Sound Decisions

"In a world..."

...where movies emphasize the essential elements of a scene, the minimization of unnecessary or distracting elements is crucial to the mix. The elements of story, character, framing, movement, design, light and sound are all selected and blended to the tastes of the movie’s makers, under the influence of the practicalities of reality (budget, schedule, time, weather, mood, talent [or lack thereof], insert-your-own-variable-here: ___). When it comes to the sound mix, what is not heard could be as important as what is not seen.

No matter its size or complexity, a typical movie’s emphasis during pre-production and shooting is on the visual. Think about it: camera, lighting, grip, props, production design, costumes, hair & make-up, and still photography are generally all about “the look” – not “the sound”. However, production sound is the vital first step of the sound recording process, before it is further manipulated in post-production, until it’s finally heard by an audience of one-to-many, either at home, in a theatre, on a plane, in a vehicle., via a projector, an iPhone, a TV, a computer, or any number of current and upcoming electronic media devices, with or without headphones. That’s a lot of delivery system variables in a lot of environments, each subject to its own quirks. But ultimately, unless you're watching a silent movie, if the dialog isn’t comprehensible (or sub-titled), you’ll have a dissatisfied audience. They might be dissatisfied for other reasons (bored by the story, annoyed by the actors, distracted by the visual effects), but if they can’t understand the words uttered by the performers (or the “real” people in a documentary), even the most clichéd movie will lose something.

Perhaps the writer(s) and director want the dialog to be bland or meaningless, but if one doesn’t hear it or understand it, one wonders “what did I miss?” Unless, of course, there are some key lines or words that are purposely obscured for obvious creative reasons, such as a bad cell phone signal in a thriller wherein a clue or identity is missed, audio feedback in a comedy about a performer’s debut at Carnegie Hall, or muffled voices heard when a kid covers her ears during a family squabble in a drama.

There are only a handful of people on a set who are primarily concerned with what is heard during shooting. This handful of people starts with the Production Sound Department (post-production sound is another matter, conversely involving more people than those involved post-production picture -- unless visual effects are involved). During shooting, the assistant directors are the sound department’s primary support team. They ensure that the set is “locked up” while rolling, keeping everyone who isn’t saying lines or giving cues quiet. Besides the A.D.s, sound’s best friends are (fingers crossed) the director, producers, and actors, all of whom have varying degrees of interest in getting a good, clean production soundtrack. For the director, it could be a matter of aesthetics, wanting the real sound from the real environment, preferring to use the dialog that is captured during the original shooting performance, as opposed to the artificial recreation that post-production “looping” (replacing dialog in post-production) entails. For the producers, it’s a matter of saving money; get it now and you won’t have to pay for it later. For the actors, it’s a matter of performance and time; they have the character and the scene fresh in their heads while shooting, and they might not want to spend the time trying to recreate it months later, especially if they’re committed to another project.

When you see (and hear)* a scene, the make-up, hair, wardrobe, art and lighting departments have eliminated the distracting-if-commonplace detritus of shiny sweat on skin, of food fragments amidst follicles, of sordid stains on shirts, of warped windows and welted walls. This is all artfully illuminated in a way that equally defies reality’s often-random and unflattering lighting. Meanwhile, the sound department has tried to minimize the equally natural but unwelcome noise of honking horns, blaring boom boxes, passing planes, hovering helicopters and revving refrigerators.

*[There should be a term encompassing both of the movie senses (sight and hearing). “‘Experience”, “witness”, “observe”, “view” don’t do it for me. Let’s coin a new term! Any suggestions?]

Sometimes these efforts are to no avail, and they are always performed with varying degrees of support and comprehension from non-sound (unsound?) personnel. Due to the sometimes-incompatible needs of various factions within a production -- and because of the usual personality differences found in any group situation -- rivalry between departments might develop. These rifts and conflicts are generally on a far-pettier level than those within the story being shot (I’ve never heard of a sound mixer having a light saber duel with a cinematographer), but they can compromise a production nonetheless. Not only that, they just make the many hours spent on a shoot more miserable than necessary. One of the prime factors in job satisfaction is compatibility with one’s colleagues. Sometimes the worst conflicts can be within one’s own department. Familiarity breeding contempt, or garden-variety differences of opinion and technique play into this. Sounds like a typical family and their neighbors...

TO BE CONTINUED