the music of sound

I know right – Mercedes should so give me a convertible for posting their ad! One of the most memorable, lovely summer sounds in New Zealand is heard while driving down a rural road on a hot summers day…. Hearing the epic doppler shift as you pass a tree full of cicadas is a shrill form of bliss!

> An interview with the guy who created the ‘built-in’ sounds in your computer (if its a Mac)

 

> “A great room acts like an instrument, it has a voice…… alas, many of the great, distinctive studios are long gone” re: Abbey Road For Sale?

 

> A handy site for ProTools users, Protools Dudes

 

> “What a great challenge in moviemaking: the various sounds of breath — gasping, sighing, speaking, expiring — may be film’s first and most consequential sound effect. Here’s to films that revisit and rethink the sounds of breath and breathlessness.”
The NY Times considers the Oscar sound finalists

 

> Nine approaches to problem solving

 

> Some great dry ice sounds recorded at 192k here – dry ice is something every soundie should have a play with, strange sounding fun!

 

> Alva Noto from DVD Magazine Slices

 

> A transcript of David Byrnes great TED talk on music, creative process, evolution, music made for its environment etc…

 

> Handy monome 64 adaptation of Strettas obo

 

> Why I don’t like talking on phones

 

> Fascinating interactive table developed for the Vancouver Olympics (thanks David!)

 

> A request to hardware developers – what I’d like is a DI box with wifi – plug an instrument or mic pre in & it streams wifi to workstation… & maybe with a headphone send back, for overdubbing… like a wireless MBox maybe?

 

 

Its been over a year in the making & next week it launches: DUB45.COM

This is definitely worth watching full screen & on good speakers, in fact go to the films vimeo page & download the 720p quicktime… The film is designed and animated by Kevin Megens, Floris Vos, Arno de Grijs, André Bergs, Music and sound design (very well done) by Alex Debicki Script by Jan Eduards. Produced by il Luster Productions. Pivot website

& thanks for the tip Michal!

Director – Julien Vallée
Concept – Julien Vallée & Nicolas Burrows
D.O.P. – Simon Duhamel
Flash Development – Jérémi Dallaire
Sound Design – Nicolas Burrows & René-Pierre T.-Guérin
Motion Design – Julien Vallée
Additional Keying – Pierre-Olivier Nantel & Marie-Michele Bergeron

I have a week off, but as a freelancer that really means I get to work on my own projects but don’t get to invoice anyone… So its going to be a busy week off as I have lots to do, but one thing I have noticed with the virtual interns which may apply here as well, is that it is often faster for me to answer their specific questions than it is for me to dream up, develop, write & edit a decent rant on some worthy topic… I also noticed this when i did a talk on sound design at Dunedin University – the most fun part for me was the Q&A, as it meant we discussed topics the audience were specifically interested in & it became less of a monologue… So while I am busy this week if there is anything you want to ask me, then please consider this an open thread specifically for that purpose.

Its awards season for sure – the BAFTAs start right about now, but yesterday was the MPSE awards ceremony & the results as tweeted by @soundworksvideo

UPDATE: Visit the Soundworks site for exclusive coverage & interviews of the MSPE winners including interviews with Steven Spielberg and Larry Singer!

- “Avatar” wins Sound Effects & Foley Feature Film

- Steven Spielberg given MPSE Filmmaker Award

- “Battlestar Galactica – Daybreak Part 2″ wins Sound Effects & Foley Long Form

- “Battlestar Galactica – Daybreak Part 2″ wins Dialogue & ADR Long Form

- “Spectacular” wins Music Editing Long Form

- “House M.D. – Epic Fail” wins Sound Effects & Foley Short Form

- “True Blood – Beyond Here Lies Nothin” wins Dialogue & ADR Short Form

- “Glee – Pilot” wins Best Music Editing Short form

- Larry Singer given MPSE Career Achievement Award!

- “District 9″ wins Sound and Music Editing Foreign Feature Film

- “Something, something, something, Darkside” wins Best Sound Editing Direct to Video

- “Uncharted 2″ wins for Sound and Music Editing for Computer Entertainment

- “Scarecrow” wins Verna fields award on Sound Editing for Student Filmmakers

- “Up” wins Sound and Music Editing Animated Feature Film

- “Penguins of Madascar” win for Best Sound Effects, Foley, ADR and Music Animation in Television

Congrats everyone – one great thing about the MPSE Awards is it recognises everyone in the team
so I’ll update this once the MPSE site has the full list of the winners….

Tristand Perich’s Interval Studies

 

> Your tools are not your competitive advantage

 

> Maybe this noteput music table might help me learn to sight read!

 

synth cushions? Yes I own that exact red SH101 with the mod handle and no I will never sell it;
it will be in the same rail gun cannon that ejects my cold dead atoms into interstellar space!

 

> A great bit of speculative projection of possible iPad apps for film making & post production

 

> Swim and/or listen with the fishes with Leafcutter Johns DIY Hydrophone & Preamp

 

> Scratching with cassettes? No way! Yes way!

 

> Honk honk! Damn those horseless carriages

 

> Whats your favorite website sound like? well its code anyway…

 

> new Monolake album was apparently mixed with no compression – splitting hairs or actually a significant statement? It makes me think someone might claim a film mix was achieved with no use of ‘de-essers’ except plenty of volume graphing was done to reduce ‘esses’… In the fight against undynamic music, maybe there needs to be a better means of illustrating such admirable concepts than not using one form of plugin? I admire the intent, let me listen to the content…

 

> God bless twitter – my synapses randomnly asked: “does inhaling helium & talking evoke a consistent pitchshift?” @wetterbug replied with this link

 

> This should really be its own post, because its about more than the music, or the video…..
but first watch & listen…

 

Truly beautiful song huh? And lovely animation/shadow puppetry…. Turns out its a promo for a short film AND a music video… but the song was released on an album back in 2007 by Little Dragon and why it intrigues me is that music marketing people would say that its just an example of the long tail but that somehow infers music thats sitting on some dusty shelf collecting the odd royalty, whereas that song feels as new & meaningful to me as anything I’ve heard recently. The moral? Great music doesn’t age & shouldn’t be relegated to the long tail bargain bin, or forgotten… because generations of younger (& older) people will discover it and enjoy it like it is new…. Keep it available, accessible & who knows, someone might put a nasty beat behind it…

Lovely hand drawn animation! Characters, art & composition by Matias Vigliano, Animation by Dante Zaballa and Music by Ariel Gandolfo

If you are a fan of animation you should also check out this great blog: Animade