Category: Audio Production

AUDIO CONSTRUCTION – Final Scene Foley

13421070 / / Audio Production

A waterloo moment in George was the sound of the threatening teenagers spray-painting the house and then running away right at the end. I felt the perspective for the design here this should support the camera’s and be heard from inside the house.

There follows a quick, and largely photographic, precis of the various methods we used to try and achieve this.

Location Sound

The scene was shot multiple times, and we collected a considerable amount of location audio from multiple angles and with multiple mics. However, this was blighted by two things. Firstly, it was raining, but the picture doesn’t look as though it is in the final cut. Secondly, it was roughly 5:30pm on a week day, and traffic on the road outside the house was relatively busy at this time meaning we’d collected almost no clean takes of some fairly subtle sounds on review.

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The stereo mic position above did collect some unexpectedly excellent stereo fields of the cars passing on the road below, however.

First foley + sfx attempt

Turning to ‘easy’ methods in post, I tried to use a combination of sound effects from the library for the spray and cans and a walled off foley mic in various positions and concrete slab for the footsteps.

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Sadly, this didn’t have anything like the desired perspective effect.

Foley on Set

So, we returned to the set approximately three months after the shoot with a portable recorder and reran the action in location foley. Once again, traffic and circumstances conspired against us, as we pitched up during the bell ringing at the Cathedral, which is clearly audible across uphill Lincoln. This, alongside the fact that the set (an uninhabited residential house) is very old and not sound proof in any sense, meant that the audio we captured inside with the front door closed was also of the wrong perspective, as it sounded more like the action was outside and still very close.

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Solution

On our return from the above we recorded one more attempt at this foley on campus, through a large, closed double glazed glass door at the back of media loans. This finally furnished usable audio for the scene, once we’d cleaned the internal air conditioning sound out of it with EQ.

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KEY POINTS

Problem solving for foley perspective – Application of skills and conduct in production

  • To manage the post-production workflow and contribute substantially to the sound design, construction and editing of the piece.

FINAL SUMMARY

13421070 / / Audio Production, Contribution, Individual Reflection, Learning Outcomes, Process Management, Project Overview, Role - Supervising Sound Editor

Reflective Summary – G.Bailey – Production of ‘George’ 

SUPPMAT - Group Feedback

The image above documents the positive email feedback we received on my group’s involvement with the production team during the production of George, which speaks directly to the achievement in my  first learning outcome for the project pertaining to the role of Supervising Sound Editor – To successfully manage the audio team’s interaction with film’s director, editor and producer on a practical and creative level, and ensure the audio team’s work is delivered on time and to a good standard – and one of my personal learning outcomes – To successfully manage a three person team in delivery of the entire soundtrack to a new piece of visual media efficiently.

Interaction with the client was one of the most critical parts of the process from my perspective as well as the most fraught, due to the two seperate directorial directions the film required and the production problems around the time of the original directors departure. The fact that we delivered audio for the film under complicated circumstances which met and exceeded the client’s expectations in some areas on time and on target (with respect to the extension granted us) whilst having had to guide the direction of the audio for the film with little collaborative support from the creative lead in it’s early stages, and still received universally positive feedback suggests I successfully managed the interactions with the relevant personnel. I dealt with a great number of logistical and technical problems for both the media groups involved throughout the production, generally made the final call on decisions about our priorities when I was able to do so, spent a great deal of time trying to keep spirits up on all sides as problems mounted, and attempted to encourage the other members of the audio team to look at things I felt they were perhaps missing (like trying to clear the director’s music choices via PRS, rather than taking an easy, copyright free, option). In managing the process here, I learnt above all that I should be more expectant of the kind of problems thrown up throughout because, whilst I classed them initially as unusual difficulties, according to the industry sources I consulted they appear par for the course in film production.

To judge the initial direction of and maintain the consistency of the overall tone of the audio team’s work on the piece, and liase with the director to ensure this is concurrent with their vision of the piece – This outcome is more difficult to judge because the initial direction of the audio for the piece was not necessarily the direction that was requested of our work after Christmas, which is not to say I misjudged either directors requirements as far as I’m aware, and no one aspect of the audio particularly jars with any other. There are plenty of tangible examples that stemmed from the requests of the two creative leads – audio devices influenced by Green Mile, the use of the specific radio track at the behest of the second director etc – in the final artifact that will testify to the attention to directorial requirements paid throughout both the pre production and production process. Of scenes in which I led the sound design, I feel we did everything we possibly could to bolster the story without overstepping the boundaries created by the picture, even though this was fairly frustrating as we could clearly see the initially strong idea being buried under the production problems, and I consistently pushed for the audio dimension to be given as much headway as possible to help tell George’s story, even as the picture was hampered in doing so. This approach was also, ultimately, in keeping with both director’s vision for the piece.

To manage the post-production workflow and contribute substantially to the sound design, construction and editing of the piece – Getting down to the nuts and bolts of the post-work aspect of the Supervising Sound Editor’s role, I can cite my overall contribution as evidence of my success here. I put a lot of time and effort (at least 60 hours of editing and foley work alone) into making a slightly confused final edit as good as it could audibly be across the various disciplines of audio post-production work, as well as dealing with much of the final quality-control decision making and the crucial final mix and master stage, all under considerable time pressure and with sometimes weekly changes to client requirements. The detail of some of the managerial and technical challenges are documented elsewhere in this blog, though it is worth mentioning the main one from an editing perspective was the lack of information forthcoming about changes from the films editor until we pressed home this information’s importance, and both my team and the client are apparently proud of or happy with the technical aspects of ‘George’ I’ve had a hand in. I also feel this level of involvement in the film satisfies my personal intention to have a good degree of creative involvement in the conception and direction of the soundtrack for the piece. There are plenty of ideas and work I can call my own in the audio of this film.

To manage the delivery of the soundtrack at various stages of the production along with relevant paperwork, to the director and producer – The various deadlines for all the groups have been met consistently throughout the process, and all paperwork completed as per the supporting materials of this blog.

Moving on to personal learning outcomes not particularly related to my official ‘role’ within the production I will say only a few words as I would hope they are self-evidently fulfilled by information furnished elsewhere in this blog –

To expand my knowledge of the theory and audio techniques deployed in the films influencing ‘George’, and in drama as a genre more generally – I refer to my research posts here, and ven though I at first thought the big budget reference points that were furnished to me for the films sound design would be difficult to find relevant material in, I was surprised at the amount of useful information I was able to glean from them through researching their creators.

To contribute extensively to the practicalities of creating and recording music for, and of recording location sound for the piece – This outcome encompasses my only real regret about the production in that I simply could not find the time to get involved in the composition of the music as I would have liked to. This is not to detract from the music in practical terms nor to say I didn’t have a hand in okaying the direction of the original compositions alongside my contribution to recording and mixing them, merely to say that as far my fairly ambitious outcomes are concerned this one was a bridge too far. As I more than fulfilled this requirement in terms of my first experience of location audio work and learnt a great deal from my colleagues in that matter, 50% will have to be enough here.

Conclusion – critical appraisal of the film as a finished piece:

Group Aim

  • To create and deliver the soundtrack to the film ‘George’ by Lucy Norton, Charlotte Hughes, Shaun Standring and Angelin Selvanathan.

Group Objectives: 

  • To create an effective musical score and soundtrack that suits the themes of the film and supports the story in a manner concordant with the picture and the preferences of the director.
  • To successfully manage and conduct location recording to capture useful dialogue and atmospheres that will form the basis for some sound design aspects of the picture.
  • To create believable and relevant atmospheres and sound effects in post-production, and edit these into a full soundtrack using foley, location recordings, composed music and replaced dialogue where applicable.
  • To final mix the project and deliver it at a good standard.

Watching ‘George’ with a critical eye I cannot find an area where we have spectacularly missed the mark on any of the above objectives and we certainly fulfilled our main aim. I would make the following observations however –

Dialogue is intended to tell ‘the human story’ of the film, and the revised script’s lack of it is severely problematic in a film intended to tell one man’s story. My feeling is it fell to the music in George to attempt to make up for this lack of emotion, and as such I would have liked to have been able to increase the complexity of our compositions and recording techniques to make this more effective. This was an opportunity to prioritise composition we arguably missed in the early stages, though without picture to compose to it would have been very hard to do.

We found ourselves in the dreaded position of having committed detailed audio work to picture only to have the editor change the cut. I knew this wasn’t desirable as a method of working, but the pressure to get SOMETHING underway in the audio realm as the production lost coherence and fell further and further behind was overwhelming. This introduced a huge degree of inefficiency, necessitating spending some hours resyncing scenes, but was necessary in order to avoid having to condense the entirety of a month’s worth of work into a short period in January after picture lock was completed.

The axing of various complex audio ‘show-stopper’ scenes explains the ‘peaks and troughs’ of the audio dimension to my mind. Our more abstract sound plans were not always built upon similarly complex and layered foundations, and I think this means the sound in George is often found leading the image, but elsewhere feels somewhat strait-jacketed by the image as we were forced to use more ‘parallel sound’ than we would have liked by the picture. One could argue it’s a little inconsistent dynamically in this sense, and this will teach me to pay more attention to the core aspects of film atmosphere’s rather than getting carried away with the areas in which the team could show off.

In conclusion, production of George was a great learning experience and worked as an opportunity to really get into coordinating the audio side of a film production and problem-solving the inevitable issues, as well as providing ample opportunity for plenty of nuts and bolts audio production work. However, after making it the focus of our daily lives for almost four months, I can honestly say I’ll be happy if I never have to hear George weeping again and that I’m looking forward to seeing parts of the university which aren’t the Sound Theatre once more too.

– 1749 words

05/11/15 – Project Management – ROLE DIARY: Shoot Days 1 + 2

13421070 / / Audio Production, Individual Reflection, Learning Outcomes, Process Management, Role - Supervising Sound Editor

03, 04, 05/11/15 – ‘George’ Set Dressing and Shoot Days 1 and 2 – 

Production

The team has successfully completed the first two days of location audio recording for ‘George’ at an indoor location in uphill Lincoln. This has comprised roughly 16 hours of work time, with Rory Hunter taking the lead role as location supervisor and with Alice Asbury undertaking most of the boom op work. I have seconded Alice on the boom when required, and spent my time collecting secondary perspectives for action and dialogue, and wild tracks.

This has mostly been achieved with a combination of a PZM boundary microphone and a Rode NT4 stereo condenser, with the former recording into the main Sound Devices mixer and the latter managed by myself and recording into a Zoom handheld unit, as this enabled me to mix, manage and monitor my own audio without interfering with the main team. With these, I have consistently attempted to deliver a room / distance tone coloured by the set environment to specific action and dialogue for the picture, to enable us to have multiple audio perspective options for key scenes in post without having to build each one from scratch using FX or new foley work. An A/B example of our dialogue recording can be heard below, featuring the same scene from our “up close” boom mic and a second gleaned from a combination of secondary sources.

In terms of mic placement, I’ve found myself inverting a good deal of the technique used in studio work to avoid or cut out reverb or room-tone because that’s precisely what I’m after, and thus sticking a Rode NT4 into corners, out of windows, in corridors, stairwells and under beds…Having never handled a stereo mic or worked location audio before, this entire process was a trial and error learning experience for me. I spent much of the setup day prior to shooting listening to the rooms and testing mic positions relative to them as the production team organised the set, as well as capturing ‘base’ atmospheres and specific foley or SFX from the local environment.

Obligatory photos of the shoot –

Distant perspective - Living RoomStereo running waifsBedroom from cupboard

The NT4 is a stereo mic (two capsules at 90 degrees over and under one another) and seems exceptional for ‘immersive’ captures and was often placed a considerable distance from the action, often in another room altogether. Whilst this did away with a couple of moments where I might have captured a ‘live’ stereo aspect to the action, it tended to create unusual and slightly unbalanced stereo atmospheres as the reflections travelled from room to room and struck the pair of mics relatively unevenly. I judged this would be more useful to the team later, as what little action takes place in ‘George’ can easily recreated if necessary, but that these various perspectives would be harder to obtain.

We used the boundary mic to take advantage of the exclusively stone and wood floors of the set-house – we located it under furniture for concealment, under the floorboards themselves at one stage, or either directly on the floor or taped to the underside of a table or bed. This really enabled a pre-synced and consistent ‘chunkiness’ to footsteps, furniture motion and prop motion, which I expect will come in handy later. The mic-heavy ‘live’ approach above was arrived at through a group decision as a method of getting us ahead of the game with some of our requirements for foley and atmospheres for the picture.

Logging the collected audio properly when using a second recorder was naturally critical as it lacked the convenience of being recorded in sync with the 663 audio, though this was somewhat complicated by the haphazard nature of the picture teams workflow. This necessitated annotating each days shooting scripts carefully with filenames etc, and rapidly editing and renaming these after each day’s recording was wrapped.

Team and communication management

Whilst our team’s audio outcomes were positive, it has been reasonably difficult to manage our interactions with the film crew.

Prior to shooting we had pushed for a ‘dry run’ style test phase in order to be able to establish some idea of the workflow on set, but this was not possible. The knock-on effect of missing the opportunity to meet, brief and dry-run together as one team was a rather optimistic shooting schedule which in turn meant that some important shots were dropped or moved to later days as they were beyond the time that was realistically available, and this despite a surprising number of ‘got-it-one’ takes. The time issue was exacerbated by a habit of shooting in ruthlessly sequential order, necessitating the technical setup for audio and video for shots in the same scene to be unnecessarily rigged and de-rigged. The audio team variously offered the director advice on these matters but were ultimately required to defer to our employer’s method of working.

The location audio team are making communication on set a key issue going forward. As well as the issues outlined above the production team appeared reticent to inform us (or indeed their actor) of schedule changes or even when they had returned to work after lunch, and maintained noticeable distance from us. This made for several rushed set-ups on our part and we’re keen to build a more cohesive team approach for the rest of the shoot.

All told, these first couple of days have gone reasonably well from the perspective of results. The dialogue and action collected is clear, and the multifaceted perspectives collected at source should help minimise the amount of foley work necessary in post production. However, I realise that I will have to revisit the set at night for further collection of atmosphere audio as traffic noise was a key issue with this location, a fact we had established during recce. The general audio atmosphere’s for the piece during these scenes are intended to be quite important and as such it’s necessary to collect some ‘noisier silence’, which simply cannot be done during daylight hours or indeed with a working crew present.

1000 words

KEY POINTS –

Technical process for ‘secondary sound’ on-location recording – Contribution + Role, Individual reflection on learning and team role, Application of skills and conduct in production.
Learning Outcome – To contribute extensively to the practicalities of creating and recording music for, and of recording location sound for the piece.

‘Artistic’ and overview decisions for secondary sound on-location recording – Process Management, 
Learning Outcome – To have a good degree of creative involvement in the conception and direction of the soundtrack for the piece.

Team management and interaction issues – Process Management, Professional Practise.
Learning Outcome – To successfully manage a three person team in delivery of the entire soundtrack to a new piece of visual media efficiently + To successfully manage the audio team’s interaction with film’s director, editor and producer on a practical and creative level, and ensure the audio team’s work is delivered on time and to a good standard.

 

PLANNING – Sound Script Elements + Reflection

13421070 / / Audio Production, Individual Reflection, Planning

The sound script we devised and communicated to our client contained a number of ‘key’ audio scenes. This post will discuss a few of these and how they panned out or didn’t, as the case may be, and as such the post will make considerably more sense if tackled after you have watched the piece.

One of the main motifs of the sound design in ‘George’ was intended to be the sound of the outside world encroaching on the protaganist’s home as a metaphor for his level of anxiety or distress at any given point in the film. However, we rapidly discovered it is very easy for audio devices such as the sound of people passing by outside the walls of the kitchen to be distracting when there has been no visual suggestion of their source. In the end, we attempted to turn the constant traffic noise which plagued our location recordings (and which is, coincidentally, perfectly setup visually in the opening scene of the film and reinforced repeatedly throughout by fortuitous edits) to our advantage by using it to signify the threatening outside world encroaching on George’s anxious existence. In reflection, I think we convinced ourselves that this worked better than it did because we didn’t do enough detail work to the films atmosphere layers – whilst the outside does very much burst in on occasion, for me the question is ‘on what?’. That suggests I didn’t do enough to bring out the sound design of the base atmospheres, such as incorporating small details ala Green Mile. This is in line with Mangini’s idea of –

“…the sonic equivalent of LIGHT and SHADOW. I learned from Joe Dante how painters use a touch of blue to make white seem “whiter”. An old visual trick to give texture to something that is textureless. I extrapolated this idea to the silence of the MILE. To create silence I needed to “define” the space with little sounds that highlight the emptiness.” – (Mark Mangini).

George’s textures have plenty of shadow but not quite enough light, in my estimation.

The bread and butter scene is the most infamous of the project, and was initially supposed to be a chance for the film to hint at the dark past of it’s main character. We’d planned to refer to his previous, violent crime with the audio landscape around the slicing of a bread loaf by making the sounds associated with this action a little more visceral than realistic, and by subtly weaving the scene with screechs, yelps and whimpers in a process often referred to as ‘sweetening’. Unfortunately, this scene was axed due to health and safety evangelism on set and replaced with a shot of George buttering pre-sliced bread. We felt it would be inappropriate and off-putting to attempt to apply the same audio components to the new scene, feeling that no amount of audio work can add an undercurrent of menace to Kingsmill, and opted for the music cue becoming the focus of the scene.

Upon George’s final return to his home in the evening after the graveyard scene, we were asked to provide the sound of music being played at high volume through the walls of the house from next door (ostensibly by the teenagers who are introduced earlier in the film). We had developed a complex system of audio segues from one scene to another rooted in the idea of having ever-present music pumping through the walls, including morphing the bass thump of the beat into a heartbeat and then into a variation of our main score and a variety of interesting perspective shifts depending on George’s location in the house, as well as weaving further references into the music choices themselves, if possible. The entire plan proved unworkable as the directors failed to film any visual reference to a source for the music, and we collectively abandoned the idea in concord with the second director during post.

Finally, the BBC report playing on the radio after the opening credits was a late addition because we felt the scene was just too devoid of activity and needed something to invigorate it and give it a focus which didn’t overwhelm or detract from the very stilted visuals. Talk radio makes great audible wallpaper, and we requested and were granted use of the Radio 4 piece in the context of this film by it’s producer at the eleventh hour (though not before recording our own re-scripted version in a similar style to get around the potential copyright problem). The dialogue in the R4 piece encapsulates some of the premise of the film right at it’s outset, and very much supports the story and character development of the piece.

In reflection on these points, I think it can safely be said that no battleplan survives contact with the vicissitudes of filming and I found it necessary to be extremely flexible as some of the plans were forced to change, without compromising the overall audio arcs and themes of the piece.

– 800 words

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KEY POINTS

Planned aspects of the sound script – Planning, Application of skills and conduct in production

  • To judge the initial direction of and maintain the consistency of the overall tone of the audio team’s work on the piece, and liase with the director to ensure this is concurrent with their vision of the piece.
  • Develop creative, original, and innovative strategies within an audio production project.
  • Structure intellectually rigorous and coherent ideas to an advanced level in order to communicate ideas through the integration of form and content.