Reflective summary

Now that our project is fully edited and back into the hands of the director,  I thought it’d of value to revisit and initial project aims and goals to see how effective this project has been for me personally.

 

“Objective: To provide location sound along with post production work on a 15-minute film for a client, ultimately providing a final audio mix down that’s consistent to that of the post apocalyptic genre of visual.”

The overall objective of this project was to provide a film crew with both on location and post production services for a short film that fit the relevant genre. Conducting a lot of research into the genre offered me with insight into some of the connotations that came with genre of post apocalyptic. Looking through various interviews with critically acclaimed audio engineers such as Mark Mangini and Nigel Christensen, both of which works on films within this genre such as Mad Max. What we ended up with was a product that fit the requirements set by the director and met our standards personally.

 

Screen Shot 2017-12-15 at 12.23.15 PM(message from the director).

 

Moving onto my initial personal goals that I set myself at the start of the project, I believe that i’ve succeeded in improving overall within this field.

 

“– To better familiarize myself with on location recording equipment such as the F8 and 633.”

Although I exclusively stuck with the 633, I believe that i’ve gained first hand experience with the device to the stage where I can happily navigate it and get any set up I’d like out of it when required. Making sure that I was entirely comfortable with using the device before getting on to set was crucially for working in conjunction with time constraints on the given day. Although having to go through each track and separately labelling them (as posed to naming them before recording on the day) was time consuming, I put this down in part to trail and error.

 

“- To improve my skillset when it comes to working with clients.”

During this project I would work hand in hand with all members of the team in some capacity. Whether this be bouncing idea’s back and forth the director or ensuring I knew where I could and couldn’t stand with the boom pole in conjunction to the shot, I personally believe I’ve proved a sufficient service to the clients whilst maintaining a consistent level of communication that in turn, has aided the overall finished product.

 

“- To place a lot of effort on pre-planning, making sure that every stage of production goes off without complaints and overall, to improve my organizational skills.”

This was a goal I was keen to stay on top of due to not wanting to become overwhelmed with the workload. I ensured that throughout the process everything was preplanned to an extent such as making sure all the equipment was ready and working on the go, making lists of time stamped edit notes and prepared multiple potential music cues for the director. The only time in which this came under scrutiny is when I didn’t check the clip microphones on day 4 of recording however I was able to use my incentive to make sure that filming wouldn’t of been disrupted and potentially stopped.

 

This project has been a beneficial to my skillset as a whole, working with clients on a project as big as this has resulted in me becoming more comfortable in the service I provide.

 

Link to final piece: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_JhGSPafSM&feature=youtu.be

Post production: Day 4

This was our last day working within the sound theatre and it would be spent entirely on mixing a final mix that’d be approved by the director. We would arrive at around 10am and we had the director coming in at 3pm so we would have to work efficiently to ensure we had a near complete film.

 

The first initial call of action was to refer to the sheet that I made reference to in day 3. As this was time stamped it was simply a case of going through every single note and applying the relevant changes. Using this sheet as a point of reference made both Ed and mines job a lot efficient time wise which in turn, would allow us a lot more when it came to creating a final mix. One key contribution I put forward within this day was the inclusion of more non-diegetic sound which would create a wider sonic environment within the film. This included adding automated reverb to certain tracks such as background shouting. This was so done with aim of making our piece seem larger than the screen it was on and in turn, hopefully more immersive to the viewer.

 

We would then turn everything down in the mix and go through scene by scene adding each individual element into the mix. This is a stage we took a lot of time into as we wanted to ensure every element got through and sat correctly in the mix, their isn’t any point of having well produced effects if nobody can hear them.

 

Once this was done, we would have one more play through before our director and editor both turned up. From the initial play through they didn’t notice any huge problems, was simply a recommendation of moving a few music cues slightly earlier so they would come in a bit earlier. After making these amendments we would have one more play through before they were happy to sign it off.

Post production: Day 3

For this session we would be focusing on recording our audio dialogue replacement with our actors and applying relevant effects to our piece overall. For this session, I made sure we were well prepared for recording dialogue by taking much of Lucy’s advice into consideration.

 

Before the actors even arrived I assured thorough checks were taken when it came to the technically side of the recorded. This include preemptively setting up the sE X1 and ensuring that we had a signal going directly into the Pro Tools project, I would then do test recordings that informed me of a rough level to record at and where we would have to place the actor in accordance to the axis of the microphone. Due to the fact we had to record shouting I ensured we made use of a pop shield to avoid plosives. Finally, we would print off scripts for the actors including sync and non-sync labels. This was so that actors could see which scenes they’d have to get precisely correct due to the diegetic nature of their mouths on camera. Due to all this pre-planning, we only took up roughly an hour of the actors time which was obviously beneficial to them and us.

 

For the remainder of the session we would start placing various EQ and reverb on relevant recordings so they sat better within the mix. This process included rigorous watch throughs and note taking. One of the contributions I inputted into the overall mix was ensuring each locations features had a consistent sound, this included applying similar reverb using the D-verb plug in and EQ using the 7 band EQ plug in.

 

Once this session was over I decided to take a bounced export home with me to look through and make a few pages of notes on. This would speed up the process of the final day of post production significantly.

 

Screen Shot 2017-12-15 at 1.37.34 PM(Page 1 of the editing notes that I wrote up for day 4).

Post production: Day 2

This second day of post production was mainly focused around getting prepared for this day and we managed to do a thorough job. This session would focus around recording various foley to fill in for aspects that were either not captured at all or just needed a little more amplification in the final mix, such as footsteps and rustling tracks.

 

We would first start of by capturing footsteps from as many scenes as we could, these would eventually be adjusted with relevant diegetic reverb to create an effect that allowed them to blend in with our previously recording atmosphere tracks. Following this we would record in various other diegetic effects such as rustling, breathing and object based recordings. Throughout this process I would be the one in the foley room trying to replicate the images shown on screen. This proved to be often challenging at times as I had to try and replicate sounds that required improvisation. For example; when trying to replicate footsteps on the abandoned building I decided to place a fine layer of sand on top a concrete slab as initially the slab offered footsteps that I believed were too dense and therefore, didn’t fit. By adding the sand it thinned these footsteps out just enough for it to fit the scene.

 

By the end of the day we had sufficiently recorded everything we needed for the final mix barring ADR, we did however confirm a time with the actors for day 3 of post production in which we plan on taking the advice of week 9 lecturer, Lucy.

 

 

 

Post production: Day 1

Before getting into the studio me and Ed made the decision that this initial session would be entirely based around getting everything into the Pro Tools session so we knew where we were before we even thought about recording, mixing and effects. We also scheduled for the director of the film to come in so they could have their input for musical cues and such.

 

I decided that it’d beneficial to find some potential music cue’s for the piece before this session began, assigning multiple different royalty free pieces of music for each individual cue. This was in part due to Dean Humphrey’s advice when it came to showing directors multiple different takes as it offers the director a role of importance in this stage, it was also incredibly helpful to the director as I can imagine they wouldn’t of wanted to spend hours searching through the web for relevant and fitting royalty free music. When initially showing the director the recommendations for each cue they shined away from some of my preferred choices however I wasn’t really offended as it’s what they see fit although, I did convince the director about the importance of adding a sting over the top of the music cue to create the same desired effect that my personal preferred track had within it. This was a point that Lucy got across well in her week 9 lecture, putting across the important of not taking offense to a director not being as passionate about an aspect you personally see as fitting.

 

Once we had selected the music cue’s. Me and Ed went through the project and made vigorous notes on foley to record and potential effects to assign, this would important as it meant we wouldn’t go into day 2 blindly.