The ‘Off My Trolley’ Meeting... 

A SOUND EDITORS VIEW

The divide between production and postproduction sound in film and television, though not willful or intentional, is in practice very real. Both sides of the line have questions they’d like to put to the other, but time and opportunity rarely permit a proper exchange. 

As an editor and re-recording mixer I’m firmly routed in post production. Apart from the comfy chairs and air-conditioning, one of the things I’ve found attractive about the post world is the ever expanding range of sophisticated equipment available to achieve our ends. Not particularly high-minded, I know, but there we are. Compared with this, the pole and shoulder-slung Nagra has always appeared rather bare and the miracles achieved by Production Mixers in acquiring usable sound far too reliant on real-time native cunning and physical endurance. This, as Production Mixer and panelist, Stuart Wilson points out, will always be a big element of the job: 

“There will always be a need for this ‘real-time native cunning and physical endurance’ as on location, aeroplanes will fly over period sets, costume shoes will clump loudly on wooden floors, sets will be too reverberant and need dampening, lighting equipment will hum and buzz and need cooperation to reduce, cutlery and crinoline underskirts will be louder than the dialogue and unfortunately no amount of high-tech equipment will eliminate these very practical, mechanical problems!” 

That said, after the meeting, it’s clear that the array of kit now employed, by said artful individuals, is hugely expanded. Simon Bishop demonstrated SAS-like efficiency in deployment of his customised equipment trolley as, stopwatch running, he rolled the beast from the back of his van, powered-up, flipped out a few LCD displays and control panels and stood, 75 seconds later to my watch, ready to serve his glorious director. 

With his Deva 4-track HD recorder and facility for four radio mic’s plus booms plus transfer from Deva to DVD RAM, Simon would be capable of leaving options very open for the post-production department in terms of sources. In practice, of course, ever-greater budget/time restraints mean that the PM’s live mix is often used by the editor, with recourse to the multitrack being for emergencies only. Heart-breaking, considering the lengths sometimes gone to offer this flexibility. 

However, this knowledge makes it even more important that the PM gets the live mix as right as possible. With this in mind, Simon told of a colleague who had an interesting solution: He was using an 8-track rig where seven tracks of his eight-track recorder were fed from separate mics, with the live mix going to track eight. 

Having recognised that his mix for a certain part of a recorded scene had not been ideal, he would wait for a break and then roll-back his 8-track, and remix the section to DAT still preserving synch. The post-pro team were apparently amazed at the consistently high quality of the production mix. Simon is currently looking into various models of hard disk 8-track, with a view to designing a system that would allow instant remixing (on set) but not necessarily archiving the 8-track originals: 

“How many post pro schedules have time to even find the offending shot on the 8-track tapes?” comments Simon. All this also points up the importance of conscientious dialogue editors. It’s easy for us to complain about lack of information and consistency, but it’s also up to us to make that extra effort to read any notes and listen to all the takes. Time permitting... which it rarely is! 

Fully loaded with human ingenuity and also topping the kit-and-caboodle stakes, Stuart told of his most recent job on which he was using no less than 11 radio mics going to two eight-track recorders. In a quasi Dogma 95-style his director was adamant about not replacing any dialogue and recording everything at all times. The film had started out as a relatively low budget project shot on DV with available light. Of course, it soon became apparent that to derive usable dialogue from this rough-and-ready approach was going to be far from easy or cheap. The director wanted to get good sound though and so Stuart was expected to do what he had to do to make it all happen without taking any extra time, of course, save for a small allowance for getting the radio mics on before the start of a scene. 

Stuart: "There seems to be an idea among some directors and producers, that sound is just ‘there’ and as long as we push the record button, what goes down on tape will be exactly what they hoped for - a lovely, clean, ready-mixed dialogue track with minimum background noise! The fact is that to make a small improvement on location, usually involves a disproportionate amount of effort! But with a sympathetic director who is prepared to allow the time to get something better out of a challenging sound situation, there is a lot which can be achieved.” 

One such adventure involved two of the main protagonists engaged in conversation while hurtling down a water slide, into and tinder the surface of a swimming pool, re-emerging to conclude their chat, covered by a second camera on the opposite side of the pool. A lesser person would have marked it down for ADR, but utilising hermetically sealed plastic bags, condoms for the mic capsules and lashings of gaffer tape (no Fairy Liquid bottles), he strapped transmitters to the actors’ backs, placed mics in their hair and got the whole process as a clear and convincing single take. Tape should be removed from hirsute backs with one swift yank!