RESEARCH – Naked by Mike Leigh + How This Informed ‘George’

13421070 / / Individual Reflection, Research, Role - Supervising Sound Editor

Mike Leigh’s Naked is a British, semi improvised drama starring David Thewlis. It is a favourite of mine in the drama genre, and I thought it could be useful to study it’s audio dimension with reference to ‘George’.

Most aspects of the piece are very realistically constructed, and the audio as no exception to this rule. I felt this would give us some useful pointers for the sound design of George’s static sections.

Graham Fuller, interviewing Mike Leigh, pointed out that he is ‘economical with the camera movements in his films,’, and watching the scene below we can see how audio is used to enhance the power of the actor’s performance where the camerawork simply allows it to happen. The audio however tells a different story, walking the line between enhancing the mise en scene without compromising the realism of the environments, with the objects that are active (the postcard, for example) in any shot are given a sound focus to draw attention to the actors interactions with them. The postcard signifies an aspect of the two character’s shared history in the story, and the audio is used to draw attention to this, but without compromising realism of the scene.

We attempted a similar thing with the radio in the second scene (post titles) of George. The report being broadcast from the radio (cleared for use from the BBC’s The Report on Radio 4) pertains directly to the story of our character, and slips in and out of the audio ‘shot’ throughout the scene as well as remaining tied to camera perspective.

As for further observations on Naked, dialogue is a massive part of the audio and in most cases the rest of the scene is very much subordinated to it, and it is here that it digresses most substantially from our project. What is useful however, is the way the people’s bodies are put into the scenes even when they’re not speaking through the sound of mouth movements, breathing and the general sound of the physical. Considering the fact that, as post production of ‘George’ advanced we realised that the main character’s lack of dialogue (and corresponding lack of bodily movements etc in our location takes) meant the character often doesn’t seem ‘present’ in the film, I decided we should pass over the entire film and record an extra track of these. Most of the sounds the character makes in the film are additional if they are not dialogue.

The film had no specific supervising sound editor, but it’s dubbing mixer – the person who would have handled the final mix of the various audio aspects – was Sue Baker, who apparently worked in sound design for film fairly sporadically from the 1980’s to 2000, but worked as a supervising sound editor on both Donnie Brasco and Four Weddings and a Funeral. The scene from the former below is interesting from a props / dialogue mix perspective (ignoring the music) – A sense of threat and claustrophobia is suggested by the close perspective of the moves and breathing of the characters.

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Key Points –

Research of the film ‘Naked’ by Mike Leigh – Planning & Research

  • To expand my knowledge of the theory and audio techniques deployed in the films influencing ‘George’, and in drama as a genre more generally.
    Assess the technical requirements of a production to inform the selection of appropriate tools, techniques and processes

ROLE DIARY – Reflection on Picture Lock and Delivery

13421070 / / Audio Production, Individual Reflection, Learning Outcomes

Picture lock for George was originally scheduled for 4th of December and to be completed 12 days later ready for hand-in on December 16th. We have received the final cut of the picture on the 12th of January, leaving us 8 days to complete as much of the audio as possible in time for the film groups hand-in on the 20th, and with another 7 days in hand to polish up for our own hand-in on the 27th. Whilst this is, on the face of it, a reasonably similar timeframe for completion, it is complicated by the disruption to our workflow caused by the extension and the Christmas break, the fact that our advance facilities bookings assumed the earlier completion date which means it became more difficult to access the facility we have committed to technically, and the incoming pressure of organising our impending Semester B studies. This provision of multiple versions of the picture for different deadlines at different times was then further complicated by the unexpected request for a copy of the film with most of the key audio devices included and as much of the music completed as possible on the 16th, to enable the media production group to critique the film for their paperwork.

Taking the audio for a 16 minute film from 50% complete to around 85% complete in 4 days with limited access to facilities is obviously nigh-on impossible to achieve to any reasonable standard, especially given that the length of titles and credits (requiring hefty alterations to music compositions) were not made available until the day of delivery of picture lock. Due to the client-employee relationship of this particular project there was no disincentive for the director to begin requesting mixdowns earlier and earlier as soon as the edits were complete, all of which further interrupted our workflow and took the priorities on the project out of our hands. We managed to provide what was requested largely on time, and I was prompted to consider this situation as it would pan out in the real-world and the possibility of some kind of contractual stipulation on clients for recompense or renegotiation in the case of overrun’s of this type, as the complications here have impacted our planning for Semester B work and a similarly protracted project would likely cause problems for a schedule of work. I ran the question of whether such a thing is ever formalised past Grant Bridgeman by email for the benefit of his experience…He pointed out that this situation comes to pass on ‘almost every job’, and that he deals with it on a case by case basis judged on existing relationships with the client. For me, that’s about as succinct a description of the way creative freelancing works in practice as any I’ve seen.

For Grant, the malleability of deadlines as in the case of George is inevitable and it’s all about how you deal with it, and the relationship with the client. Practically, realistic projections of the amount of work that can be accomplished in the timeframe should be furnished to the client, which brings the whole point here back to communication. I was confident in our ability to deliver the bulk of the work even for the close deadline when communicating with our client, but should perhaps have been more cautious in my appraisal of specifically what we were able to deliver by certain dates.

As per my role within the production, I’ve tried very hard throughout to keep communication with the client about their audio requirements to a maximum, and I see this as a useful and successful aspect of the project from my own perspective, given the fact that the film has effectively had two directors (from our perspective that is, the film was co-directed by all four people in the group, but I requested a single point of contact with the team from the outset to minimise potential for confusion). The second director altered a number of the first director’s artistic decisions as far as the sound and music of the film is concerned, which meant essentially rerunning the process of the earlier spotting sessions with the second director to see if requirements were to change. I could have foreseen this likelihood earlier and discussed her requirements immediately when she agreed to be point of contact for us upon the departure of the first director as it’s critical to remind the creative lead for the picture they are also the creative lead for the audio team, to my mind.

More specifically on communication, I realised it is vital when (even basic) audio tracklaying work has begun in parallel with picture editing (an imperfect situation at best, but unavoidable given the circumstances of this production), to hammer home the critical nature of good edit logging with an editor who is working on the piece – The third cut of the film we received had no accompanying information on alterations to the footage we’d begun work on, which roughly doubled the time it took us to resync our audio. We did mention to the editor previously that we needed this information but didn’t receive it, so this must be communicated with more force in the future. Again, this situation is apparently fairly standard in film work and it tallies with the view of John Purcell,

‘It’s much more common to run into postlock changes than to work on a movie whose structure is set in stone,’ (Purcell, 2008, 239)

The use of temp music tracks is also worthy of note as the receipt of them by our director represents a classic example of something we were warned about in Lol Hammond’s guest lecture. The 2nd director had had little time to think about the music for the piece, was clearly surprised at the impact even basic composition can have on the picture, and rapidly became accustomed to the temp tracks we provided despite our admonishments not to do so as these were for suggestion only. This was fortuitous in a sense as she asked for the songs to be kept simple (like the skeletal temp tracks), which saved us a certain amount of production time, but unfortunate in that we had to back away from our plans for more complex original compositions for the piece. This is something to be very wary of in the future, as it could just as easily have worked in the opposite direction and caused us further complications.

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 Key Points –

Reflection on post production interaction with director, and delivery requests – Process Management, Individual reflection on learning and team role.

  • To manage the delivery of the soundtrack at various stages of the production along with relevant paperwork, to the director and producer.
    Application of skills and conduct in production

Reflection on post production interaction with editor – Process Management, Individual reflection on learning and team role.

  • 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.
    Application of skills and conduct in production

Reflection on use of temporary music cues – Process Management, Individual reflection on learning.

  • To contribute extensively to the practicalities of creating and recording music for, and of recording location sound for the piece.

CONTRIBUTION – Overview

13421070 / / Audio Production, Contribution

In brief, my overall contribution to ‘George’ has included –

Present for 75% of the location audio work.

40% of the total audio editing and track-laying for the piece.
40% of the sound design and creative audio work (foley, SFX etc) involved.
90% of the final mixing of the piece.
Present for 100% of rerecording of foley and SFX on location.

Involved in 30% of the foley work for the piece as either recordist or performer.
Lead on 75% of the artistic and production liason with the client.

Ancillary work for the project included –

Involvement in the enquiries for clearance of the source music in the piece.
Organising use of and access to one of the main locations in the film.
Performance on one of the music recordings used in the piece.
Mix of said music performance.
Transportation of the entire crew’s equipment on numerous occasions throughout.

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KEY POINT –

Breakdown of contribution to the work on ‘George’ – Contribution.

  • To contribute extensively to the creation and editing of foley, atmosphere, dialogue and SFX for the piece
  • To contribute extensively to the practicalities of creating and recording music for, and of recording location sound for the piece.
  • To have a good degree of creative involvement in the conception and direction of the soundtrack for the piece.

15/12/15 – PROJECT MANAGEMENT – ROLE DIARY – Post Begins

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

Despite the production problems, we have still received a version of ‘George’ with all the scenes complete before Christmas, though this differs noticeably from the film as originally discussed in terms of scene and shot lengths and is not a ‘picture lock’ version as we were originally promised. We’ve already had to start the post-production process proper even though the film will still be undergoing edits and other alterations into January, as we will be unable to complete the work to a good standard if we wait for the picture lock version to begin the finer audio work, mainly due to inability to access facilities for the required amount of time now the critical period of post-production has shifted into the new year. Considering these factors myself and the team decided that some slight changes of audio direction were warranted.

Some plot devices which our original audio plan had relied upon have not made it into the picture, and the overall feel of the piece has changed to such a degree that I feel the picture now dictates the arc of our audio work much more than we had originally planned, mainly due to the differences in style of the multiple directors who’ve created it and the way these have been constructed across the film. For example, the picture is very static early on but becomes much more animated in terms of shooting style later, a result of the two different directors shooting styles, and this provides a very definite ‘arc’ to the technicality of the piece. This provides the audio the opportunity to work with this overall arc or to counterpoint it, or a combination of the two. Whatever the choice, we feel our sound design should certainly account for the fact in some way, and in doing so enhance the synergy between the audio and the visual.

Also, in referring to my original briefing and synopsis, it is noticable that several devices used in the original script for the picture to hint at the dark past of the film’s protaganist have been removed. Our original audio plans, particularly with reference to our musical score, had looked to represent this theme strongly in intending to present a reasonably ‘normal’ drama style soundscape with an undertone of dissonance.  Indeed, the film overall has generally been simplified and is less rich in references to the character, which has also altered the balance of the themes the script originally portrayed.

All this meant I felt we should seek some guidance and run some new ideas for the audio past our new director as the new creative lead on the project, as well as enquire which themes within the piece were now to take primacy given the changes, and particularly to check that the mood of our music was still relevant to the vision of the piece and to their taste. As such, we touched base with the new director and the rest of the team just before the Christmas close-down of our facilities to demonstrate our work in progress and outline our plan for alterations to some of the more complex scenes. This meet was very useful with feedback on the work in progress being uniformly positive, and we used the opportunity to agree when a picture lock version of the film would be provided (8th December), and gave some advice as to what we need if further edits are to be made now we have begin the fine detail audio work, such as close foley editing. Specifically, we need the exact scene, shot, take and time information of any cuts, fades or additions to enable us to catch up with these in the context of our audio track-lay as quickly as possible.

Nominally, we have agreed to try to have the music for the piece completely recorded by the  10th of January and agreed to deliver as close to a completed film as possible by the 19th.. This leaves us a few extra days to tweak and QC our final hand-in and double check our paperwork etc.

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Critical and artistic consideration of the rough cut version relative to the original audio plan – Planning & Research
Team management and interaction – Process Management, Professional Practise.

Learning Outcome –
Structure intellectually rigorous and coherent ideas to an advanced level in order to communicate ideas through the integration of form and content.

Personal 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.
To manage the post-production workflow and direct the creative contributions of the audio team as efficiently as possible.