our audio that was an immense help. His work brought our film to another level and cemented the realism I was after.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. We didn’t do too much beyond a basic mix. The cost of hiring a mixer and venue to mix for theater sound was not justified for the application of this film, and I was very happy with what Nathaniel and Bob produced.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. For the most part Bob recorded all new foley for the film but he also used wild sound that we acquired during photography and some library sounds from the various popular sound banks.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. We got very lucky with Bob. I met him at a networking event here in the city and our goals as artists seemed to be aligned. I will say this though, it is very important that a sound designer be equal parts artist and technician. And if you were to err on one side or the other, err on the side of artistry. It was to our good fortune that our sound designer fit this bill.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. Our post audio supervisor, Nathaniel, also happened to be a very talented composer so he handled all of the scoring for the film. His workflow was very easy and his approach to giving me what I wanted as a director was highly effective. We also set a soundtrack of four songs which he provided. It was important to us to use music from up and coming artists and local if possible. We did this for two reasons. Foremost, we wanted to support other local artists such as ourselves in our effort. The other reason was that it just happens to be far more economically viable to support local talent (bonus). After a discussion on what I was after he provided a sizable list of songs to choose from that he felt were compelling and interesting. This made my job very easy.
7. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
I was very happy with Nathan’s approach and don’t see changing much. One thing we might do differently next time, and he would whole heartedly agree with this, is record live musicians for the scoring. Doing so would achieve yet another level of organic realism as well as provide a new opportunity for a new artist to express my vision.
Filmmaker Ezra Peace is a writer/director based in New York city and is responsible for creating the films “Palmzooka”, “Catch of the Day”, “Domesticated Secret Agent”, and “The Way We Need Her”. He is currently promoting his fifth film titled Death and Beauty which is making its rounds in the festival circuit and currently in post for his 6th film “Double Crossed”. He is also developing several more short and feature length scripts for production this year including what may prove to be his breakout short “Interrupted”.
08:
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to being considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. I considered sound very early on because I was editing the film while it was being shot. I knew we’d have to do a lot of work in post so it was fantastic when our first choice composer (out of sixty that we considered) was also able to do the sound design. His name is Andy Stuteley (www.stootzmusic.com) and he did a fantastic job. Andy worked hard with some very difficult location sound and we knew we had to give him the necessary time rather than impose restricting deadlines. Getting the end product the best it could be was the main consideration.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. We got Andy Stuteley for free because he viewed a rough cut of the film and loved it.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. I think the Cubase (apologies if that’s spelt wrong – Andy’ll be laughing at me) system he used had a few issues because it was the first feature he had done a full audio mix on it, but Andy always managed to get us the files we needed for editing in the end.
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. We used a combination of a sound effects library that Andy had and we did our own raw/unsynced location sound capturing, where necessary, to give Andy what he needed. We didn’t have the budget to go to a foley stage and it was very much in keeping with the feel of the film that we wanted to do as much as we could at the actual locations so everything was as real as possible.
For a few key flashback/dream sequences one of my fellow producers and DOP, Dave Francis, did the sound editing. It was heavily layered and he’s a fantastic editor anyway and on these sections he had a very specific end goal in mind in how he wanted them to look which is why he shot them the way he did. They turned out better than I imagined they would when I wrote the script. Dave did the sound design directly in Final Cut Pro and then exported the sound to send to Andy who looked at it and we all agreed that we didn’t want to touch a thing!.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. I just turned to Andy and said “Look, here’s your budget – £0. If you need more we can double that budget or even triple it if necessary.” Whether he sold his soul to the devil or had to sleep with people to get what he needed I don’t know and I don’t want to know. All I know is that he delivered.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. I wanted to get a composer on board when I had a rough cut of the film so I used a guide track music throughout for the initial rough cut. This music was given to me after I had had a lot of conversations with Neil Richards who is an amazing designer (he did all the artwork for the film including the great poster) and also happens to be a good DJ and complete audiophile. One day he just walked up to me and handed me about twenty CDs he had burnt and the tracks on them were perfect – minimal, eerie, but with a contemporary edge – a bit like Neil.
Andy Stuteley composed all of the music specifically for the film except for one piece – a song by the very talented Scottish singer/song writer David Lockhart – www.myspace.com/davidlockhart – which he submitted to me and it fit perfectly. It’s had radio play in North America and David has been absolutely committed to the project just like so many other great people which has made the film what it is and helped it get in Warner Bros. slate of films and a good following on FaceBook – Emanation Films on Facebook.
For the main score Andy and I had a lot of discussions about what we both thought would work best which was a great collaborative experience. I said “Minimalistic, eerie, haunting lyrics – a mixture of the baroque greats and Einaudi/Armstrong/Glass .” And as usual Andy said “Done”. And it was.
7. Were there any pros or cons to your method of finding music for your film and would you do anything different next time?
The frustrating thing was really being stretched for time and not being able to give Andy the initial support he needed. Of course that didn’t phase him, he just kept moving ahead, but he probably did a bit too much work on certain sections of the score before I could feedback. This was my fault for not being available enough. But the great thing about Andy is he just accepted everything with a smile on his face and worked even harder on the next version.
8. Please include a bio, synopsis of your film, and/or link to your website or film’s website.
Simon Tate is an experienced commercials director in the UK. He has written four feature films, all sold into development deals and has won several awards for his work in the industry. The film discussed above, “The Point of Regret,” is his first feature as a writer/director and the trailer can be seen at Emanation Films. This dark and moving film involves a recently released murderer who was convicted of killing his entire family when he was only 12 years old. Drama unfolds as a the protagonist William attempts to find a reporter to tell his story to the world.
03:
"Say NO To Violence Against Women - RED"
Q. Some filmmakers wait until the final hour to begin considering post-production sound. Did you plan ahead regarding sound design and audio sweetening or did you consider the audio aspect early on? Were there any pros or cons related to your timeline of post-production sound?
A. I am a very visually oriented person, but because I do motion over time, I require a beat, or a rhythm. When I edit documentaries, and we focus on the different sections, I like to have the accompanying music (or at least a stand-in file to cut to) available. Conversation, like any piece of music, has cadence, and having the music or score available, it helps to experiment with the mood and rhythm. How can you tell music was the last consideration in a film? it doesn’t flow, feels wooden, and the music seems out of pace.
Q. How did you handle audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering? (hired a sound designer, found someone to work for free, did it yourself)
A. I try to hire a designer and mixer, but I do a lot of the basic work myself. On most pieces, I can handle a lot of the work if its just dialogue with a score underneath it. On more complex pieces, I need a good ear to come in and tweak where needed. It helps to have someone to bounce audio ideas off of.
Q. Were there any pros or cons related to your strategy for audio sweetening, mixing, and mastering?
A. Cost and time are the cons – never enough money or time to get work done, it seems. Allot for at least 2 to 3 weeks to mix a feature. Make sure your sound person is ALWAYS AVAILABLE TO SPEAK and doesn’t underestimate how long the work will take or cost. Don’t go overboard on sound re: effects, etc, cause that eats into studio time. Make sure rendering and outputting time are not part of the bill.
"Say NO To Violence Against Women - RED"
Q. How did you handle securing sound effects to use in your film/s? Did you use a sound effects library (CDs or downloads?), a foley artist, or did you create your own?
A. You have to do all three – record wild sound while shooting, find effects from libraries if you need them, and if neither work, use a foley artist. Believe it or not, foley is not as expensive as you think and a good foley artist will have all the tools to make any sound you need in-house.
Q. Did you encounter any difficulties or set-backs with your choice of securing sound effects? (ie “foley artist wasn’t good enough,” “Sfx CDs too expensive”). Or, did you find your choice of securing sound effects perfectly suitable?
A. Using canned effects can be very effective if you sound designer/mixer knows how to make them feel natural in the piece. Try to find obscure libraries but also know not everyone is going to harp on how those footsteps you used in one scene have been used in umpteen other films. Only sound designers pay attention that deeply to .5 seconds of sound on screen.
Q. How did you secure music for your film/s? (Royalty-free or stock music, volunteer musician or composer, paid a professional composer to create a unique score for your film)
A. Most of my work is using royalty free music, but I also work with freelance beat makers and composers. Its getting easier to connect to composers one on one via the internet.
"Say NO To Violence Against Women - RED"
Melissa Ulto is a filmmaker, photographer, VJ, artist, and designer. She has a full production studio in the Fashion District in New York City and recent projects include editing the B Girl doc “All The Ladies Say”, with director Ana Rokafella Garcia, and directing and producing “From 0 to 90″, a doc about Obama’s first 90 days in office. Her credits and projects are too many to list here so visit Melissa Ulto to discover more about her numerous creative projects and skills. To view more of her work, check out Melissa Ulto’s Youtube Channel
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