Music of Sound

Oh my god, i still dont quite believe it, but we have finished mixing!
After what feels like an eternity spent in a dark occasionally LOUD room
(& was probably actually 4 weeks) we have final mixed all the reels!

And screened them in a continuous run, discussed the comments & notes from the director, producer & execs, implemented the changes, reconformed for picture changes, screened again, implemented new material & essentially finished…
The mix will now be screened in LA for the uber-execs & i suspect we will get a few final mix notes to update prior to completion & print mastering but for all intents & purposes we are DONE!
And I bought a lovely bottle of 1800 tequila to celebrate the fact!
Hallelujah Jah! It went down a treat…. cathartic!

One funny side note, we all work in these intense work environments
oblivious at times, due to the immediate needs at hand… but at one
point during the mix someone commented ‘this really isnt the place to
be if you have a fear of monitors’
i laughed too, but after i took that photo above I counted up the number
of screens on the dub stage…there are 26 seperate monitors in that room!
Obviously that includes the bank of screens associated with the Euphonix
mixing desk but holy cow, talk about visual feedback for your soundtrack!?!

And technology aside I am left with a huge sense of warmth from the
dedicated work of a combination of many many clever creative lovely
people involved in making the soundtrack for this film – respect!

Ok we’ve finished premixing all the FX – between the three of us cutting FX we premixed our elements down to 5.1 stems (from A -> L) which took us 6 days.

Next was the foley premix, which will take us 3 days work and then… set up for the final mix! Its always quite a concentrated mission, patching up the Euphonix Series 5 desk as it can handle over 250 tracks, and they tend to get filled up! The orchestral score is arriving on Monday and has been recorded and premixed in Los Angeles…
Its only then that we get to see what the final soundtrack is going to sound like. we will spend one day per reel final mixing, and we usually start the day by playing down the reel with all the faders up, to get a feel for it… It then becomes a moment by moment, scene by scene process of balancing all of the elements into a cohesive dramatic soundtrack. In a funny way the difference between that first run through in the morning and where we are by the end of the day is like slowly bringing an image into focus. The content is essentially the same but how you perceive it all is radically different. And good mixers make it seem easy, which it sure isn’t!

We have just started mixing this film at Park Road Post – Peter Jackson’s fantastic film post production facility. So I thought I might document the process a little….

For the first week or so we are mixing in two rooms – the dialogue & ADR premix is happening next door in Theatre 3 while we start the atmos/ambience premix in one of the bigger theatres, Theatre 2.
We will spend two or thre days on atmos and are printing to a number of 5.0 and LCR stems, so as to maintain some flexibility in the final mix. After thats done we’ll move onto the sound effects premix followed by the foley premix….
All up we’ll be three weeks premixing everything before the score is ready & we can start final mixing – I can’t wait! Its always a joy to have everything fully premixed & finally get to hear it in context….

Heres a screen shot of the ProTools session for Reel 1 Atmos:

After lunch I got distracted & started taking photos through a glass:

no photoshop filters involved! cool huh?