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noisy lamps and cameras, set discipline (cellphones etc): all these points can be brought to the attention of the industry more effectively by an association approaching other bodies and guilds than by the wretched mixer/recordist bleating on about it by him/her self; AMPS can bring points like these up. Other concerns are things like radio-mic frequencies and licences; the general regard in which sound is held by directors and producers (and cameramen); effective two-way feedback between the floor and postproduction - AMPS does all this already and I would like to see it enhanced. Personally speaking, I have been on the shooting crew all my life as sound camera operator, maintenance, and now recordist (I was never clever or skilled enough to be a boom op!), and my knowledge of what goes on beyond the transfer bay is still very much confined to film practice. There are courses available, but they are a long way away. I read the articles in AMPS Newsletter and other journals and am utterly, utterly confused by the digital jargon and technology. My practical experience is that when doing a playback sequence with DAT, but shooting on a camcorder and post-production on Avid, everything ended up out of sync. I got the blame for months until, shamefacedly, the editor admitted that there was something wrong with the system and it had been Avid’s fault. Burning hatred and distrust of solid state editing has been the result of this! If AMPS could bring out simple guides to post-production, written in language adapted to the meanest understanding and with unambiguous diagrams, I would be very happy. Perhaps by the same token, location recordists could gently point out to post production, again in strip cartoon form perhaps, that coping with aircraft, actors who mumble, cameramen who can’t light out boom shadows and directors who will do retake after retake for dialogue but not for any other sound reason, makes for a full life for the location crew. Keeping exact notes in the wind and bloody rain, setting user bits and all the little things that make life a little easier for those lolling in their comfortable seats back at the studio, sometimes represent the straw that broke the camel’s back!

I rant and rave. However, out of all this I think my message is that AMPS is damned good and is already doing everything right. Just keep going onward and upward. Falling attendance could just be that there’s a lot of work about. I haven’t been able to come for ages, but I regard AMPS as an essential to our industry. Being chiefly a sound recordist who works on his own, relations with other sound-men in the local area are always tinged with a little reserve; we are in competition for the same limited work-pool and so we cannot be completely frank about what we know, although of course we all get on well. With AMPS it is different. I want to share any new bit of insight I get and to know how other guys have surmounted unusual problems that have cropped up. As I said earlier, reports from Members who have used new pieces of gear are invaluable.

 Just keep going, chaps. I value you extremely.

NICK FLOWERS

AN ICY LETTER FROM A HOT CLIMATE

Dear Editors

While I would like to thank Bob for his most interesting article it Will Record, I take strong exception to his derisive comment that it was studio policy in the late 5Os and early 60s, and I quote; “to post-synch all sound recorded outside the walls of the sound stage”. I do not know which major studio employed you Bob in that period but I had the pleasure of working at ABPC for seven exciting years. Believe me, Tony Lumkin and Len Shilton were at the forefront of all possible ways to use original location tracks. Mike Bradbury designed and built a background noise suppressor years before the Fairchild was introduced. Jack Lovelock made windshields for the RCA 10,001 mics to enable them to be used on exteriors. The music scoring theatre was equipped to reproduce a broad range of conditions so that a sequence was not discarded for the sake of a sentence or two, and was well cared for by Eric Baynham. Add to this the talents and endeavours of recordists such as Norman Coggs, Les Hammond, Cecil Mason, Len Abbott, David Hildyard, Bert Ross and others. Throw in the expertise and ‘unit-togetherness’ of boom-ops such as Dennis Whitlock, Don Wortham, Tommy Staples, Derek Kavanagh et al, and you have a fine sound department, dedicated to usable location sound whenever possible. You dismiss all this with one phrase. maybe you were working on documentaries at the time, or maybe you just don’t know.

Yours sincerely

KEN OSBORNE

Pattaya City, Thailand

Bob Allen replies: Thank you for your letter Ken. it’s always good to hear from metnbers commenting on Newsletter content, even if it is taking exception to statements made therein.

My statement regarding post-synch attitudes towards location recoding was certainly not intended to be ‘mocking or scoffing’ (as the word ‘derisive’ means) at sound crews, whether studio employed or freelance. I should have made it clearer that it was producers, who at the time were the studios, that I was referring to.

I would be the first to agree that although the producer may decree that to save time on location everything would be guide track. sound crews never took that to be a reason to sit back and take it easy. It was usually regarded as a challenge to get as much usable track and humanly possible.

Your long list of names of sound people, I too have the greatest respect for them and I could add many more names who did great work during their careers in motion picture sound.

I’m sorry if I offended you, or any other people in our business. I assure you no insult was intended. However from my own experience as a freelance sound mixer, who also worked through the period in question, I don’t consider that any comments in my article are completely incorrect.