Features

Whiplash

by Thomas Curley CAS

People are astonished that principal photography on Whiplash was only nineteen days and a $3.3M budget, so every day had to count. Add to this a first-time Director, Damien Chazelle, and a complex music intensive plot and the degree of difficulty increases. When the script and actors are top notch, then there is no room for compromise.

Pulling off the shoot took a lot of logistics and the AD team led by Nic Harvard was instrumental in making all of this work. I have worked with Nic several times in the past, so when I took his call to do Whiplash, I knew it would be a challenge, but he put me at ease.

I do not have a musical background. After finishing film school, I worked as a licensed Broadcast Engineer for television; my approach is both artistic and technical. Music is like a foreign language to me. After reading the script, I knew that the sound department would have our work cut out for us; we had to knock this out of the park.

I met with Director Damien Chazelle, and we spoke about the problems he had in shooting the short version, which won the Sundance Film Festival Short Prize in 2013 and how we would approach this for his ‘big screen version.’

Re-recording Mixers Craig Mann and Ben Wilkins as well as Music Editor Richard Henderson were already on board and working on prerecords of the drums, and the orchestra. We decided that it would not help to have a properly mic’d drum set and jazz band in the school environments, so doing live recording was out. The other major challenge would be the start-stop band practice scenes.

For these scenes, Miles Teller would wear a wire, and the boom would dance back and forth between J.K. Simmons and the drum kit. The rest of the music scenes were 95% playback. We recorded every playback take with the boom and faded the track down, rather than just stopping playback, so that any resonance, room tone and noises from the real instruments, were part of the production track. Additionally, Craig Mann recorded impulse responses on each set to get a precise model to apply reverb and the results were very convincing.

I improved my package for Whiplash and purchased a Schoeps CMIT 5U microphone, a Lectrosonics OctoPack, with four SR dual receivers and a Sound Devices CL-9 controller. I had previously owned a Yamaha 01V96 and a Sonosax SN-S eight-channel console. I gave them both up for a much more streamlined workflow with the CL-9. While it lacks some functions of a traditional analog console, the elegance of the system more than makes up for it. I like that it controls the mix track in the 788T without having to lose an iso track. It works off of the same power as the 788T, which is important to me, as I never know what our power source will be.

Even if my cart power and NP1 systems go down, I can still mix off the CL-9 with the internal 788T battery.

Our tech scouts revealed how we were going to pull off a nineteen-day shoot. Two weeks of our shoot were at the Orpheum Theatre in downtown Los Angeles. The building proved amazing for the art department to build different sets on different floors. We had at least ten different sets in that building. All we had to do was hop in the elevator.

There was one spot where I knew there would be a huge problem, the Jazz Club, where Andrew reunites with Fletcher. The set was built in the lobby of the Orpheum Theatre. The back wall where the band would play did not exist, so the art department agreed to my request to build a double wall. The resulting air gap served to dampen the incessant bus traffic on Broadway. There was some bleed through, but it made the difference between rolling off the lows or sending the five-page scene to ADR.

By the end of the nineteen days, everyone on the crew knew they had worked on a really great film, no matter where it ended up. The level of professionalism and collaboration was exemplary. I felt like this was the set I dreamed of working on when I was driving from upstate New York to Los Angeles many years ago.

Whiplash turned out to be the gift that keeps on giving. I was thrilled to learn that it would open the Sundance Film Festival. I was on a mission to get into that screening. Just five minutes before the film started, I got the very last ticket and witnessed a standing-room-only crowd blow the roof off as the end credits rolled. What a rush.

A few weeks later, we were BAFTA and Academy Award nominees! I have never been so pampered in my life. We were thoroughly surprised to win a BAFTA, a unique and unequaled pleasure. This was was also a special honor for Ben Wilkins, who is from the UK. We were suddenly backstage, a whirlwind of press and then partying until the early morning.

Fast-forward to the Academy Awards. I couldn’t believe when the day came to walk the red carpet. I brought my dear mother, who couldn’t have been more proud. I spent most of the ceremony convincing myself that there was no way we could win. Statistically, no film this small had won the Academy Award for sound in thirty years. The amount of talent and money we were up against was intimidating too.

When they called our names, it was an overwhelming rush of pride and terror. I now had to gracefully walk to the stage in front of a 1.5 billion television audience! We were told that only one of us could speak, but when they didn’t play us off, I had to get a shout-out to my crew. It is still somewhat surreal to see these trophies in my living room. I got to check off several items from my bucket list, thanks to Whiplash. My life will never be the same. However, looking forward, I am excited about the great things I’ll be working on to keep challenging me much further.

House of Cards

House of Cards and Digital Boom Removal

by Lorenzo Millan

I began my career in 1993, in a circuitous path, growing up in Baltimore, Maryland. My family owned an old reel-to-reel tape recorder that was purchased to teach my father English, but my older brother and I commandeered it, where we recorded ourselves playing instruments.

Thanks to a geometry teacher in high school, who screened 16mm prints of Battleship Potemkin, Birth of a Nation and Un Chien Andalou. He encouraged us to make two Super 8 movies a semester and on graduation, I decided to apply to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. I signed up for a class called “Sound Image.” I was hooked and for the next four years, was the Sound Mixer on many of my fellow student film projects.

After returning to Baltimore, I taught a film class for two years at my old school and later, was introduced to Cameraman Richard Chisolm, who gave me the phone numbers of several local Sound Mixers. I joined IATSE Local 487 and worked on commercials and then Second Unit for NBC’s Homicide: Life on the Street.

Bruce Litecky, the mixer on that show, asked me if I wanted to boom the fifth season. That was 1996, I was so green, however, I dedicated myself to it and ended up being the main boom operator in the Baltimore area.

In 2010, when The Social Network came into town, I worked with Mark Weingarten for several days. Mark called me again in 2012 to ask if I would like to work on a new show, House of Cards, as a Utility. I was trying to do more mixing and declined his offer, going on to mix an independent movie, Better Living Through Chemistry.

Shortly after finishing that project, Mark asked me to come in to do Second Unit on House of Cards. Mark listened to a few of my takes and told me he was going home for his son’s birthday and would I be available to cover him for that week? I’ll be honest, I was scared, but I said yes. The week went off without a hitch and Mark told me he was leaving to do a feature and wanted to recommend me as his replacement. Mark was even kind enough to leave much of his equipment package. It was a steep learning curve, but I grew with confidence.

I was asked back for the second season of HOC, it was now ‘my’ show. One of the producers had mentioned putting booms in the shot, but I was unclear of the parameters. When David Fincher came to visit, I asked him to explain the process and had a good discussion about it with the director and some producers. We tried it while Fincher watched and explained when to and when to not use it.

The opportunity to put booms in the frame helps in many ways. First, we get good quality sound and don’t have to wire the actors. Secondly, the directors don’t have to sacrifice a performance by having to loop a scene later. Thirdly, other departments can take advantage of the same principle with a stand, flag or light.

There are several hard rules to “busting the frame.” If the shot has some movement at the top, then we look at the possibility of dropping the mics in, once the move has ended. Sometimes it isn’t practical to do this just for a few lines of dialog, as the majority will have to be on a wireless, due to distance from the boom, lighting, and/or geography.

If the wide shot is static, then we’ll bust the shot from the top and decide how we are breaking down the scene with the two booms.

We consider the vocal levels of the actors and what their tendencies are. How much of the room is covered by the cameras. Sometimes we end up with a triangle of people so we’ll decide who to wire and who is the best to cover with the booms.

If it’s crucial dialog in the scene, like a speech by Francis Underwood, I want to get those on the boom.

We look at the boom movement. Are there reflections, shadows on the actors? Is the boom crossing through moving foliage in the windows? It’s an organic discussion with Boom Operator Randy Pease, Chris Jones, our Second Boom/Utility, and the A Camera Operator, Gary Jay.

Sometimes after a rehearsal, Gary will say, “Well, you can bust this one.”

We make sure the 1st AD and the Director know we need a few seconds at the top before action. We’ll roll a clear frame without the booms and count off a second or two. Then Gary says, “OK, come on in boys.” We do the same at the end of a scene too.

I’m benefiting from David Fincher, who is the innovator and I am just riding that wave. The Post Production Supervisor, Peter Mavromates, and the current Post Supervisor, Hameed Shaukat, and their teams of Editors and VFX people have been enormously helpful.

I always record every line on camera or off. We have also built a small ADR booth on our stage, located in Edgewood, Maryland, about 20 minutes northeast of Baltimore.

We use the PIX System, LLC, so the editors in Los Angeles can upload a QuickTime file and a cue sheet and I can record the actor with my Zaxcom Nomad and a Sennheiser MKH 40.

I began the second season with a Cooper 106+1, recording onto a Deva 4. I use Lectrosonics wireless and Sanken lavs.

The boom microphones are the Sennheiser MKH 50 and sometimes the 60 and even the 70. I love the sharpness of Sennheiser and the MKH 50 in particular. For podiums, we use the Sennheiser MKH 40 or the same Shure SM57VIP dual microphones that match the presidential podium.

Sanken CUBS are for car interiors. They are very natural sounding and can be positioned very easily.

I moved to the Zaxcom Fusion 12 and the Mix 12 for season three.

We don’t use slates on HOC. Everything is linked by timecode and metadata. The workflow begins with my metadata; episode, scene and take numbers in tight collaboration with our Script Supervisor, Robb Foglia. The Assistant Picture Editors use my file name for the clips.

Fortunately, we have a very experienced camera crew and great Camera Operators who look out for things that I can’t always see. House of Cards treats the sound department and my tracks with great respect. The stages and sets are quiet. The actors expect quiet as well. Many times before I’ve had a chance to tell the AD department about noise issues during a take, an actor has already spoken about it. It is the way it should be.

Mad Max: Fury Road

The Traveling Road Show on Mad Max: Fury Road

by Ben Osmo

Our mission was to record dialog and sound effects while constantly in motion. We set up three multiplex systems to give me a range of one to three kilometers (about two miles). This became a necessity after the first run through with the Armada, where they took off to a distance of seven kms (four miles). I relocated all my equipment into a small 4WD van and followed the action. The crew dubbed it The Osmotron.

The Osmotron

My setup included four Sound Devices 788T, each with a CL-8. I did a mix down to each recorder as well as a two-track mix to a 744T for dailies. There were six Lectrosonics Venue receivers on Blocks 21, 22, 23 and 25, as well as two VR Venue Field receivers on Block 24. One Mackie 1604 for monitor mixes, four LectrosonicsIFB transmitters and three video monitors all powered by a Meon, a Meon Life and one more UPS (see Schematic #1).

When traveling, the equipment was powered by a 2k generator mounted on the back of the vehicle.

I was happy that all of the 788Ts had SSDs (Solid State Drives), as most of the filming was off road and they performed exceptionally well under extreme vibration. They were in road cases that were well insulated. The 744T was suspended in a pouch, so it could absorb the many bumps in the Namib Desert for six months.

The eight principal cast riding on the War Rig wore Lectrosonics SMV or SMQV transmitters on Block 24 with DPA 4061 lav mics. I find the DPA microphones quite transparent and the best for wind protection.

Andrea Hood, the genius Set Costumer, helped us enormously by designing a system to attach the packs and pre-sewing the lavs on costumes. I am forever indebted to her help. We supplied the lavs and packs at the end of each shooting day, as Andrea had to have the outfits washed.

There was an antenna hidden inside the cabin of the War Rig, with a coax cable to the interior of the tanker to two Lectrosnics Venues, Block 24 with their outputs to twelve Lectrosonics UM400 transmitters on Block 21. RF Engineer Glen English in Canberra, Australia, multiplexed the RF out of Block 21 to a specially designed RF combiner/ booster.

All this was in an “E Rack” ruggedized road case with a Meon UPS. In the back of the case was a cooling system, as it got to above fifty degrees Celsius (122 F) and very dusty inside the tanker. We called the road case the Sputnik (see Schematic #2). There was a 10k generator in each War Rig for special FX, lighting and sound, so I was able to tap in to this to run the Sputnik.

From the RF combiner/booster, one coax went up the inside of the War Rig, where we hid a transmitter aerial on the top, above all the metal, giving a 360-degree line of sight.

We built Sputnik #1, Sputnik #2, as well as Pod #1 with one Lectrosonics Venue and six UM400s. A small generator or the power from the Edge Arm camera car could run Pod #1.

Additionally, we had a Mini Pod, with three channels, that was battery-driven for use on small vehicles. Three Lectrosonics 411 receivers Block 25 and three UM400 transmitters on Block 23.

The Sputniks and Pods were shifted to different vehicles, as required. The main cast were on Block 24 and kept their wireless packs as they moved between one of four War Rigs that were in different stages of art department breakdown, for different camera and driving configurations, or special FX requirements.

At the same time as recording dialog, we also tried to grab as many sync sound effects as possible. We placed a lot of hidden microphones in the cab, in the engine bay, near exhausts, transmissions, on the top of the War Rig, in other vehicles and on the vast supporting cast.

I was in The Osmotron, with Erwin our van driver, a local safari guide. We never got stuck anywhere!

There were times, in close proximity, that I was able to record direct with the Venue Fields on Block 24 and bypass the repeaters. But all the exterior vehicle microphones were direct, either on Block 24 or Block 25.

Traveling long distances meant the walkie-talkie repeater towers were often out of range. I provided my Lectrosonics wireless and IFB comms to Director George Miller and First AD-Producer PJ Voeten. They too were great distances apart and now able to have hands-free communication. Additionally, Cinematographer John Seale, two of his Camera Operators and the First ACs were on this system.

George might be in his van with a few monitors, traveling behind the action and discuss shots with PJ and John and the Edge Arm crew that were shooting other angles. Or, George would be in the Edge Arm vehicle, while PJ and crew were on the War Rig or other tracking vehicles.

This also helped some of the cast. Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) would be in the extremely loud Gigahorse vehicle, where you could barely hear yourself think. We put a DPA 4061 microphone inside his mask and an IEM (In-ear monitor) to a Lectrosonics IFB receiver, so conversations were able to take place.

Iota was Coma on the Doof Wagon; he played the double neck guitar with flames. Iota wrote some guide temp music with drums and guitar whilst in Namibia, on Pro Tools. I imported the sessions and transmitted him a mix via an earwig.

Iota had no dialog, but wore a mic so he could communicate with George Miller, PJ Voeten, my crew and me. The vibrations were so intense when traveling off road, my laptop kept crashing. I quickly downloaded the cues to my iPod, it worked well and later, to an iPad. There were also four drummers that had to keep time, they also had IEMs.

Mark J. Wasiutak was the Key Boom Operator; he was also on the first Mad Max. Mark traveled wherever the cameras were set up. Mark was able to troubleshoot the War Rig, slate the cameras as backup and record sound effects. And of course, as the Key Boom Operator, Mark was in charge of booming whenever we had traditional setups.

For timecode, Ambient master clocks were used with GPS antennas set to Greenwich Mean Time. All the cameras and Denecke timecode slates were supplied with Ambient Lockit boxes. My 788T recorders and the 744T were jammed from the same Ambient master clock.

The two-track mix down was transmitted to our genius Video Assist, Zeb Simpson, who was in a larger truck with an RF trailer that had a forty-five-foot telescopic tower with microwave and UHF antennas.

Sam Sergi, our sound department RF Engineer, modified one of my IFB receivers with an SMA connector to facilitate a connection to a large Wizy antenna that was also on the forty-fivefoot mast. This gave us a range of at least five km (three miles) to send a mono guide to video assist, so Zeb could compile the action and drama sequences from both main and action units for Director George Miller. Using our IFB comms, Zeb could talk to George remotely. Thanks to support from Greg Roberts, of Lateral Linking Broadcast Pty Ltd, Zeb was able to show George cuts, loop playback and show various live cameras, including the Action Unit.

On the last weeks in Namibia, we set up my assistant, Oliver Machin, to record specific vehicles with a 788T, hard-wired and multitracked. Oliver was fastidious with his recording and logging of his sound reports. He did a great job.

Derek Mansvelt was the Action Unit Sound Mixer from Cape Town who, with Boom Operator Ian Arrow, duplicated a smaller version of my rig in a van and chased the stunt teams and vehicles around the Namib Desert for a few months, recording vehicles, explosions and crashes.

Finally, we were off to Cape Town Studios, where green screen components were filmed. It was still a hostile environment; in order to simulate the wind and dust, large Ritter fans were used.

I continued to mix in the The Osmotron as there was no time to reconfigure. We parked it outside the soundstages, cabled inside to Video Assist and our antennas. Along with the usual comms and talkback for George, PJ and the camera crew, we also needed a VOG with handheld Shure SM 58 microphones with on-off switches into Lectrosonics plug-on transmitters. I continued to use the in-ears for Immortan and Coma, and smaller battery-powered speakers, placed in vehicles for communication and playback.

After a break for a few months of editing, we regrouped in Australia, for the crucial Citadel sequences. The exterior Citadel location proved a challenge again, as it was spread out, 100m wide by 200m long (328 x 656 feet). We rented two large speaker stacks for the VOG, from Slave Audio in Sydney and our gentlemen grip department built us scaffold towers on either side of the large set.

The Citadel sequences proved fun for the Boom Operators, as they were in costume and makeup so they could wander amongst the crowds with the costumed Steadicam crews. It was a great opportunity to record large crowds with multiple booms.

The interior of the Citadel was back in the studio, with very large sets as well as tunnels. The VOG was still in use as well as in ears, for drummers.

I reconfigured my equipment to two sound carts and no longer required the Sputniks and Pods.

The two carts contained two 788T with CL-8, a 744T, Pro Tools 10, a Sonosax 10SX, Mackie 1604 and Yorkville PA. Three Lectrosonics Venues, four Lectrosonics 211 receivers, four Lectrosonics UM 200 transmitters (for additional comms), eighteen Lectrosonics SMV and SMQV, DPA 4061 and 4063 lavaliers. Four Lectrosonics IFB transmitters, along with twenty-four receivers. Boom microphones were Schoeps CMIT 5U, Schoeps CMC5 with MK41, Sennheiser 416 and 816. A Nagra 4.2 for loud vehicle crashes a Meon UPS and Blackmagic HD monitors.

I must acknowledge Sound Designer Wayne Pashley and his team at Big Bang Sound, who initially took on the job and constructed the fundamentals.

Later, Sound Designer David White came on board with his team at Kennedy Miller Mitchell and continued to work closely with George Miller to come up with the brilliant tracks.

In fact, hats off to all the Post Production teams and Re-recording Mixers in Australia and the United States, who did a bang-up job on the final mix.

It was a real adventure and I feel privileged to have been a part of this iconic film and very proud of the amazing international cast and crew that contributed to this film above and beyond.

The Sound of Birdman

The Sound of Birdman
or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

By Thomas Varga

It was a great honor to receive the CAS Award for Outstanding Achievement in Sound Mixing for Birdman. Being nominated by my peers for a BAFTA Award, an Oscar and then receiving the CAS Award, makes the latter so valuable to me.

I had been approached by many talented mixers who asked me the same question: “How did you do it?” Well, hopefully, I will shed some light on the process.

Initially, I was asked by a line producer I had worked with on Everybody’s Fine and the Washington, DC, portion of Breach. She informed me about the project and set up an interview at Kaufman Astoria Studios, where the sets for Birdman were being built. I was familiar with Alejandro Iñárritu’s work and thought the script was brilliant. I was looking forward to meeting him and working on the project.

The interview turned out to be one of the most surreal I’ve ever experienced. I entered a room with Alejandro, expecting it to be one-on-one. I was surprised to see several producers, the Production Designer, Kevin Thompson, and the Cinematographer, Emmanuel Lubezki “Chivo.”

They were all in the room to collectively drive home the point that Birdman was going to be “impossible” to record. “I don’t know how you’re going to do it” was expressed to me many times. Chivo made a point of saying that he didn’t think it would be feasible to use a boom because of the complexity of the shots. They were clearly concerned about the technical aspects of tackling such a nonconventional movie, and what that would mean for the soundtrack.

Luckily for me, one of our Producers, John Lesher, called James Gray, the Director of The Immigrant, a project in which we collaborated on a year prior. James said good things about me so I basically just told Alejandro that “whatever you guys throw at me, I can handle. I am not afraid.” I also made it clear that I loved the project, was willing to accept the challenge and would be honored to be a part of their team.

Within fifteen minutes of leaving the studio, I received a call from the Line Producer, while on the subway home.“They loved you. We’d like to offer you the job.” I didn’t expect the decision so quickly. Taking a moment to reflect on what just happened, the last scene of The Graduate came to mind. Dustin Hoffman is on the bus after stealing Elaine away from her wedding. It was a “be careful what you ask for, because you just might get it” moment.

I met with my crew, Adam Sanchez and Brendan O’Brien, and it was apparent that in order to handle the challenges of this film, I would need to upgrade my wireless and bag rig. I decided on a wideband Lectrosonics VR Field unit with four different blocks, to go along with my SMs, SMVs and SMQVs. I have always believed that in New York City, the more blocks the merrier.

[The three of us figuring it all out: Tom Varga and Boom Operators Brendan O’Brien and Adam Sanchez work out the next scene. (Photo: Alison Cohen Rosa)]

In my experience, the SMQVs can be too large to hide in tricky situations, although they are bombproof. I usually put the smaller SMs on women or use them with tight-fitting clothing on men. My bag rig included a Sound Devices 788 with a CL- 8. I also invested in several Lectrosonics 401 and 411 receivers to match the cart-based Venue Field receivers. With this setup, if I couldn’t work off the cart, I could grab the bag, go portable and not have to touch the transmitters on the actors. I could also record part of a scene outside on the cart and have the interior portion covered with a portable rig simultaneously. Luckily, I never had to do this on Birdman.

I have an assortment of COS-11s and B-6s. My main cart now houses two 788s and a Cooper CS-106 with a seventh channel. The Main mix is on Channel 1, Iso’s are 2 through 8. On Birdman, I used one 788 as my main recorder and a Fostex 824 as a backup. Yes, I know, the 824 is currently in a giant pile of unused 824s on the “Island of Misfit Toys.” I used Schoeps MK-41s for all interior dialog and 416s and 816s for all the exteriors. The Schoeps CMIT 5U was too long to use with the very low ceilings that were purposely designed to make the audience feel more “claustrophobic.”

Effects gathering was one of the most fun parts of the job. A good friend and very talented sound mixer, Mark Cochi, lent to me a Holophone H2 7.1 surround Dummy head, for gathering Times Square sound effects. The locations department found us a couple of offices that were directly above Times Square. This allowed me to record many different interior perspectives with large crowds below. I recorded passes with the windows closed, partly open, fully opened and at different distances to the window; close, two feet back, four feet back, etc. Locations also found a theater in Times Square that would allow me to record the crowds entering before a Broadway play. Martin Hernandez and Aaron Glascock, our wonderful Supervising Sound Editors, were happy with all the ambiences I was able to record. Finding the time to break away from the set to record useful ambience is often a challenge. Luckily, Alejandro was very adamant that the AD department budget time for us to gather these unique sounds.

I had set aside a good three weeks of prep time to incorporate all the new gear. However, on a Friday, almost a month before production, with piles of various cables and connectors lying on the floor, I received a phone call. “The director and producers would like you to be part of the rehearsal process.” I thought “Wow, what a great idea.” Then the bomb was dropped. “We want you to start this Monday, recording all of the rehearsals to the Alexa with the stand-ins running the lines.”

I had a stress-induced out-of-body experience and all I could hear was “Come Sail Away” by Styx. I spent the next forty-eight hours straight building a better bag rig, accommodating seven receivers and a wireless boom option. I also had to make an Alexa input cable and a Comtek feed from the bag. I I have almost exclusively worked off a cart, so putting this entire rig together in a weekend was a daunting task. After a soldering marathon and a groggy Monday morning, I had everything up and running and along with the rest of the crew, learned just how tricky these shots were going to be.

I carried the bag behind the camera, exposed the lavs on the stand-ins and tried to figure out at what point in the shots we could utilize booms. I later found out that they had rehearsed in LA and used on-camera microphones which sounded awful. I was brought in to help Alejandro hear the stand-ins so he could gauge the timing of the dialog with the camera moves. This proved to be an invaluable experience in planning an approach to getting booms over the actors instead of relying on wires.

To me, it is a testament to Alejandro’s vision to see how little the camera blocking changed from the initial rehearsals. We ended up bringing first team in to rehearse for a week before principal photography. This gave us yet another opportunity at squeezing in booms whenever possible. When we started principal photography, every department had a game plan and I don’t think we could have pulled it off without the director and producers willing to pay us to be part of the rehearsal process.

There were many curveballs thrown along the way. One such curveball was an overhead LED light array that Chivo, our talented DP, wanted to use as his primary source in the St. James Theatre. This location was to be used for about three weeks of our schedule. The rig was quite amazing, a series of 12-inch by 12-inch LED panels, connected side by side and hung over the stage. This rig enabled Chivo to computer control the colors and effects of each panel separately. The problem with the rig was that each panel had a fan in it. Multiply that by 12 and you have 144 fans all hanging over the actors in a relatively quiet theater. I stumbled upon this rig one day as they were setting it up to test it.

This LED panel Chivo liked would mean looping the dialog, which Alejandro and I did not want. The producers thought I was being overly demanding until they learned that this same problem existed with the LED lighting rig used on Gravity, resulting in a lot of ADR.

They initiated a series of LED light tests, costing a fair amount of money with additional time and manpower. In the end, they found a company that manufactured a similar system that Chivo liked where all the fans could be switched off without the panels overheating. Many thanks to the producers for paying for these tests. I am extremely grateful to the grip and electric crews who always gave us a hand when needed. Their professionalism and talent never went unrecognized by my department and was a contributing factor in Chivo’s Oscar win for cinematography.

We can only record what is in the room; if the room is noisy, our recordings include that noise. It doesn’t make a difference what mics you use. All of the subtleties of the human voice; the quiet breaths and sighs, the minute details, all add to the effectiveness of a performance. It is our job to capture it to the best of our ability, even if that means risking popularity. In the end, we can only hope that the battles we fight are appreciated.

Every day on Birdman was basically one shot. We would rehearse for six hours, eat lunch and shoot take after take until all the elements came together. It was the first time in my career that after breakfast, we could safely say, “Martini’s up.”

While each day posed a new set of challenges, there was one shot in particular that my crew was very proud of. It is when Riggan (Keaton) comes into the main entrance of the theater from outside, only in his underwear, so wiring him was not an option. The camera covered four areas. In rehearsals, I decided that we would need a third wireless boom operator. Luckily, our wonderful line producer approved that request.

The third Boom Operator, Teferra McKenzie, was waiting in the entrance and there was a plant mic for the actress behind the ticket booth. Teferra covered Riggan in the first room and was able to let the camera sneak through a narrow doorway before entering the room and covering four other actors. We had another plant on the arm of the wheelchair. Once Riggan opens the door to the theater, I cross fade to Brendan, booming Riggan as the camera is over Riggan’s shoulder at the stage. Brendan boomed Riggan’s lines until the camera pulls a quick 180, revealing where Riggan came in. At this point, Brendan has no chance of clearing the shot. We got him in wardrobe and left him in the scene. During this four-second pan, Brendan has to grab a line, then move into a sitting position and hide his pole behind several extras sitting in the same row. While Brendan is doing this, Adam Sanchez is fully extended with a twenty-two-foot pole on stage behind the curtains. The moment the camera pans off the stage, I cue Adam to move, Brendan sits and Adam sprints down a set of stairs into position over Riggan. Cross fading to Adam’s pole, the boom handoff was very fast and we were lucky to get what we did. Adam had to continue with a couple of 360-degree moves around the actors. This also required another magic disappearing act off stage somewhere. Sound magic; it all worked, but only by fractions of a second.

Birdman was a collaborative effort. There were many talented sound people in all the stages of post production. It’s wonderful to know that the tracks you work so hard for are going to safe and competent hands. Often, the problem with giving post so many tracks is that they don’t know how to build them as you intended. The Birdman post crew did great justice to my production recordings, along with adding a brilliant sound design and final mix. To all my talented new friends that I had the pleasure of meeting during this awards season, thank you. It was a pleasure and let’s do it again soon.

Strikenado

by David Waelder
Photos by David Waelder unless specifically credited

The Asylum is a production company specializing in ultra-low-budget projects that capitalize on trending events with titles just this side of copyright infringement. They made Transmorphers in 2006, capitalizing on the pending release of Transformers, and, in 2008, they made The 18-Year-Old Virgin—well, you get the idea. In 2013, they had a feeding frenzy with Sharknado, a film based on the premise of a cyclone vacuuming up sharks in waterspouts and depositing them to run amok on land.

No film that makes money could ever be too silly to have a sequel and Sharknado 2: The Second One soon followed. Sharks still rained from the sky but this time there was a difference: there was an IATSE contract. (We don’t know if the sharks were represented.) And the film went on to enjoy the highest ratings on the Syfy network for an original movie, according to IATSE Assistant Motion Picture Director Vanessa Holtgrewe.

Like many ultra-low-budget agreements, the Sharknado 2 contract provided that wages would be adjusted if the budget exceeded an agreed level. The budget puffed up like a jellyfish and the film made lots of money but the cartilaginous producers slipped out without paying the whole tab. And when they started production on Sharknado 3, it was without any IATSE participation, as if the negotiations of the previous film had never happened.

There’s nothing funny about working these shows; they’re long hours—low-wage slugfests. By the fourth day on Sharknado 3, the grips were circulating a signature document seeking IATSE representation. The vote was 24 to 1 in favor of union representation and, when production refused to negotiate, the crew walked on March 3. Alistair Duff, the Sound Mixer hired for the show, joined the picket line and promptly posted a notice of the job action on the LA Sound Mixers Facebook group where there was already an active series of posts about the event.

Response to the challenge was outstanding; the production found pickets wherever they went. From Tuesday (March 3) through Sunday, there were pickets every day at The Asylum offices and adjacent editing suite in Burbank, at Blue Cloud Ranch in Santa Clarita and at a location in North Hollywood. The participation from Local 695 members was particularly strong. There were times when half the picketers were 695 members. Four replacement sound crews were brought in and, one by one, each was turned and joined the picket line. We heard reports of Zoom recorders being taped to a pole in an effort to record some sort of scratch track.

On Sunday, March 8, Sharknado wrapped out of the North Hollywood facility and moved on to Washington, D.C., where they also encountered pickets. They did not have an easy time. Organizing a show that is determined to resist and only shoots for a few weeks is exceedingly difficult and, under cover of darkness, Sharknado slipped out of town without a contract. But there was blood in the water and no business as usual for a production that disavowed its commitments, disrespected its crew, dishonored its responsibilities.

Life on the Frame Line

by Mary Jo Devenney

1. INT. FILM SET — FIRST DAY OF SHOOTING

FRIENDLY CREW MEMBER

Hello! You must be our script supervisor.

If I am, we’re all in big trouble.
Can you guess what I do?

FRIENDLY CREW MEMBER

Gee Mary, Set decorator? Props? Medic?
Teacher? Dialog coach?

I’ll be your Sound Mixer.
Call me “Mary Jo” and no one gets hurt.

I don’t mind not looking like the person that people expect to see. I love being on a film set. It’s home. It’s comfortable. I know what needs to happen there. Years ago I was catching up with a friend from film school who was working in Post, and he laughed, “You’re a total set animal!” He was right.

As a kid, I watched a lot of movies. I was an only child till age eight and went to an all-girls’ school whose vacation time was always longer than at my friends’ neighborhood schools. With much time to fill, movies became my friends too. After a women’s college in Massachusetts (What was I?—Nuts?), I drove from suburban Phillie to USC film school to experience co-education for the first time. Surrounded by film lovers, I totally fit in. We were making movies! The ultimate project for most of us was a class called 480. This course had five to seven student crews make sync-sound 15 to 20-minute mini-features. I shot one, recorded one and wrote and directed one. A couple months later, a classmate called to say he was “bailing” on a boom job and I should apply. They didn’t ask if I’d ever done it professionally, and I was off to Rochester, NY, to boom Fear No Evil, a horror movie that shot for nine weeks. I had the distinction of being the only crew member flown in from LA who was working for a totally deferred salary. I got $53/week per diem. As far as I was concerned, I’d arrived. This was before video assist and video village, so the Director, Script and I haunted the frame line during shots. Having just directed my own (student) film, I made lots of suggestions to the forgiving, first-time Director (What fun!). The last week of shooting, the Mixer had a tiff with the Producer and left. With a locally rented Nagra, a 415, a smart PA to boom and much apprehension, I mixed the last two days.

Back in LA, I couldn’t find a production job and wound up working at Richard Einfeld Productions, a little sound house. I did sound transfers, ¼” tape to 16 mag and 35 mag. I also auditioned and sold sound fx from a ¼” library that Einfeld had compiled with partner Frank E. Warner, the Supervising Sound Editor on some of the biggest films of last half of the twentieth century. I’d get calls to transfer some sound effect for Being There, and send it over to his editing room. On his next project, he came in and had me put tapes on the Ampex. “Get that loon (the bird) track out and load it backwards.” Then he’d manipulate the tape with his hands, slowing and ‘wowing’ it while I recorded it to 35 mag stock and voilà, it became the sound of a punch that would land on De Niro’s face in Raging Bull. As cool as this was, I found myself listening during transfers to what the crew guys said before “action” and after “cut” on the set of Roadie. I knew I should be on a set.

I was lucky to have a former co-worker remember me in a good light. The Key Grip on the New York film recommended me to Anna DeLanzo, an experienced Boom Operator who was about to mix a low-budget movie for Cameraman/ Writer/Director Gary Graver. She needed a Boom Operator and hired me. I have repeatedly discovered that you can never guess who might recommend you. It could be the usual suspects: UPMs, Directors, Post Production people, or it could be anyone from Grips or Accountants to DPs or ADs. On the film in question, one of the actors was Gene Clark, a veteran Boom Operator who worked with great Mixers like Jim Tanenbaum, CAS. So there I was: booming a Boom Operator for a Boom Operator. Both Gene Clark and Anna DeLanzo knew more about what I was doing than I did. I learned so much from them about the art of booming (and it is an art as well as a technical exercise) and this time I was actually getting paid a little! I loved/love booming.

When I didn’t get calls to boom, I would mix. Ron Curfman was a Mixer of shows like Dallas and a shrewd businessman. He owned a little recording studio and told me and others that if we got mixing jobs, he’d make sure we had enough equipment to make it worth our while. Then he’d get the contract to do the sound transfers and the syncing of dailies to make it worth his while. If you needed work, you could make $10/hr performing these jobs on other people’s shows. A group of us met through him, boomed for each other and shared work. Decades later, several of us are still in touch and still sharing jobs.

I got to work on The Executioner’s Song, an NBC miniseries that was nominated for the Sound Emmy. I also got to work on a movie in Spain called Hundra, the making of which was much more entertaining than the movie itself. I would plan the setup and then the Producer/AD would turn on the Nagra while I boomed.

OK, so in the midst of this I got pregnant. Would that affect work? I described booming to my doctor and he assured me that I was healthy and that prenatal kids are very well protected and I could stay as active as I wanted. So I did. Never considered petite, I ‘passed’ as non-pregnant for months, then entered a phase that still makes me laugh. People would look and I could see that they were about to ask if I was … but they’d stop themselves, realizing how embarrassing it would be if I answered, “No, not pregnant; I’m just a big girl.” As time went on, work got interesting. There was a lot of twisting sideways to keep my stomach out of frame. When moving between C-stands and the camera lens, what used to be accomplished with a gut suck now required deep knee bends to pass my neck through the tight spot. Maybe it was hormone-induced, but in the middle of a shot I’d think, I’ve got this guy totally on mic ‘and’ I’m making a human being. Talk about multitasking!

I was three weeks into the TV movie Murder: By Reason of Insanity and no longer ‘passing’ when, after the second sixteen-hour day in a row, I cried “uncle.” I was too tired. I’d had Laurie Seligman (great Boom Operator) standing by and asked her to take over. That was May 8. My daughter, Roma Eisensark, was born May 18. To this day, she knows when to be quiet on set.

That July, Russell Williams II asked me to work with him on Cannon Film’s Invaders From Mars. “You bet!” I said. Not only was it was always fun to work with him, but this precious, beautiful infant, while priceless, came with a big price tag. Invaders shot for twenty weeks. The lovely Louise Fletcher let me use her motor home as a bottling plant (don’t ask). A couple movies later, I got to work on the last five weeks of another non-union Cannon film, Masters of the Universe, with Ed Novick. Cards were signed. Cannon agreed to go union if there could be deals for projects under six million dollars, and with that, the union tier system was born. After seven years of knocking on 695’s door, I was in! (And I don’t believe Cannon ever made another movie in LA.)

I must interject a side note here as a few people who have seen this writing in progress feel that the sound person/ motherhood dynamic is important to my story. I was as lucky in parenting as I was in having the strength to work pregnant. My husband, Dave, is a writer and a wonderfully committed parent. He worked at home and carried the ball when I worked long days or nights. Of course, he did turn more to short stories during Roma’s first year and she could sleep with her head next to a Smith Corona electric typewriter. I think we all enjoyed my times of ‘unemployment’ when I could take over the caregiving. The three of us went to Philadelphia when I boomed Mannequin and Seattle when I mixed The Chocolate War. I had all the advantages of anyone with a work-at-home partner unlike many of my sisters and brothers in the business. Single parents are beyond heroic!

In the fall of 1989, Russell Williams was mixing the fourth month of Dances With Wolves. The show was going to go an extra month. (“Thank you” to the headstrong wolf playing Two Socks!) Russell had plans that would conflict, so he tapped me to come and finish the film. I still get goose bumps when I remember reading the script on the plane to South Dakota. It was great. I inherited the wonderful Boom Operator Albert Aquino, who, sadly, we lost three years ago. Everyone was friendly; there was just one problem. Most of what was left to shoot were tepee interiors. The plan was for the Special FX crew to do gas campfires via hissing pipes that the cast would sit around. I approached the DP, Dean Semler, not knowing then that this great Australian bear of a man was as much of a collaborative filmmaker as he was a visual artist. “Would it be possible to use real fire for these campfires?” I asked. “There’d still be noise but it would be the right noise.” “Well, that’s my main light source for these scenes,” he said, but “I’ll check with the FX guys to see what’s possible.” We went with real fire! Camera people have since told me that the visual warmth of real flames looks better than the bluish gas fire. Maybe it wasn’t a concession made for the sake of sound, but it’s been a great argument when I tell camera that one guy who went along with my request got an Oscar. So did Russell, and he mentioned me in his acceptance speech.

I could go on like this for another twenty-five years but, out of compassion for the reader and a realization of the size of this magazine, let me say that I have kept working to this day. Let me share some of my conclusions about being in our field.

A film is created in the editing room but, on set, we’re making the raw material. I’m always trying to hand over silk material from what is often a sow’s ear environment. It’s hard to re-create an actor’s magic if we don’t get it when it first happens, so capturing that moment is the goal. When we succeed, the magic and the budget both benefit. If the sound is good, I drive home happy even if the day’s been physically tough, or emotionally unpleasant. If I know the sound will need some fix in Post, I’m unhappy no matter how comfy the shooting day was.

As sound people we’re often at the mercy of others, so I try to speak everyone’s language. Working with every department (and understanding their goals and tools) will get you much further than many of the newest gadgets you can buy. (I am, however, grateful for radio microphones that work as originally promised decades ago. I’m also grateful for digital recorders with as many tracks as I have microphones so that Post can perfect my real-time mix. I’m particularly grateful that digital recorders won’t allow me to accidentally record over that last printed take that the Director asked me to cue up.) Being a woman might help in dealing with wardrobe and finding creative ways to hide microphones. Actresses are the people who most often say they’re glad I am a woman. I mention that I’m a recovering soccer mom and will leave this person looking neat. I suppose that’s proof that we’ll all play the stereotype card when it’s useful. But like all preconceptions, nothing’s true all the time. I try to evaluate mine often and dispel preconceptions about me. With a new crew, I always try to demonstrate that I understand what Camera, Grip and Electric are up against. It’s good to point out that the genny should move before the cab’s engine has stopped, and I always thank the people who have to lug out more heavy cable to reach it. There’s a line in the movie The Imitation Game that expresses my experience so perfectly. Joan Clarke explains why she’s been friendly to a co-worker that Alan Turing consistently antagonizes. “I’m a woman doing a man’s job,” she says, “I don’t have the luxury of being an ass.”

I talked to Brent Lang for a Variety (July 29, 2014) article about the small representation of women below-the-line in production. He asked if I was paid less for the same work. I said, in a sense, “yes” because I tend to get lower budget shows as a Production Mixer. Not only is there less money for sound but, as the budget falls, getting good sound tends to be harder. This is because of all the other money compromises, like worse deals on locations, older equipment used by other departments, smaller staff and shorter schedules. Of course, the boys work these shows too, but it sure feels like they move on sooner. (Again, nothing’s true all the time.) The positive side of low budget is the chance to master knowledge of new wave equipment and practices that will make their way up the production ladder—wide-and-tight, RED camera, ‘D’ cameras, etc.—before the rich producers start to use them. It’s also a chance to be available for the occasional innovative or true “labor of love” film where you can feel very appreciated and integral to its success. I’ve been lucky to see some really good movies while I was recording them. (Including two movies that my husband wrote and produced, one of which was Monkey Love, a comedy starring Jeremy Renner in 2004. Yes, shameless plug.)

My parents chose a girl’s school partly to round out their little tomboy. It probably had the opposite effect. If you wanted to do something, there was no one to stop or slow you down by “helping” you. It wasn’t the place to learn about gender norms. There was no reason not to be a leader. You could be the president of the dramatic club or on the school paper or on the varsity basketball team. If there was a drawback, it was that I didn’t learn to navigate a system that treats you as different or less acceptable. I still work at understanding why people would object to you doing whatever you’re able to do. When we get out of the pass-van on a location scout, it feels a lot like taking the field as a member of a team on which I’ve earned my spot. I loved that feeling in school and love it now.

The bottom line is, it’s a great job. If it’s taken a bit more time and work because of artificial obstacles, I figure you just take a little extra pride in what you do achieve. I owe a tremendous debt to the 695 “brothers” that I’ve worked for, and with. I was going to list them but it’s a very long list. I cheer their successes and those of my ever-increasing number of sisters.

PS: As I write, it is over a year since the loss of my friend and mentor of longest standing, Lee Strosnider. He was perfectly generous and professional. He would explain equipment and rent it to me at all hours knowing I’d pay when possible. His stories and nuggets of advice were as interesting as they were long. I miss him.

The Utility Sound Tech

by Peggy Names and Jennifer Winslow

You might ask, “Why does a professional Sound Department need a Utility Sound Technician, anyway?” By the end of this article, written by two longtime Boom/Utility Techs, you will be wondering how any sound crew could function without!

The Utility Sound position is hard to define because it has so many facets. The job requires immeasurable amounts of knowledge and a LOT of multitasking. It is both technical and physical. Being able to think on your feet is not only important, but can save the day. We are always problem solving, which helps prevent those dreaded words, “Waiting on Sound!” Although we are often invisible, you can bet we are working hard to keep production flowing.

The history of the job goes back to the early days of “talkies” when yards of sync cables were needed between sound and camera. Today, with innovations in technology, the job has morphed and the title has evolved. We once were called “Cableman” or “Cableperson” and “Second Boom Operator”; now we are called “Utility” which is short for Utility Sound Technician. We are one and the same; we are the third person on the sound crew.

Basically, as a Utility Sound Technician, you have to know how to boom, guard precious equipment from harm, manage distribution of audio, be an expert with wireless microphones and transmitters, know how to do playback, move heavy equipment from one place to another (endlessly), know how to fill the Mixer’s chair when nature calls, think like a detective to find unwanted noises, “play well” with others to achieve cooperation, be aware and alert at all times, blend like a chameleon to your Mixer and Boom Operator’s style, know when to speak and when to be quiet, have great organizational skills, know basic electronics, know how to interact with the talent and that’s just the tip of the iceberg … whew!

Jennifer: As a Utility Sound Technician, I have a lot of detail work. On an average shooting day, Utility handles things like checking and changing batteries in all equipment, setting up the carts, running cables, powering up the Mixer’s equipment, setting up the boom poles, and many other tasks. We put Foot Foam and Silent Steps on noisy heels of principal and background actors. We lay rugs on floors to catch footfalls and tape them down so no one trips. I have a tape roll on the follow cart, or sometimes on my belt, which is especially handy if I’m booming. When I work as an A2 on multi-camera shows, the duties are similar, but we rely on different equipment with their own particular challenges.

We have a unique awareness of our environment on stage and on location. While our Boom Operator is working out moves and cues, and the Mixer is getting the mix just right, we may be stealthily moving around the set seeking and destroying all unwanted noises. Having a refined sense of hearing helps to identify and choose the best method to squelch the sound source. When something goes wrong, e.g., radio transmitters need to be tuned to a new frequency or the recording device freezes, that’s our cue to act. There are times we must run to the truck (an organized truck is a must), find a piece of equipment and get it to set quickly so the problem is fixed as soon as possible.

At any moment, we may have to drop what we are doing, and focus our attention on another, higher priority. We call it “putting out fires” on the set. The ability to refocus is a must-have skill. Knowing how to prioritize these split-second decisions comes with experience. Our eyes may not be on the set at all times, but we are tuned in to every little noise, our ears working overtime. We are always looking and listening, anticipating and planning for the problems the next setup might present.

Jennifer: Early in my career, I worked with Mixer Bob Wald. He was very organized and professional. He had a “cheat sheet” printed out for his Utility that outlined the Utility Tech’s duties. I found it very helpful to have a written reference, especially while working long hours. Our department counts on us to remember many things like: jamming the slates and Lockit box with timecode every four hours, keeping fresh batteries in transmitters, running the bell and light cable on stage and managing noisy electric appliances on location. Many of us use additional reminders for location work, especially with refrigerators. While the Locations Department is ultimately responsible for restoring order at the end of the shoot day, it’s good discipline for each department to leave things as they found them. To be sure we restore settings, some Utility Techs put Post-it reminder notes on their follow cart, while others place their car keys in the refrigerator. I put bright camera tape on my iPhone with FRIDGE written on it, as a reminder to make sure the units are on when we leave a location.

We watch and listen for door slams on dialog, clomping footfalls, plates that rattle, chairs that squeak, lights and ballasts that hum, props and special effects that hiss, boom and bang. Dealing with all these noises requires cooperation from other departments. Many an ADR session has been spared by working with the Grip Department to quiet the moves of the camera dolly and with the Location Coordinator to chase down a leaf blower.

Peggy: One of the more sticky situations involves the “herd of elephants” that accompany the Steadicam … Me: “Would you mind taking your shoes off or wearing booties?” Camera Operator: “You want me to WHAT!?!” Then imagine the delicacy required to ask the Costume Department to change the pantyhose of the actress because the swishing noise of her legs rubbing together on each step is drowning out the dialog! Okay, I have to admit that the diplomacy required for this was above my pay grade! When Mixer Bill Kaplan gave the Director the bad news, he threw up his arms and said, “You want me to tell the actress that her thighs are too noisy!?!” True story!

Sometimes second booming can be more challenging than first. We are often called in on take two when it becomes evident that the blocking or overlaps require more than one microphone. What this means for us is that we drop everything, run in with our boom gear, get clued in on our assignment, find a place to operate and boom our asses off with no rehearsal! We must pay attention properly so that being called to duty will not be a surprise.Second boom work is increasingly in demand as it is now commonplace to play the overlaps (when actors speak at the same time) and mic off-camera dialog for ease in editing, allowing the Director more creative choices in performance. Booming isn’t easy, and knowing when to use a ladder, stand on an apple box, climb up into the greenbeds (on stage) to boom is extremely important. Boom operating can be nervewracking at first: your arms shake a lot in the beginning, you don’t want to be the one to screw up the take, you don’t know where to place your body or the pole, camera moves freak you out, actors can be unpredictable, but eventually you build new muscles, learn lens sizes, develop a good rapport with the camera crew and Dolly Grip, drop the fear and it becomes second nature—and fun! Booming requires knowledge of the camera movement, the size of the frame, lighting, blocking of the actors and dialog cues. Obstacles can be thrown in your path at the last moment so you have to be flexible. Booming is such an important skill to learn well. There is so much more to booming, but that is another article in itself.

Jennifer: I have worked on many shows with Mixer Mark McNabb. He always makes sure (in his deal with the UPM) that his Utility is hired on at boom rate, because of the heavy second booming. I worked on Family Affair with Mark and Boom Operator Raul Bruce, where I second boomed every day. One time I was booming a big scene with actor Tim Curry. My kids were young (they were like little petri dishes of germs), and I had a cough left over from a cold. I tried to suppress my cough during a take but couldn’t, so I timed it out and then coughed on Tim’s off-camera dialog. I was blue (and red) in the face! The minute the camera cut, Tim walked over and, with a smile, gave me a cough drop from his pocket. He told me he grew up as a preacher’s son. He had to sit in the front row of church with his mother every Sunday. If he ever coughed during his father’s sermon, it was extremely embarrassing and, to him, it was worse than death! He was so empathetic and kind. Even though my kids are healthy teenagers now, I carry cough drops in my kit, because you never know when someone else on set may be struggling to stifle a cough during the take!

Playback has become much easier since the days of the Nagra and the pinch wheel. Digital playback has many advantages: now playback can be performed on a laptop and the cues are much tighter. We are skilled at running playback should an unexpected need arise or the use is minimal, like playing music to set the mood in a scene. Being proficient at playback makes you a more valuable member of the sound team because you are available to perform this work on a moment’s notice, especially on distant location. For these small units of playback it is often easier to have someone close to the project run the playback and call in another Utility Sound Tech to fill your shoes. If the playback is of paramount importance, like lip-syncing actors to a piece of prerecorded music, or a song and- dance number, then we call in the big guns! Along with big guns comes big equipment. The Utility Tech is assigned to help with the placement of the playback speakers and run a multitude of cables. This sometimes requires a lot of schlepping and grunt work. Always ask for help if speakers need to be hoisted to the greenbeds. Promise the grips they can play their music through them at lunchtime and you will get all kinds of cooperation.

Peggy: I have done more than my fair share of digital playback beginning in 1997. The late Mixer, David Ronne, introduced me to a whole new world of possibilities. Together, we created our own click tracks using the clave (rhythm instrument) as the guide with an accent on the second beat for the dancers and shifted the thump track to compensate for distance from the speakers to the dancers. We jumped from one part of the song to another on tempo, all on-the-fly. Latin music can be especially challenging because the rhythm is fluid. When I play back dialog, I have to think like the actor would so that the timing of the delivery is spot-on.

The improved quality of wireless microphone technology has mostly done away with the yards and yards of sound cable that were regularly laid out. It is still good to know how to use the XLR cables, just in case the RFs crap out (yes, that’s a technical term!). When, where and how to lay the cable can be critical for safety, avoidance of interference from electrical cables and dimmers, and flexibility when things change on set and you have to reroute equipment. Coiling cables is an art. “Over, under, over, under” is like a mantra to many of us. You do not want to fight with a hundred-foot XLR, wrapped the wrong way, trust us! Many hours have been spent untangling and cleaning mud and gunk off the cables. We are happy that we are no longer called a Cableperson!

Peggy: Working with Mixer Ron Judkins and Boom Operator Bob Jackson on Minority Report, we had to run cables three stages away with communication both ways and that was just one crazy situation on that movie. With Mixer Bill Kaplan on Crimson Tide, we had a snake running to a pulley hanging from the top of the stage to the set which was on a gimbal twenty feet off the floor. From there, we had a break-out to eight cables. I had to climb all over the top of the submarine set like a monkey and poke the wires in holes to Boom Operator Earl Sampson, who then set the plant microphones. The metal structure of that set was screwing up our radio transmitters and the obstacles prevented most booming. Mixers Edward Tise and Kirk Francis are the boldest Mixers out there, flying with no net. They carry not one cable on the cart. Times are changing.

Electronics can be very finicky and, if not given the proper care, are unpredictable. Wireless booms and radio microphones can act up and wreak havoc at any given moment. Utility Technicians are in charge of making sure the equipment does not have bugs so the sound is clean and causes no delays. Capturing the sound is hard enough without those headaches! If a plant microphone is in a bush or other exposed position, we make sure no one accidentally kicks it, stomps on it or sprays it with water. When supplies are getting low, we order more. God help us if we run out of AA batteries.

We make sure that everyone who needs to hear the soundtrack has a way to do so. This could be anything from a remote speaker in a car or Dimmer Operator’s room, to an earwig in the actor’s ear. The biggest chore occurs daily when trying to wrangle twenty or more receivers (Comteks) and headsets used by the Director, Script Supervisor, Producers and Writers on set. When guests drop by from time to time, we provide Comteks for them to listen as well. We are often asked for Comteks at the last minute, for example, when the Camera Operator needs to take a cue from dialog. We keep close track of headsets and hope the equipment will be returned to us at the end of the scene or day. It is our responsibility to ensure these devices are operating properly and some of us take it hard if batteries fail or Comteks go missing. We are continuously surprised at some of the strange places we’ve found Comteks at wrap!

Radio microphone use has expanded in the new age of digital filmmaking. With requests from Editorial to deliver all the actors’ voices on individual tracks, compounded by the actors overlapping, and multiple cameras moving and holding different shot sizes, comes the ubiquitous use of radio microphones.

An increasing practice for the Sound Department is to wire everyone and boom what we can. The Boom Operator needs to stay on the set, to work out the shadows, obstacles, dialog cues and moves. We are increasingly asked to wire actors in their trailer, so the Utility Tech goes off to the trailers to wire the actors. Some of us carry a “radio mic kit” with transpore tape, overcovers, moleskin, leg, ankle bands and waistbands, sewing kit (you often don’t get “intel” on what wardrobe they will be wearing), scissors and any other tools that can make the wiring go smoothly. Upon arrival back at the set, we get ready to boom and find that the dolly move has changed and there is a light placed right where the Second Boom was planning to operate. Trusting and relying on your Boom Operator is mandatory, especially when you have to find a new position. Often while we are booming, we must jump into action on the front line, if the lavalier microphone needs adjustment or an actor’s Foot Foam falls off, or if a door needs to be silenced with WD40. Having strong nerves and knowing set etiquette is a must, especially when all eyes are on you as you hurry to correct the problem.

It is not uncommon for more than five actors to show up at the sound cart all at once for wiring. Utility Sound Technicians that can wire like lightning, make it disappear like a magician, with ingenuity, good humor, confidence, grace and outstanding results, are worth their weight in gold. Working closely with the Costume Department to ensure the wardrobe is not damaged and the actor’s comfort is not violated is important, even when the AD is calling for “Picture!” Doing the job the right way the first time prevents mishaps and spoiled takes. We have been told many times that women and children feel more comfortable with a female working under their clothing. This may be one reason why women are drawn to this position and Local 695 has seen an increase in the number of female applicants in recent years.

Jennifer: When I wire a young child, I will ask them if they like spy movies. (They usually do!) I tell them to imagine they are like “Spy Kids,” or a secret agent and then I remind them not to touch the pack or the microphone and blow their cover! It also helps to strike up a conversation so the parents know you are professional and puts them at ease, and it can keep a kid from fidgeting and hitting the lavalier during the take. I have worked with Mixer Sam Hamer on shows where many children needed to be wired. Sam has said he’s impressed at how the kids not only sounded good, but respected the radio microphones and equipment. It’s my secret, but I’m happy to share my tricks.

Peggy: With the fluid nature of filmmaking these days, the Utility Sound position has become much more crucial to getting the job done. On my most recent films with Mixer Petur Hliddal, I was hired on before the consideration of the Boom Operator, specifically for my skill set in the Utility Sound position. It is unusual for this position to take priority but when a movie is heavy on wireless, additional communications, mobility and the unforeseen, then it makes sense. It is a misconception that going wireless should require fewer people. I see the trend of adding a fourth person to the sound crew in the near future … it is a challenge to keep your hands clean to attend to the wires on actors while also laying carpets, throwing hog’s hair under drips, swinging a boom around, applying Foot Foam and running cables. Mixer Simon Hayes regularly has a five-person crew … hmmmm … food for thought.

For the people who think Sound Utility Technicians are a luxury position, that can’t be farther from the truth. Ask anyone who has mixed or boomed shows without a Utility Tech; it is almost impossible to get the same high-quality production track. The sound quality suffers and the production suffers. Utility is indispensable at almost any budget-level project. We save the production plenty of time and money. Productions that know the importance of hiring a Utility Sound Technician are usually five steps ahead and they might even have a headset waiting for them when they come to set!

The bottom line is that the Utility Sound Technician position more than pays for itself. We are proud to have a career doing what we love, with interesting people who are unique, smart and funny. It’s also fun working with actors, traveling to different locations and knowing that our work has helped make the finished product, the soundtrack, sound just that much sweeter.

Glossary

Silent Steps: Small tips made to fit on high heels to quiet them.

Lockit: A timecode clock that can be remotely mounted to equipment. The Lockit is a trade-named product from Ambient but is often used to refer to similar devices from Denecke and others.

Foot Foam: Flat rubber adhesive-backed sheets cut to fit the bottom of shoes.

Comteks: Most commonly used receiver for a listening device.

Transpore: A medical tape frequently used to attach lavalier microphones.

Moleskin: A cotton fabric with a soft pile on one side. The favored brand, Dr. Scholl’s, is available with adhesive on one side making it useful as applied padding for a microphone.

Overcovers and Undercovers: Adhesive windscreens made for lavalier microphones.

Hog’s hair: A woven filter material commonly used in air conditioners. It serves the purpose of dampening the sound of falling water.

Greenbed: Called green because of their color, they are suspended scaffolding for mounting lighting and grip equipment above the set walls, also used for boom microphones in multi-camera shows.

Break-out: The distribution end of a “snake cable.” The snake carries multiple lines in one conduit and the individual signals break-out in a fan at the end.

A2: An Audio Assistant.

A Career

by Cabell Smith

I spent my entire working life in an alternate universe. I was terrified every day that someone would find out that I would have paid them for the fun I was having! As a big fat plus, I was there when a paradigm shifted. To be present at change for the better is a very powerful tonic! Weird prelude: as a nine year old, my best friend Susan’s father was an engineer (I clearly remember the pens and pocket protector) at the world-famous Bell Labs. Bell’s engineers invented the transistor, created the laser, the solar cell, and countless other transformative technologies and have won at least a dozen Nobel Prizes. One day in the late 1950s, her dad came home with a portable tape recorder, maybe an Ampex 600?

Susan and I took to this wonder, and immediately recorded our songs and little plays into this amazing device to the long-suffering delight of our parents. Who knew that sound recording would be my life and my delight? I came to the World of SOUND via the independent film community and the Women’s Movement, which were intertwined in New York City in the early 1970s. Women were beginning to produce and direct independent films, and many wanted to work with women technicians, of which, of course, there were none.

In 1970, I was invited to join a womens’ consciousness-raising group. We were seven; with a grant from the New York State Council on the Arts we purchased a Sony Portapak—a revolutionary new portable video camera and video tape recorder. We were going to tape our sessions; we were going to make our own TV! We wrangled through the technology, each of us mastering the camera, sound and editing for programs about women’s health issues, many of which were broadcast on Open Channel, New York’s new public access cable outlet.

In 1972, a cameraman friend’s regular sound tech was not available (always the point of entry, right?) and he asked me if I wanted to learn to do documentary sound. We took the Nagra III and a Sennheiser 805 and went into Central Park. I put on my first pair of Beyer DT 48s and bang! zoom! Truly the earth moved, and reoriented itself, around my head! What a rush of tone and volume and clarity and precision. And, by changing the position of the mike, I could control this new enormous universe. I was hooked.

I began trying to build a resume, and track down jobs that would be paying jobs. Up to now, I was working on friends’ films for free and occasionally working for WNET, the New York PBS station. I went through the Producers-Production Companies section of the New York Motion Picture TV Directory, calling every single company asking for a chance to work for them.

Usually the response was a flat “no.” However, in December of 1971, I got a call from a woman (!) at the Canadian Broadcast Corporation. The American Academy of Sciences was having a symposium in Philadelphia between Christmas and New Year’s, and the CBC needed someone to go and record the talks. I was thrilled to have my first paying job, which meant my first time in a hotel on my own, my introduction to the concept of per diem.

The travel arrangements were especially exciting: arrive at world-renowned cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead’s office in the Museum of Natural History and travel to Philadelphia with Ms. Mead in her limo! I spent a glorious week “tying in” to the soundboard with my rented Nagra III and listening to Margaret Mead, Louis Leakey and Carl Sagan talk about their latest research. It was a very cool beginning!

Around the same time, John Chester, Chief Sound Engineer for Bill Graham’s rock venue Fillmore East, gave a class on basic electronics for women. Ohm’s Law, capacitor, resistance, condenser microphones, proximity effect—now I could define and understand my new universe. Many of my male counterparts came to sound via the music world. They were knowledgeable about electronics and sound. John’s course was a godsend. I could now hold a conversation with another sound person, and understood more than “plug this into that.”

In March of 1973, NBC-TV News hired me as a Sound Technician. NBC, a closed IATSE Local 52 “shop,” was dodging a legal suit regarding hiring of women at the time. All men, solidly union, and I was neither. There was no other woman working in a union shop on a day-to-day basis. A news (film) crew consisted of three people: camera, sound & electric. We captured the story for our producer and the on-camera talent. Being on a news crew in New York City was hugely exciting. My crew was the first on the scene when Philippe Petit walked on a high wire between the towers of the World Trade Center. I was there when Secretariat won the Belmont Stakes to capture the Triple Crown, and hung a microphone on Mickey Mantle for the Old-Timers’ Game.

We went from opening the trunk of a Caddy in the depths of Brooklyn to discover a dead body, to a shootout at the Mosque in Harlem, to trying to set the microphone at the right height for a news conference with both NY mayoral candidates: John Lindsay, 6’ 4”, and Abe Beame, 5’ 2”. We usually covered two stories a day. After filming each story, a dashing Teamster on a motorcycle rushed our sound-striped film back to “30 Rock” for its developing bath—“into the soup”—for “film at eleven!” Between stories we usually had time for a lunch at one of New York’s best restaurants. If our morning story found us in Brooklyn, we headed for Lundy’s in Sheepshead Bay. We prayed to stay in Manhattan on Thursdays for the creamed spinach at the Brittany du Soir. Many of these restaurants, like the technology and leisurely pace of news gathering, have disappeared.

Most guys thought I something of an oddity—why would a woman WANT to do this job? But I don’t remember any nasty incidents. I don’t know what went on behind my back, but I have the feeling that because technical jobs are so easily evaluated by ones’ peers—either you’re doing the job or you’re not—there really wasn’t much of a fuss.

Within a year, NBC was hiring other women technicians, on staff and freelance. I think we were successful because we were not particularly didactic about politics. We were doing our jobs alongside the men. Just being there was political. And politics was all around us. By 1974, NBC and the other networks could wrangle an all-woman crew for countless stories about women in prison, women’s examinations, rape—stories that would have been unheard of, and thus unheard, a few years before.

After about a year on the job, one of my colleagues came up to me and said, “Hey, you know, my sister could do your job.” I remember just smiling … The light bulb had gone off! The opportunity to work and make a decent living doing something you love is truly transformative. I’m grateful it happened for me, and grateful that I was able to facilitate that experience for others.

The Best Person for the Job

Assembled and edited by Rosa Costanza Tyabji
All photos courtesy of the respective participants unless specifically credited

Embarking on the creation of this article has allowed me to investigate and to understand better the dynamics involved in being a gender minority in this field. My hope is that this article also lends you greater insight on how far we women have come, and how far we have yet to go.

In November 2014, I organized a group of Local 695 member-sisters to gather to discuss our shared professional experiences for the purpose of creating this article. It was a sublime yet charged atmosphere, beneficial to all participants. Cabell Smith, one of the first women to join IATSE (Local 52) as a Sound Mixer in 1974, was laughing with new member and Y-1, Eva Rismanforoush, who joined in 2014. There was much networking and camaraderie as we got to know each other.

Prior to the November meeting, I sent requests for stories, quotes and anecdotes of working life to all the active women members in IATSE Local 695. More than thirty people responded to participate in this article.

Chartered in 1930, Local 695 has nearly 2000 members working in the fields of Production Sound Technicians, Television Engineers, Video Assist Technicians and Studio Projectionists. The presence of women working in those fields has been slowly growing since the first woman knocked on the door in the 1960s. In its first fifty-five years, the number of women members grew from none to only eight percent. It is encouraging to see that this year, nearly twenty-five percent of new members are female.

Peggy Names, a member since 1977 and one of the first female Microphone Boom Operators, prepared these statistics with help from Linda Skinner and Nikki Riordan in the office. “Every new production brings new faces,” Peggy mused, “sometimes those faces are surprised to see a woman working in sound, even in the year 2015. We look forward to the day when people stop saying, ‘I’ve never seen a woman sound person before.’”

Currently, women make up less than ten percent of the membership of Local 695, though we trust that there will be more women attracted to work in our technical fields of the industry.

We found the commonalities we have, yes as women, but also as professionals networked in our organization, Local 695. All members play an important creative role in the production world. Just as utilizing the necessary technology needed by our department for any given project may change, it is understood that the personnel needs may also change with production type and complexity. As an example, women often gain employment as Utility Sound Technicians when a project has women and/or children in the cast, when the personnel needs create that opportunity.

We share a collective gratitude to those who opened the doors of possibility and employment in this technical art, and an appreciation of the tenacity and perseverance they employed in our shared craft.

“We are grateful to our Local for opening its doors so willingly to us,” Names states. “We think we have the best brothers any sister could have. The trailblazers may not have known there were any obstacles before them, but we were tenacious and paved the way for the future generations of women in Local 695.”

Her words are an understatement. In our artistic and scientific field, the backgrounds we bring are diverse, as are the paths we’ve taken to gain experience and employment as technicians. Here are a few stories showing that diversity:

Phyllis Bailey Brooks (joined IATSE in 1981) is a Y-8 Boom Operator primarily using the Fisher for multi-camera TV: “My very first semester at USC studying TV & film, I met a Unit Manager (a recent USC grad) working on Good Times for Tandem Productions. She assisted me in getting a job as a page working on the lot at Metromedia Square on shows like All in the Family, One Day at a Time and The Jeffersons … My first engineering job was as a cable puller on Good Times, but wow, some folks weren’t quite ready for me! A young, black, female with my eyes wide open, but soon those that weren’t keen on the idea in the beginning became my best mentors.”

Michele Wolfe (1980) is one of only four female Projectionists in Local 695. “I worked as a cashier and candy girl at the Sunland Drive-In Theater. I was lucky to meet another union projectionist in 1972 to teach me the trade. At that time, you needed a license to work because of nitrate film. I received my license and became the second woman to join Local 150. I started out in the theater Local and paid my dues by working the porno houses in the valley. So I became a Studio Projectionist. I feel very lucky to be a union member in a great industry that has provided me a good living for forty years.”

Jillian Arnold (2012) is a Y-4 doing data asset management and data capture. She shares: “My first shooting/media managing job was with the RED camera for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. We were shooting parachute tests for the Curiosity Mars Rover at one of the world’s largest wind tunnels … I felt very lucky to be working alongside some of the most seasoned and intelligent men in the country. I started out doing media management from camera cards to field hard drives, and now I operate the Pronology ingest control application, an all-encompassing media ingest and management software.”

Rita Rubalcava (1974), a Y-9 Videotape Operator, began her career in the newly inaugurated Engineering Training Program at KCET after being their first female Videotape Librarian. She recalls, “After taking a three-year hiatus for parenting, I rejoined the workforce as a freelance Videotape Operator in 1986 and my first production was Family Ties. After more than forty years, I am still in the workplace and currently working on the Disney show Liv and Maddie and CBS’s Mom.”

Rosa Costanza Tyabji (2007), a Y-1, gained an apprenticeship on the Universal cop drama New York Undercover, arranged through the Institute of Audio Research, where she received her certificate in recording engineering. She apprenticed with the late Bill Daly on the Universal Studios soundstages in NYC. Rosa remembers: “New York Undercover was very popular at the time and it was exciting to shoot on locations all over the city for a show with such strong public support. I helped Bill as a utility person, making BNC cables and soldering connectors on busted wires. Much of the professional work ethic I still carry comes from that experience.

“Apprenticeship programs are so rare these days. We need to bring them back to train the next generation, whether tied to schools or guilds or otherwise.” Rosa has given lectures on location sound for students enrolled in the film/video program at the Orange Coast College.

“No matter where you learn your craft, who you work with, or where you work, we all adapt to the parameters of each style of film, TV program, documentary, commercial, reality show or event for which we provide our services.”

Rosa adds, “Working as a Sound Mixer has gifted me with amazing life experiences: From recording around Zanzibar with a Nagra, on set of a South African MNET TV show in 2000; to following the Dalai Lama and documenting through the Golden Temple in Amritsar, India; spending six weeks on and off of seagoing vessels in Mendocino; or hiking the border of Tennessee carrying a portable kit plus all expendables for a documentary. Each of these productions presented situations demanding immediate assessments and action. I draw from my background the problem-solving tools with which to solve new challenges.”

Emmy winner Gail Carroll-Coe (1996) joined as a Y-8. She cites her ability to anticipate and adjust her responses as a key reason she can meet challenges. “I love challenges and embrace being able to anticipate problems in order to solve them without holding up production and, more importantly, getting the best sound possible. I immediately communicate the information needed as it arises on the set to those concerned: the Mixer, the Director and/or Producers. I try to accomplish this by keeping calm and thinking rationally. One of my favorite sayings is, ‘Panic is not our friend.’ Last year, I did a movie with a director (actor-turned-first-time-director) who told me he was extremely happy I stood my ground when needed and that he loved my negotiating techniques … whew!”

Patrushkha Mierzwa (1983) is a now-retired Y-8. Her love of production as a whole gave her this perspective about her work: “Boom operating is a perfect storm of crafts; it requires knowledge of nearly all the other filmmaking disciplines. Because Boom Operators often work next to the camera, they become the default sound representative on the set, and the one to relay essential information. Sound is one of the few departments that does not directly support the visual (camera), so it is important to help educate our brothers and sisters that our contribution does not take away from that, but imparts a valuable layer for the audience.”

Upgrades and updates, shifts and changes in our electronic toolkits are the norm in our lines of work—something that we all roll with to stay current as we utilize our knowledge in the field. Here are some anecdotes and observations:

Kim McCall (2003) is a Y-4 working in video/24-frame playback, currently at Warner Bros. on new show Blunt Talk. She recalls, “I started my career in an analog world. Going all the way back to using quad, to one-inch tape reels. Editing and shooting on 3/4-inch tape to beta. Then learning the old 24-frame standards conversion and color correcting to playback on set syncing up film cameras using the old CE or Barton box and phasing that old bar out of the modified tube TV … It was a challenge for all of us to switch over to the HD 23.976 world. Always trying to keep up with new technology. Of course, you could write a book on this subject alone.”

Nicole Zwiren (2013), a Y-1, has an MFA in sound design, so her knowledge of audio post informs her work as a Location Sound Recordist. She shares: “Mostly I am a bag Sound Mixer, which requires a lot of stamina, luck, skill and tact. As a Post-Production Sound Mixer, I know how difficult it is to remove background noise, so I make sure that all sources of noise in my control are handled to make for the quietest set possible. I prefer to use wireless lavaliers on actors when I know there will be problems with background noises.”

Lisa Gillespie (2007), a Y-8, agrees with Nicole: “I went to Columbia College in Chicago, where I did location sound. I worked in their sound studio. I was a part-time student and an employee, checking out equipment to students. I mixed films with the Nagra. I also did Foley recording and Post Production. I always have Post Production in mind when I work.”

We are all team players by our natures or we would not gravitate toward this business. We are all also singular in how we do what we do. Meeting each other, creating the open discourse about our work, and having a reliable pool of referrals that we trust are key. Networking works.

Alexis Schafer (2009) went from being a Y-13 Service Sound person to a 7A, Utility Sound. She gained the bulk of her understanding from day-playing with various talented Mixers who started as Utilities. Alexis highlights her ability to make connections: “I have made friends with my fellow 695 members and have gone to numerous BBQs and other events, but some of the most beneficial friendships I’ve made are with individuals in other departments. Understanding how these different departments contribute to the production has become a valuable asset in my ability to get my job done.”

Amanda Beggs (2013) joined as a Y-1 Production Sound Mixer, with encouragement from mentors: “I’ve had the amazing honor of getting to network with the other Mixers I’ve looked up to and tried to emulate since I first realized I wanted to go into this field. Shawn Holden, a Y-1 Mixer, let me accost her at Location Sound one day. I was so thrilled to meet the woman who I absolutely feel is blazing the trail for women like me.”

Jane Fleck (1981) is a Y-4 with multiple qualifications, a Video Engineer/24-Frame Playback/Sitcom Sound Recordist.

Her take is to “network relentlessly, if the networking does not feel right, rethink what you are asking. Doing for others is part of networking; it is always a two-way street. The woman who hired me for my first job in Los Angeles a zillion years ago recommended me for a job in the last five years as well. Stay in contact, say hi when you can, send thank-you notes when someone helps you out.”

We make strides for all women who may be interested in the technical processes of production, the electronic arts, so cooperation together is tremendous. There is a responsibility to be always at your best. This awareness was expressed by all in different ways.

Jillian Arnold describes her view: “As a woman, I am very mindful that I have to be on my game. I believe I need to know all aspects of my craft well. Therefore, I spend quite a bit of time training and studying on my days off. I often feel I can’t afford to make a mistake without it reflecting poorly upon me, and my gender. Some may say I’m too hard on myself, but I think that I have to be as good as the best.”

Cabell Smith, a pioneering female Sound Mixer, reflects on her thirty-plus year career: “A word of advice—if they offer to carry it for you, let them! I retired in 2005 or 2006, after two hip operations and a back operation. So, I am serious. You really don’t have that to prove anymore.”

Lisa Schway (1993) is a Y-7A, part of a unique team that started in Carsey- Werner Productions’ run of classic TV. The team was a standout for having four women on the floor, as a sound department in a multi-camera studio environment. Technicians Azhar Aluqdah (1996) Y-7A, Yasmin Muniz (1990) Y-8 and Phyllis Bailey Brooks completed the crew.

Lisa sets the scene: “In the late eighties, four of us ‘audio girls’ made up the audio floor crew while working on Grace Under Fire. We were comprised of two Boom Operators and two Boom Pushers. The four of us knew at the time what a special bond we had and that we were so fortunate to have such a supportive and positive team.”

Yasmin Muniz, one of the two Y-8 Fisher boom specialists from that same team, had her first TV run in 1983 on Mama’s Family. She is grateful for her career path “… coming from multi-camera, which is the most stable of all the jobs, we have regular hours. Working on features is grueling. Doing anything single camera is grueling. I respect you who do that work immensely. I was fortunate to have started out in sitcoms.”

Phyllis expands the conversation and says, “My quest now is to continue to be a positive image on set, and to mentor as many young women pursuing this work as I can. This opportunity has given me so much and I continue to be eternally grateful.”

We are having a great exchange within our community regarding the expansion of professional skills, sharing tales of different production styles, expanding job opportunities and experiences, keeping the right attitude and swapping stories from set life. Wisdom hard won through adversity has no substitute.

Rosa recalls: “One of the greatest challenges I met was when filming on the ocean, in fishing boats and sailboats and on the beach. All the elements in the environment were stacked against us. First, we modified a sound cart for beach mode by installing bicycle tires and then made two sets of B-unit ‘run and gun’ style harnesses. We got waterproof cellphone cases and made them fit on transmitters. We added extra shrink-wrap to connectors on cables and to antennas. Our maintenance was immediate, with boom poles being disassembled and cleaned daily. Other than a zodiac-type boat being capsized and dumping my Boom Op in the ocean, we came out of the shoot just fine.”

Currently, women make up less than ten percent of the membership of Local 695, though we trust that there will be more women attracted to work in our technical fields of the industry.

We look forward to continuing this conversation and to drawing new voices into the dialog. Some one-liners to wrap up:

Eva: “I keep a positive attitude; nothing is an obstacle, just a challenge in determination.”

Jillian: “For me, being a woman in the tech world is a non-issue. The screensaver on my phone is a Steve Martin line: ‘Be so good, they can’t ignore you.’ I live by these words.”

Rosa: “Location audio recording is a fusion of art and science in the world of film production. I have always felt my work to be a part of the creative process on set, and negotiated potential difficulties using creativity and flexibility.”

Eva says, “Coping under pressure? I never take anything personally. The prime directive is to do your job exceptionally well while keeping a great attitude. Even if that means throwing on a flashlight and a pair of latex gloves to kill an ice machine in a dive bar …”

Amanda: “I love my job so much and can’t see myself doing anything else, so I’m excited to see where my career takes me. I like bringing something new to the table as far as not being what people expect in a Sound Mixer.”

Theresa Radka (2006) Y-1: “When I am told, ‘I’ve never seen a woman do this,’ I get over my shock and my pat answer is: ‘Well, they needed the best person for the job.’”

Glossary of Y Classifications

The Y numbers specify particular union work classifications as defined in the contract.
Y-1 – Production Sound Mixer
Y-4 – Supervising Sound or Video Engineer
Y-7A – Utility Sound Technician
Y-8 – Microphone Boom Operator
Y-9 & Y-13 – Sound and Video Service Person

Shooting the Cover

Peggy Names recruited her friend, retired cinematographer Julius Metoyer, to take a picture of as many of the women members of Local 695 as they could assemble in one place. They scouted locations together and settled on Brookside Park in Pasadena for its rugged, terraced look and its accessibility and available parking. With assistance from Linda Skinner and Nikki Riordan in the office, Peggy compiled a list of the 146 women members and invited each of them to participate. The first couple of attempts ran into some conflicts with the Academy Awards, rain and the K-Tek open house. When everything finally clicked, the ranks had thinned a bit but the attendees were a good representation of women active in the various disciplines of the Local.

1. Rocky Quiroz
2. Alexandra Gallo
3. Anna Wilborn
4. Carrie Sheldon
5. Valeria Ghiran
6. Amanda Beggs, CAS
7. Peggy Names
8. Jennifer Winslow
9. Susan Moore-Chong, CAS
10. Rosa Costanza Tyabji
11. Patrushkha Mierzwa
12. Veronica Kahn
13. Sunny Meyer
14. Victoria Thoma-Bowes

15. Shawn Holden, CAS
16. Sarah Chilson
17. Cara Kovach
18. Yvette Hill
19. Elizabeth Alvarez
20. Kathryn Ballard
21. Mihaela Jifcu
22. Felicia Starkey
23. Gilah Friedberg
24. Jackie Summers
25. Rita Rubalcava
26. Chantilly Hensley
27. Lisa Gillespie
28. Mary Jo Devenney

Boyhood

Growing Up With Boyhood

by Ethan Andrus, CAS

One of my first real breaks into the world of production mixing for feature films came fifteen years ago in 2000, when I had the opportunity to work on Richard Linklater’s film Waking Life. In 2002, I signed on to his Boyhood project and mixed the first six years. It seems appropriate that as my career has matured, so too has a film that I embarked on with Rick more than a decade ago.

Boyhood is a unique, innovative narrative with an honest and moving portrayal of life, family and growing up. It was a fascinating experience to watch all of the characters, especially Mason Jr., grow and mature throughout the film. We began shooting in 2002, filming approximately three to five days each year. At the final screening, twelve years had passed and the six-year-old Mason Jr. was now eighteen, a young adult beginning college.

I had the benefit of working on two Linklater films (Waking Life, Tape) prior to starting Boyhood, and two more (Fast Food Nation, A Scanner Darkly) during its filming. These experiences gave me insight into Linklater’s filmmaking style and how he would most likely use and mix the sound. In my experience, Rick’s films have always been very dialog-driven, relying heavily on the production track and without the benefit of a lot of masking by ambiences and sound effects. This made the role of the production soundtrack that much more crucial, often living in the mix alone.

The shooting was broken up over twelve years, but the approach was much like a standard feature narrative. We had scripted dialog; rehearsals with the actors took place prior to filming. Our locations at times presented a challenge, as this was a low-budget film, and we didn’t always have the luxury of “owning” our more public locations. Linklater consciously tried to utilize public spaces “as is” to further reinforce the authenticity of the character experience. A few particularly demanding scenes that I recall were the bowling alley and the Astros game at Minute Maid Park, where a live game was taking place.

A critical aspect of this film was documenting the narrative within a real time period that we can all relate to, so it was important that the actors were filmed during an actual baseball game, rather than a staged event. We opted to wire all the actors in this scene in order to get useable dialog during the live game, and also to avoid the excess attention brought on by swinging a boom around in the stadium seats. They naturally spoke up because of the high ambient level around them, which helped a lot, and with a little Post help, the production track made the mix. We did surround our talent with extras, but only in adjacent seats, so no actual spectator would accidently look at the camera.

When presented with the concept of shooting a small portion of a feature length film over the course of twelve years, I knew the issue of changing technology and archiving would be a significant challenge to address. Had production begun just a few years earlier, I would have started with a Nagra and spanned almost the entire continuum of film sound recorder technologies. For production sound recording in this film, the story begins with timecode DAT and ends with digital multi-track field recorders. I utilized multiple machines throughout the process. I began with an HHB Portadat, and then switched to a Fostex PD-4. Shortly thereafter, digital multi-track field recorders became the standard and years 3–6 began with a Fostex PD-6 and ended with a Zaxcom Deva IV. All of these recorders offered different sound deliverables (DAT tapes, 8cm DVD Ram cartridges, DVD RAMs, CF cards and external hard drives), and it had to be coordinated with Post Production Sound for dailies and archiving purposes. All the different formats had to make their way into Pro Tools in preparation for the final mix.

Although I had many recorder changes, my microphone selections remained fairly consistent throughout my years on Boyhood. I used Sennheiser MKH 60s and 416s for exteriors and Sennheiser MKH 50s and Schoeps MK41s for interiors. My wireless changed a bit during the project, switching from Lectrosonics analog wireless to digital. I utilized both cart and bag modes for this film, so my receivers changed from Lectrosonics 211s to 411s and a Venue system with VRT modules. My lavalier microphones were mainly Sanken COS 11s, with an occasional Countryman B6 used.

Unlike camera, where 35mm film was chosen as the consistent image medium, sound recording was a dynamic and ever-changing process. I give credit to Editorial (Sandra Adair) and Post Production Sound (Tom Hammond) for their work on this film, as they were able to adapt to so many different audio formats.

As Mason Jr. aged, so would his voice and this presented a special challenge to this long-running production. We were aware of this situation so Linklater arranged for studio time to re-record any problematic lines after each filming session. That avoided problems with voice matching and ensured a quality track. As I watched the film’s premiere, so many distant memories of our production days and locations became crystal clear, sequentially rolling frame by frame:

• Familiar neighborhoods and schools in central Austin
• The bowling alley and café, just three blocks from my old home
• Sterile apartment buildings and the suburbs on the outskirts of the city
• Downtown Houston
• Minute Maid Park
• The Butterfly Museum and Herman Park
• Mile-long treks through Pedernales State Park
• Process trailer after process trailer, rolling down city streets and country roads

These are great memories, and seeing the completed work gives me the feeling that my role has contributed to a greater artistic whole, which has always been the main aspiration of my filmmaking career.

Needless to say, Boyhood was an extremely interesting and innovative project to work on, and I feel very honored to have been a part of it. Everyone involved was highly invested in this amazing experiment in filmmaking. There was a strong sense of unity and family on the project, each year a family reunion, as we all worked together year after year to see it to fruition. Rick, Producer Cathleen Sutherland, the actors and the crew were all there to accomplish a common goal, and seeing the final product gives me a deep sense of satisfaction.

Unlike a typical feature, filming occupied less than a week each year, so I can only imagine scheduling actors and crew would have been quite the juggling act. Understandably, dates could be somewhat unpredictable and varied from year to year, but we all worked together to make it happen. My tenure on Boyhood ended with the fatherson camping trip, right before Mason Jr. moved to San Marcos. I was able to work on the first six years of the project; in subsequent years, production conflicted with other film commitments.

Fortunately, my colleagues Benjamin Lowry, Benjamin Lazard and Mack Melson, CAS did a great job on the remaining years, and thanks to an outstanding Post Production Sound Department, the sound remains consistent throughout the film. Together, we were able to contribute our part to this film becoming such an exciting success, and I am thrilled to have been a part of it.

Bruce Bisenz

Bruce Bisenz: His Personal Best

by David Waelder
Photos courtesy of Bruce Bisenz

Robert Towne: (recalling an interview prior to hiring him for Personal Best) What got me about Bruce— he did a movie about horse racing and I remember asking him about how he set up the sound on that movie. He told me there was nothing that he had seen or heard [in other horse racing films] that was unique in the way he figured it should be. He went out and recorded sound out on the track of the jockeys in the middle of a race and he said he’d never heard anything like it. It involved the way that the jockeys spoke and how significant [that] was and he described to me the ways in which it was different. I was fascinated because I felt that that’s the sort of thing that I wanted to do with track and field.

Jeff Wexler, CAS: I consider him somewhat of a mentor to me because anytime I was having any difficulty or I was, wanted to build something or had to do a job that I didn’t really understand completely, I would always ask Bruce, well, how would you do this … and Bruce always had an answer. It often was not the answer that I would get from any other Sound Mixer …

Bruce Bisenz has a well-earned reputation as a technical wizard. He designed and built much of the equipment he used throughout his career and he personally performed bias and alignment calibration (not a simple task) for all his recorders. It is particularly remarkable that he is essentially self-taught with little or no formal training in electronics or sound recording practices.

Coming out of military service in 1967, he was unsure what to do next but he had a good friend in David Ronne, who had already established a career in production sound. Bruce had an interest in hi-fi and work as an electronics technician, so David encouraged him to apply to FilmFair where he, until recently, had been working as George Alch’s assistant.

He stayed with FilmFair about two years, replacing David as George Alch’s assistant. He learned everything he could about production sound recording from George and then moved up when George left. He was also involved in Post Production, making transfers and preparing tracks for mixing, an experience that helped develop a sense of what was needed and what worked on screen.

Although he was earning good money at FilmFair, Bruce only stayed another year and left to tour Europe for a network miniseries hosted by skier Jean-Claude Killy. Returning home, he found work on documentaries and corporate projects. His friend David Ronne was then heading the Sound Department for Wolper Productions and recommended him for assignments including a special with historians Will and Ariel Durant and documentaries with Jacques Cousteau.

David Ronne introduced him to the practice of working with a handheld Nagra and a shotgun microphone, starting with a Nagra III and an EV 642 and progressing quickly to a Nagra 4.2 and the Sennheiser 804. That combination was a game-changer at the time.

A recordist, working alone, could produce a quality track that had previously required several people and a truck full of equipment. It was also an excellent training ground; the immediacy of working directly with the recorder and a handheld microphone imparts a keen sense of how microphone position determines the sound.

During this period and his time at FilmFair, he read everything he could find about sound recording and the science behind it, making a vigorous effort to understand all of the factors that determined the characteristics of a recording. This practice of total immersion investigation became a life habit. Portable radio transmitter/receiver sets were becoming more reliable so Bruce wanted to make the lavalier microphones used with them sound more natural. Over time he determined the placement and EQ that would allow him to ‘Mix and Match’ with his fishpole microphones. This was especially important in the days of singletrack dialog recording (no pre-fade backup tracks) when all microphones were mixed together.

Portable mixing panels with full parametric EQ were not available at that time, but David Ronne was building a device with potential. Ronne took out the guts of a Nagra and coupled a microphone preamp to a line preamp and bundled them together in a separate enclosure. Using this outboard preamp allowed feeding a third microphone to the two-input Nagra (or more if one daisy-chained the devices) and several Production Mixers built similar interfaces. (See the profile of Courtney Goodin in the Summer 2011 issue of the 695 Quarterly.) Bruce Bisenz took the design a bit further.

He recognized that the Nagra line output card was sufficiently hot to drive a passive Program or Graphic equalizer and still yield an output that could be recorded through the Nagra line input.

Bruce collaborated with his engineer friend, Paul Bennett, to custom-build a microphone mixer using Nagra cards with Bennett-modified Altec Program and Graphic EQs configured with the curve that Bruce specified to make radio microphones sound natural. They also fit custom 24 dB/octave high-pass and 18 dB/ octave low-pass filters. They even hand-selected capacitors and other components. The capability of this mixer-equalizer coupled with his experiments in microphone placement gave him the tools to tackle nearly any recording challenge.

Television commercials and documentaries were the sole beneficiaries of these skills for a long time but a change in advertising practice nudged Bruce to change direction in his career. He had been happy working commercials but the change from sixty-second to thirty-second spots diminished the work days needed on commercials and encouraged him to seek out long-form work. He was hired to record Damnation Alley in 1977 after audaciously telling Jack Smight, who was directing the picture for Fox, that if he didn’t prefer his work to their regular Mixer (who was unavailable at the time), they should fire him. This was his first studio picture.

Glenn (Rusty) Roland: The Sound Department at Fox got the dailies in from the location recordings and were amazed at how totally perfect they were. [They] didn’t need any additional work ’cause Bruce, you know, was a perfectionist right on set.

Using all the tricks and specialty equipment he had developed for commercials, Bruce produced an excellent track that needed little adjustment in Post. For commercials, he had been a NABET mixer but this project gave him the IA Signatory days he needed to qualify for IATSE membership. After his acceptance into IATSE Local 695, Bruce was able to work on studio pictures.

He worked with Cinematographer John Alonzo on FM and it was Alonzo who recommended him to Director Martin Ritt for Norma Rae.

Norma Rae cemented his reputation as a Sound Mixer of remarkable ability. Much of the action took place in the din of a working textile mill and Ritt’s expectation was that Bruce would only be able to get a scratch track in that environment but even that was not at all certain. On the location scout, he used a Radio Shack sound level meter and measured 103 dB on the machine room floor. That’s a deafening racket but not so loud that people couldn’t communicate. Mill workers wore custom-fitted ear protection in the machine room and he watched them as they would approach one another and speak directly into the other person’s ear. Even then, only the person listening could hear what was said; it was essentially private communication. He had principal actors fitted for ear protection by the mill and specified that the plugs should be molded around his 26 27 miniature microphones. Rather than stringing the earplugs on a cord, he sourced especially thin microphone wire and used that both as a neck-loop and to carry signal to the transmitter. Ritt naturally staged the action to match normal behavior in the machine room and the actors would holler their dialog into a microphone only an inch or so from their lips. While the results didn’t have the quality needed for a production track, they were quite sufficient as a guide track..

Bruce made another key contribution to Norma Rae. Near the end of the film, Sally Field as Norma Rae has a confrontation with the management of the mill and is carted off by police officers. It’s a climatic scene with dialog from several characters and would be chaotic if characters could only communicate by screaming in each other’s ears, one on one. Bruce reviewed this with the Director and encouraged him to find a way to shut down the machines for that scene. Nothing of the sort was scripted but Bruce’s suggestion came a few weeks prior to filming the scene so Ritt had some time to consider the advantages. He and his writers structured the scene so that, after Norma Rae displays her “union” sign, the workers, one by one, shut down the machinery. The scene played very much as Crystal Lee Sutton, the actual Norma Rae, recalled it but it hadn’t been part of the first draft of the script. This work stoppage is arguably the key moment of the movie and intensely powerful.

Each project in a career brings its own set of challenges. Bruce evaluated each circumstance individually and adjusted his approach for the best result. He used whatever tools or techniques would produce a good track.

Nick Allen, CAS: It was so [much] fun to work with Bruce because he would use lots of tools. With Bruce, you’d open the truck and, which of the forty-seven microphones would you like to use today, kid?

Glenn (Rusty) Roland: Bruce was always doing that on sets, he would always hide microphones everywhere … he was always placing those huge, I guess they were Neumann, those huge microphones …

Nick Allen, CAS: He was putting U-87s in the middle of a set and cranking it and getting real dialog they’d use in the movies. He did the wackiest, most obscure things but, like you said, his ears said, you know what, they’ll use that in the mix …

In some cases, the simplest method was the best choice but Bruce was not afraid to swim against common practice if that yielded results. For 10, there was a scene with Julie Andrews singing and Dudley Moore accompanying her on piano. Although he experimented with a plant for the piano, he ended up recording it off Dudley’s radio microphone. Post Production didn’t believe at first, that the piano was recorded on a wireless but he was fearless if a scene sounded good to him. Conversely, hiding microphones the size of a Buick, if they sounded good, was, for him, entirely normal.

Nick Allen, CAS: And he had a “keep trying” attitude. He taught me that if take one was wrong, put something else in on take two. When you find something that’s getting close, tweak it, don’t change. There was this path of methodology.

Regrettably, as Nick went on to say, the pace of production is now so relentless that the first take is often it and there may be no opportunity for adjustment. Whenever possible, he was a bold experimenter in the pursuit of excellence. It’s a dangerous business to be running EQ in a shot—and changing it on the fly, no less! Multi-tracking was not an option at the time and there was a risk of over-compensating and spoiling a track. Nobody gets it right 100% of the time, but Bruce had an enviable batting average. He worked to maintain that record both by doing his preparation carefully to be sure he knew what to listen for and also by keeping his hearing in top form.

Douglas Schulman, CAS: Another thing Bruce does, you know, I don’t know if he’s still doing it, but he would always wear earplugs in his ears when he wasn’t wearing his headphones.

Glenn (Rusty) Roland: Bruce was very protective of his hearing. If we were in a loud place, he’d have earplugs in or something. He did not want to get his ears damaged by bad, loud noises. He had incredible ears for sound.

Bruce regarded his ears as his primary instrument and took pains throughout his career to protect them.

Douglas Schulman, CAS: He didn’t have a problem, I mean, with teaching you something but Bruce was always funny. If he was going to show you something new, he would say, “Now, this is a secret. Don’t tell anybody.”

Nick Allen, CAS: I went to Berklee College of Music, very briefly, only for a couple years. I was studying production engineering and jazz piano and I didn’t learn as much there as I did from being around Bruce.

In the course of his work, Bruce acted as a mentor to several of his boom operators. He recalls a time with Nick Allen when they spent half a day listening to windscreens and cataloging how each one slightly altered tone and ambiance. This kind of attention to detail might seem obsessive but it provides the foundation of understanding that permits responding rapidly to challenges.

Douglas Schulman, CAS: The thing that I learned from Bruce is actually how to listen to stuff … we tend to, with our minds, focus on things and take things out and what I learned from Bruce was to listen more like a microphone which hears everything.

The summation or direction of a 37-year career isn’t often represented in a list of credits. This is especially true with crew people who don’t usually initiate projects but must accept or decline offers as they are available. Bruce Bisenz’s career was more eclectic than most, ranging from Reds, a grand historical vision spanning continents (he did the scenes shot in California) to intimate portrait films like Without Limits, the Steve Prefontaine story. He did performance films like Purple Rain with Prince and he continued to do documentaries like The Making of a Legend: Gone With the Wind. (I’m pleased to have worked with him on a few of the smaller projects like Legend.) Other highlights included Captain Eo and Smooth Criminal/Moonwalker where he engineered the off-speed playback, not a common thing at the time, so that Michael Jackson could dance in slow motion and still be in sync with the music. The one common element of all these projects is that they all received his focused attention and considerable thought. Bruce never “walked” through an assignment; he evaluated each one to consider what an audience should hear on the track and worked to accomplish that. It was just this intelligence that Robert Towne recognized in that first interview with Bruce for Personal Best.

Glenn (Rusty) Roland: Oh yeah. I always thought Bruce was, he was just the best, I mean when you worked with him. It is different than others, that’s for sure, but in a very good way.

Robert Towne: You know, I just said, this is what I need and he somehow delivered it. I honestly can’t say enough good about Bruce in terms of what he brought to his work.

The first thing that Bruce said to me when I interviewed him was that a “successful career implies a successful retirement. If you die in harness, that’s not a successful career.” He’s been retired for eleven years now but continues to be active. He records a live swing band weekly. The Jerome Robbins Dance Archive accepted for the New York City Library the photos of performing flamenco dancers he has been making over the ten years of his retirement.

Interview Contributors

I thank Bruce Bisenz for making himself freely available and for supplying the images that illustrate his profile. I’m also grateful to the following colleagues who made themselves available for interviews:

Nicholas Allen, CAS was a Boom Operator for Bruce starting with Crimes of the Heart through Gilmore Girls. He works today as a Production Mixer.

Glenn (Rusty) Roland, a Cameraman/Director, remembers working with Bruce on motorcycle documentaries like On Any Sunday. He worked with Bruce on commercials and brought him in to do The Making of a Legend: Gone With the Wind.

Douglas Schulman, CAS was Bruce’s Boom Operator on Personal Best, Heart Like a Wheel, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Captain EO and many others. He is a Production Mixer today.

Robert Towne is a Writer/Director. He hired Bruce for Personal Best, Tequila Sunrise and Without Limits.

Jeff Wexler, CAS considers Bruce a mentor; his first assignment in sound was booming for Bruce.

The American West

A remembrance of the The American West

by Bruce Bisenz

I hope you’ll believe me when I say this story’s so good that I didn’t have to embellish—even a little bit.

Seven years into my freelance career, I began to get occasional documentary work with my friends at Wolper Productions and became a regular with Group One Productions.

Those were heady times; newly available portable equipment like the 16mm self-blimped Éclair NPR, George Quellet’s Stellavox SP 7 (Sync/Stereo before the Nagra 4S) and VHF wireless from Vega made it possible for two or three to do the work of a whole crew. And Group One had assembled a skilled group of technicians who could use these new tools to best advantage. Bob Collins, their regular Director of Photography, and Editor Keith Olson had already won Emmys for Peggy Fleming at Sun Valley.

David Vowell, a documentary writer recruited for the project, had to interview a bedridden old man to construct a script. He asked for my help with equipment but jealously controlled access to his invalid, the famous film director, John Ford.

The idea was to film this amazing wreck of a man (still nobody’s fool—scant months from his passing) and combine it with footage from his legendary Westerns and interviews with actors closely identified with him to make a TV special. The American West of John Ford was to be his last project.

I soon found myself at the “Four Corners” juncture of Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico. It is now home to Navajo, Hopi, Ute and Zuni reservations; it is also the location of Monument Valley and the Canyon de Chelly National Monument, the background for virtually all of the John Ford Westerns.

For “Pappy’s” last visit, there was no difficulty getting accommodations or enticing iconic actors like John Wayne, Henry Fonda or Jimmy Stewart to be available. Dennis Sanders, the Director/Editor and Bob Collins, the DP, set up their first shot, an image of “The Duke” (I called him Mr. Wayne) against the desert west that had played such an important part in his own mythic career. Wayne didn’t seem to take to me (after all, I was a “Long Hair”) so I was relieved when a minor incident focused his attention elsewhere. Duke Wayne had his big hat set to shade his eyes from the blazing desert sun when Dennis asked him to tip his hat back a bit for the camera. We all heard him rumble, “the hat stays right where it is!”

I knew that after a hard day of exteriors in the sun, there wouldn’t be any fun in town. We were deep in the Navajo reservation and hours from any town so I brought a deck of cards. I sashayed (this was the Old West) into the lodge’s dayroom and attracted a few players.

After a while, a 240-lb, 6-foot 4-in icon, moved by his unique gait, stood over our table and said to nobody in particular, “Is this a private game or can anybody play?” And a hush came over the room …

Even I knew the response to this straight line. I took a moment to catch his eye, way up there from my chair, and then, remembering to give him a thin smile, I said, “Your money’s as good as anyone’s.” And the Duke sat down!

John Wayne in his element Now, for some reason, everyone in the room wanted to play poker at my table. Soon I found myself with five cronies in Duke’s “Home Game,” all of them millionaires except me. But I had a wad of $100 bills in my jeans and $3,000 was a lot of money back then.

“What’ll we play, Duke?”
“Oh, dealer’s choice” (5/7 card stud and 5-card NOTHING wild).
“What about the stakes, Duke?”
“Um, table stakes?”
“Sure, sure Duke.”

Whatever “table stakes” meant; I was green in this game in more ways than one.

High-stakes poker with John Wayne; it was cutthroat. His cronies kept on “Oh goshing” the Duke as he pulled on the neck of the bottle at his right hand.

“Ah, I can’t drink the way I used to.”

But I noticed the level go steadily down past half.

I started out lucky. I grinned, bet and won with some pots running $500– $700. That was three or four days’ pay. Finally, I had the best “up cards” for seven-card stud. But, for once, my first-to-bet upcards weren’t getting any better. I was surely behind but I kept up my silly grin and the betting as, one by one, the others dropped out.

Head-to-head with John Wayne! I reckoned he was holding two solid pairs. I was drawing to a “Two Outer” and “Dead to Trips” (I learned this lingo in a later century). The last down card was a “Brick” so I “Value Bet” $50 (and kept the dumb grin too).

His cronies kept calling out: “He’s bluffing, call ’em, Duke, call ’em, You gotta call ’em.” That’s when I realized: if they caught me bluffing, they wouldn’t kill me, but I might wish I was dead!

Well, Wayne thought for quite some time before he said, “Nah, he’s been getting some good cards lately” and threw in his hand. Desperately grateful this was the kind of a game no one would think to upend my down cards, I said to myself, remember this one—you just “Bought One From the Duke!”

Editor’s note: A variation of this story was originally published in The Coffey Files.

Photos courtesy of Bruce Bisenz

Gone Girl

Production Sound for Gone Girl

by Steve Cantamessa

My first impulse when the editors of the 695 Quarterly called to ask if I would write a piece on doing production sound for Gone Girl, was to pass and finish my round of golf. More thought and my wonderful wife’s prodding changed my mind but presented me with my next quandary: though I try to keep up with the tech end of my craft and, with affectionate apologies to Mike Paul, my go-to guy for technical matters, production sound is not a terribly literary topic. A microphone with a skilled boom operator in control will render the best sounding track. Not always a doable task these days. It was a pleasure to work on a project that allowed us to use this technique. I spoke about penning this with a friend who reminded me that I have now become one of the new “old guys” and that I should just write what I know. So here we are.

Before my interview with David Fincher, I didn’t really know much about him, other than that I enjoyed his films and the work of his sound designer, Ren Klyce. That they sought me out was a compliment in itself. Thanks to my dad Gino’s lifelong involvement, cinema has been part of my life since before I was born. Talking with a respected director like Fincher promised to be interesting at the least. We sat down and I instantly saw that he knows what I do and has an informed opinion of how he thinks it should be done. Sadly, these days many may think they know what we do and how we do it, but they are usually mistaken. David Fincher knows. We discussed my approach to things on the set along with various advances in technology, and then he asked me to do the show.

It didn’t take me more than a couple of hours into the first day to realize that David Fincher was that rarest of birds these days—a director who does his homework and knows exactly what he wants when he gets on the set. And I mean exactly. Too often these days, many directors like to temporize important decisions. Others look at the call sheet and check things off and still others never seem to want to go home. On a Fincher movie, it is clear that everyone on the set has the same goal: to do his or her best work in order to make the best movie possible. Fincher crews his shows with the best people based, not on their ZIP codes, but on their body of work. From DP Jeff Cronenweth to Costume Designer Trish Summerville, everyone was helpful and mindful of the big picture, not just his or her own tasks. He understands that such efficiency on set will save far more money than any state tax credit ever will. He shoots his movie, not a corporate schedule.

Gone Girl was, I believe, the first show to use the Red Epic Dragon—a 6k camera capable of stunning imagery. As with the “first” of anything, there were issues. Specifically, considerable fan noise emanated from the front of the camera, where the actors usually are. The temperature of the chip in the Red was crucial, and seventy-two degrees was the magic number; once the camera readout on my video assist monitor went to seventy-three, I knew things were going to get noisy. Happily, the people at Red were most helpful. Though we started shooting in Missouri on mostly exterior locations, I knew that once we returned to LA for stage work, that fan noise would pose a big problem. Having been around the block a few times, when I explained this to the folks at Red I assumed that they wouldn’t give a damn about some sound mixer’s problems, probably being up to their own back ends with image tech problems. I was wrong. They listened, they asked questions and they wanted to hear my ideas. I told them that the fan noise coming out the front was a big issue and that it needed to be re-routed in some way. By the time we had returned to California, they had designed and built baffles that mounted to the front of the camera, routing the “sonic exhaust” around the side and then out the back. I was genuinely thankful and impressed that they cared. Most importantly, it worked.

The movie is wall-to-wall dialog, and my Boom Operator, Scott LaRue, was a busy guy; personal relief and lunch were the extent of his downtime. Our utility man was Brad Ralston, always a big asset with the gear and frequently serving as Second Boom Operator. Scott and I have been together since about 1992, so any discussion of how a shot is to be done is usually quite brief. Scott tells me how he sees it and I say, “Whatever you think.” There are those few occasions where I ask him to wire someone, but such requests are sometimes unwelcome. I do recall that when I was booming, I hated it when a mixer would tell me to wire someone I felt I could easily get with the boom. It must be a boom operator thing, but the fact is that he’s been putting me over for years and I am truly grateful.

It seems like we were always either rolling or setting up. To repeat, Fincher does his homework. The sets in Hollywood were beautiful and well built, but without greenbeds. It’s just the way it is now, most sets have ceilings and lighting is done differently, but booming on a ladder over a wall through a slightly raised ceiling piece certainly isn’t the most elegant approach.

HARDWARE NOTE: My standard package consists of a Cooper 208 mixing panel, an Aaton Cantar X2, Lectrosonics 411 radios with SMA transmitters, Tram lavaliers and 416s on booms transmitted via Lectrosonics 400 transmitters. And, of course, plenty of IFBs for the Director, Script Supervisor, Camera and Producers.

Even with all the dialog we had to record, I can’t recall David ever telling our department how we should do things. Again, Fincher’s hiring philosophy: he made it clear that being streamlined was important. Just do the job to the best of your ability without making everything into a sound issue. Find problems during rehearsals and get them solved while the DP is lighting so that, when the actors step in, you are ready to go. I don’t know how others do things, but this is how we always work. I can only judge from what I saw when I was booming. There’s a lot to be taken from having seen the likes of Kirk Francis, Jeff Wexler, Bill Kaplan, Eddie Tise and my dad Gino. These guys got to the top because they are professional filmmakers, very good at a most unique craft.

Back to Fincher: ask him a question and he’ll give you an answer immediately without any doubt or hesitation. This makes for a far more rewarding way to spend the day than the currently popular “Oh, just wire them all.” On the few occasions where he ran a tight camera with a wide shot, he would roll ten seconds of a clear frame and then have us bring the microphone into the shot. The ten seconds of clear frame provided a plate he could use to remove the microphone from the wide shot so the sound would not be compromised by the shooting plan.

Everyone involved in Gone Girl respected one another’s department and worked as colleagues. The focus and intensity on Fincher’s set benefited our department immensely. The actors never complained about wires. The Electric Department never jammed a generator up our butt. We never had to ask the dolly grips to quiet a track. The effects people were preternaturally aware of any sound implications. Locations were pre-scouted by the Locations Department for any sound issues, and those problems were solved before we got there. The sets were always dead quiet. For instance, we had a practical police station set located on a busy street in Culver City. David had the Construction Department build vestibules at each of the doors to the outside so we might have significantly diminished traffic noise yet still see extras come and go.

The scene with Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike (Nick Dunne and Amy Dunne) in the shower was the one place that was a bit challenging and was the only set where David couldn’t arrange things to our advantage. There was quite a bit of dialog at a low level with water running the whole time. The FX Department was helpful by painting “hogs hair” the same color as the tile. This allowed us to quiet the sound of the water hitting the tile floor and, being the same color, didn’t adversely affect any of the lighting. They also plumbed the water lines and packed them with sound-absorbing material to ease the sound of the water running through the pipes. The Construction Department removed out-of-shot glass panes as we worked so Scott could get the microphone into the shower and get the dialog. Again, everyone helped.

Some of the questions that come up when someone finds out that I mixed Gone Girl are fascinating to me. One is about the number of takes. Granted, he does a lot of takes but what’s the big deal? There is always a reason for them. Any direction I heard him give to an actor, or any department for that matter, was concise and thoughtful. The second question is regarding the sound style used on the dialog throughout the film. I wish I could answer this but I wasn’t there in Post; Ren Klyce, the Re-recording Mixer, would have the answer. What I do know is that David likes to use sound, even the dialog, to create certain moods and feelings that do not follow the normal rules. Everything you see and hear in a Fincher movie is intentional and controlled by David’s sensibilities. You may like the style, you may not, but I assure you that none of it is due to a mistake, laziness or lack of attention.

Those who know me know that I would make a poor courtier and seldom sugarcoat things. That said, I enjoyed the Gone Girl experience and got immense personal satisfaction from working on such a good film that people will enjoy watching. Working with good actors, talented technicians and a good director is all any sane person in this business could or should ever want. It is no mistake that nearly every review of Gone Girl includes mention of the high quality of the technical aspects of the film. David Fincher showed the good sense to hire from the best talent pool in the land to get what he wanted. Now, about my golf swing…

Glossary of highlighted words

Greenbeds A series of catwalks above the sets in a studio.
Hogs hair A woven filter material for heaters and air conditioners, used on sets to soften the sound of water droplets hitting a surface.

Jimmy Songer and the Development of Video Assist

by David Waelder

Video Village is a standard feature on the modern movie set. Producers, writers, clients and others can view the action clustered around a monitor far enough away from the set to stay out of trouble. Their segregation in the video ghetto allows camera people and others to go about their tasks without the distraction of people jockeying for position at the viewfinder. It also helps makeup and wardrobe personnel to see how their work appears on camera and it has become an essential tool for the director and continuity person. Even the sound crew benefits by having extension monitors to see the frame and position the boom microphone. All this is made possible by a video assist system perfected by Jimmie Songer, a Local 695 technician.

The advantages of using a video camera as an aid to directing movies were apparent from the very beginning. Several directors began to set up TV cameras adjacent to the film camera so they could see an approximate frame. This became a common practice particularly on commercials where the placement of the product is crucially important. To match the view and perspective, assistants would carefully adjust the aim and image size to closely approximate the view of the film camera.

Of course, that isn’t really a video assist system. The image is useful for the simplest shots but not much help when the camera moves or the lens is adjusted. Every setup change or lens adjustment necessitates a recalibration of video camera position and exposure settings. To be a fully functional system, both the video and film cameras would have to view the scene through the same lens to avoid parallax errors and exposure sensitivities would have to track together. This presents a series of technical challenges.

It was a cowboy from East Texas with little formal education who took on the challenge and worked out all the engineering obstacles. Jimmie Songer grew up on a ranch in Burleston, south of Fort Worth, with a keen interest in how radio and television worked. He and his friend, Don Zuccaro, would purchase crystal radio kits, assemble them and string the antenna wire along his mother’s clothesline.

As a teenager, he took a road trip that would set up the course of his life. He and his friends traveled north as far as Bloomington, Indiana, when funds began to run out. Looking for a job to replenish assets, he applied to the RCA plant on Rogers Street. Ordinarily, his lack of formal training would have been an impediment but RCA was just then experimenting with designs for color sets and there was no established technology to learn. By diagramming from memory the circuit design of a popular RCA model, he demonstrated familiarity with the major components and was hired on the spot to be a runner for the engineers developing the new color system.

His duties at RCA consisted largely of gathering components requested by the engineers and distributing them. Along the way, he asked questions about the function of each element and how it fit into the overall design. He stayed about a year, not long enough to see the model CTC4 they were developing go on sale. That didn’t happen until a couple of years later in 1955. But, when he did move back to Texas, he had a pretty good understanding of how video, and color video in particular, worked.

Graduating from crystal radio sets, he and his friend, Don Zuccaro, made a mail-order purchase of plans for a black & white television. Components were not readily available at that time but Jimmie and Don were ingenious and purchased a war surplus radar set with A&B scopes and cannibalized it for parts. The task of hand-winding the tuning coil was simplified because Fort Worth had only one TV station so there was no need to tune anything other than Channel 5.

With skills honed from building his own set and working at the RCA plant in Indiana, Jimmie Songer quickly found work with appliance shops in the Fort Worth area that were beginning to sell television sets but had no one to set them up, connect antennas and service them when needed. This led to an offer, in 1953, to work setting up KMID, Channel 2, in the Midland Odessa area. After a few years with KMID, he worked awhile in the Odessa area and then returned to Fort Worth but he stayed only a year before setting out for Los Angeles in April 1963.

In Los Angeles, he worked at first for a TV repair shop in Burbank while he tinkered with his own experimental projects. Hearing that Dr. Richard Goldberg, the chief scientist at Technicolor, was looking for people with experience with color, he sought him out and secured a job calibrating the color printers. Dr. Goldberg was also developing a two-perforation pull-down camera for widescreen use. Songer became fascinated by the possibility of using that design at 48 fps to make alternate images, one atop the other, which might be used for 3D and built some experimental rigs to test the idea.

This work with Dr. Goldberg in the early ’60s brought him to the attention of Gordon Sawyer at Samuel Goldwyn Studios. Sawyer wanted him to help with an ongoing project for Stan Freberg involving simultaneous video and film recording. Freberg was using side-by-side cameras to create video records of film commercials. The side-byside positioning produced parallax errors but his commercials were mostly static. Generally, the results were good enough for timing and performance checks. But issues of accurately tracking motion would arise whenever the camera did move and Stan Freberg wanted a better system.

Under general supervision from Gordon Sawyer, the team first addressed the issue by adjusting the position of the video camera. They attached a small Panasonic camera to the mount for an Obie light. This put the video lens exactly in line with the film camera lens and only a couple of inches above it. Left-right parallax was effectively eliminated and the vertical alignment could be adjusted to match the film camera with only minimal keystone effect. By affixing a mirror just above the lens mount at a 45-degree angle and mounting the video camera vertically to shoot into the mirror, they reduced vertical parallax to almost nothing. Jimmie Songer addressed the keystone problem by devising a circuit that slightly adjusted the horizontal scan, applying an opposite keystone effect to neutralize the optical effect that was a consequence of slightly tilting the video camera to match the film camera image. Most of the time, this system worked well but there were still limitations. The video system needed to be recalibrated with every lens change. Even with careful adjustment, use of a separate lens for the video meant that depth of field would be different so the video image would only approximate the film image. Blake Edwards knew Gordon Sawyer and approached the team to design a system suitable for movies with moving cameras and frequent lens changes.

The limitations could only be resolved if the video camera used the very same lens used by the film camera. Accomplishing that would require exact positioning of the video lens and adjusting sensitivity of the system both to obtain sufficient light for exposure and to track with the film exposure. Jimmie Songer set about developing a system that could be built into a Panavision Silent Reflex camera (PSR) that used a pellicle mirror to reflect the image to the viewfinder. They left the image path from the lens to the film completely untouched but introduced a second pellicle mirror to reflect the image from the ground glass to a video camera they built into the camera door. This one design change eliminated many of the limitations of previous systems in one stroke. Since the video used the film camera lens and picked up the exact image seen by the film and the camera operator, issues of parallax and matching depth of field were completely eliminated. There was no need to recalibrate the system with every lens change and the video camera was configured to use the same battery supply as the camera. The introduction of a second pellicle mirror did flip the image but Songer corrected this easily by reversing the wires on the deflection coil. But the issue of having sufficient light for the video image still remained.

In one way, a pellicle reflex system is ideal for video use. Unlike a mirror shutter, the pellicle system delivers an uninterrupted image to the viewfinder so there is no need to coordinate the 30-frame video system with a 24-frame film camera. While there would be more frames in a single second of video, the running times would match and that was all that was important. Furthermore, the video image would be free of the flicker seen in the viewfinder of a mirror shutter camera. However, the pellicle mirror used in the reflex path deflected only about one-third of the light to the viewfinder. That was no problem when filming outside in daylight but there was insufficient light when working interiors.

Jimmie Songer needed to make three refinements to the system to address the exposure issue. First, he replaced the vidicon tube that was normally fitted to the camera with a newly available saticon tube that was more sensitive and also provided 1,600 lines of resolution. That helped but wasn’t enough. He then adjusted the optics so that the image, rather than being spread over the full sensitive area of the tube, was delivered only to the center portion. By concentrating on the image, he obtained more exposure and adjusting the horizontal and vertical gain allowed him to spread out the smaller image to fill the monitor. But, there are limits to how much can be gained by this approach. Even with a high-resolution saticon tube, the image will begin to degrade if magnified too far. There was still not enough light for an exposure but the video system had been pushed to its limits so Songer turned his attention to the film camera.

Recognizing that the ground glass itself absorbed a considerable amount of light, Songer contacted Panavision and asked them to fabricate a replacement imaging glass using fiber optic material. Although the potential of using optical fibers for light transmission had been recognized since the 19th century, the availability of sheets of tightly bundled fiber suitable for optics was a recent development in the 1960s. The fiber optic ground “glass” was the trick that made the system work, allowing the video camera function with the light diverted to the viewfinder.

Jimmie Songer and his assistant used the system, first called “instant replay” but now renamed “video assist” to avoid confusion with sports replay systems, on The Party in 1968 and then Darling Lili in 1970. It worked flawlessly, delivering the exact image of the main camera so Blake Edwards, the Director, could follow the action as it happened. It never held up production; to the contrary, Edwards said that it streamlined production because the certain knowledge of how the take looked freed him from making protection takes.

After Darling Lili, the key figures behind the project formed a company, Video West, to further develop the system. They met with rep representatives of the ASC to draw up a series of specifications for video assist systems. Don Howard was brought in to interface the camera with the playback system and operate it in the field. Harry Flagle, the inventor of Quad-Split viewing technology and one of the Ampex engineers who worked on the development of the Model VR-660 portable two-inch recorder, joined the team soon after.

They next used the system on Soldier Blue, directed by Ralph Nelson, and then Wild Rovers, again with Blake Edwards. It proved so popular with producers that Songer and Don Howard, his assistant who was primarily responsible for operating and cuing the video recorder, scheduled projects months in advance and went from film to film. The work was so tightly booked that they sometimes had to ship the camera directly from one project to the next without a return to the shop.

Jimmie Songer joined Local 695, sponsored by Gordon Sawyer, shortly after Darling Lili and continued as a member until his membership was transferred to Local 776 in 1997. In the course of his career, he obtained seventeen US patents for a variety of innovations in high-definition TV and 3D video imaging.

In 2002, he received a Technical Achievement Award from the Academy for his work developing video assist. He lives today on a ranch near Fort Worth but continues to refine the video engineering work that has been his life.

Video Assist

A quote, attributed to Tacitus, claims that success has many fathers while defeat is an orphan. It’s just so with the invention of video assist which is claimed by several people. Jerry Lewis is often cited as the inventor and he certainly incorporated simultaneous video recording in his filming practices very early. He began development work in 1956 and first used a video record and playback system during the filming of The Bellboy in 1960. He used the system to view and evaluate his own performance immediately after each take. But the system he used on The Bellboy was the simplest version; a video camera was lashed just above the main lens and would be adjusted to approximately match the view of the film camera lens with each setup. Later, Jerry Lewis also worked to develop a system that would use a pellicle mirror to view the image through the primary lens.

The assertion that Jerry Lewis “invented” video assist is overstated. The original patent for a video assist system dates to 1947 and subsequent patents in 1954 and 1955 added the refinements of merging optical systems to eliminate parallax and adding a second beamsplitter to permit simultaneous use of video and film viewfinders. The integrated video systems that came into general use in films were the work of many individuals each building on the accomplishments of predecessors. Jimmie Songer’s contributions were many and essential as recognized in 2002 by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Glossary for highlighted words

Deflection coil – In a CRT (cathode ray tube), the beam of electrons is aimed by magnetic fields generated by coils of wire surrounding the tube. Adjusting the electrical energy sent to different coils directs the electron stream.

Obie light – A diffuse light mounted very near the camera lens, typically just above the matte box, to provide soft fill on faces in close-ups. Lucien Ballard, ASC developed the light to photograph Merle Oberon after her face was scarred in an auto accident.

Pellicle mirror – A semi-transparent mirror used in optical devices. A pellicle reflects a certain percentage of light and allows the remainder to pass through. In the Panavision PSR camera, a pellicle mirror deflected approximately 30% of light to the viewfinder and passed about 70% to the film plane.

Saticon tube – A saticon tube is a refinement of the vidicon tube design that adds particular chemicals to the photosensitive surface to stabilize the signal.

Vidicon tube – A vidicon is one of the early image capture devices made for television cameras. An image focused on a photoconductive surface produces a charge-density pattern that may be scanned and read by an electron beam.

Jersey Boys Music

by Mark Agostino

When Production Sound Mixer Walt Martin called me to do playback on Jersey Boys, he and I assumed it was going to be just that, playback. Why would we think otherwise? This was how it had been done for decades. Well, we didn’t know it yet, but we were totally wrong.

There were weeks of emails and phone calls with the producers and Walt, and rumor after rumor about how we were going to shoot the musical scenes of the film. Finally, we had an answer. Clint Eastwood wanted to record everything live on set—all of the instruments and all of the vocals. He didn’t want to do pre-records. He wanted to get on set and actually shoot the guys performing in the moment. It sounded challenging. With my background in studio and live recording, I welcomed the challenge. Well, this challenge was going to be monstrous. It would be the most exciting and technically complex production work of my career.

It would have been less complicated if the actors sang and played their own instruments. If that were the case, we would simply set up some microphones for the vocals and drum kit, plug in a few direct boxes for the guitars and keyboard, put together a monitor mix so everyone could hear each other and start recording some takes. Unfortunately, the actors were only singers, not musicians, and one of them was neither. This was getting more complex. We were going to need offcamera musicians to play the instruments, bass, guitar, keyboard and drums, that the actors couldn’t play themselves. Most of the time we had an on-camera drummer and this added an additional challenge since we needed to mic the entire kit and none of the microphones could be visible. Let’s just say, it was rarely the same thing twice. Many times we were informed which musicians were being used themorning- of. Fun!

After a few meetings with the Producers, Walt and the 1st AD, David M. Bernstein, determined that we were going to need three things:

First, in order to give Post-Production the most flexibility, we needed to individually rig microphones for all of the instruments and vocals and record them to discreet tracks.

Second, after the performances were shot from the front, and, to allow the actors to save their voices, we needed the ability to quickly play back a good sounding mix of any of the previously recorded takes once the cameras had turned around to shoot the audience. The faster this could happen, the better. I had heard stories about the efficiency and speed of Clint’s shoots, and was told by the producers and 1st AD that he moved fast. They weren’t kidding!

Third, since we were going to have off-camera performers and oncamera performers, everybody needed to be able to hear themselves and each other. We would need a headphone mix for the off-camera performers and a separate foldback monitor mix for the on-camera performers.

One of the major obstacles doing a live recording is controlling the amount of unavoidable leakage from the foldback monitors into the stage microphones. This would have to be minimized as much as possible. I made sure the producers were totally aware of this from the start. They completely understood and were prepared to replace things in Post if need be.

With all of this in mind, I devised a plan that basically (and luckily) held true to form throughout the shoot.

We were going to need two multitrack recording systems on set at all times. The first would be specifically used for recording the bands. The second (which I was going to operate) would record, on up to no more than eight tracks, submixes of the band from the first system and, at the same time, all of the vocal microphones. This would allow me, with a more consolidated session, to switch from recording mode to playback mode, do a quick mix and be ready for playback as soon as the cameras had turned around to shoot the audience. On top of that, since I then had all of the musical elements at my disposal, I could route whatever was needed to either the headphone or on-stage monitoring systems.

I soon realized that this project was going to be a huge technical undertaking. It was going to require live recording, sound reinforcement, music mixing and music playback. I could do all of these things myself, but there was no way that I could do all of these things by myself at the same time.

For the first time in my 18-year career in music playback, I needed a crew. With the immediate and full support of the producers, I began my search.

I needed someone to run the first recording system and focus specifically on mic’ing and recording all the instruments, someone who had studio and live music recording experience, someone who would take control and make decisions without me having to hold their hand. (I was going to have a huge amount of work myself.) I needed someone who knew how to do it all low profile. Those people who wanted to bring in a recording studio in a semi-truck just wouldn’t do; this person had to have a small footprint and be mobile. Looking for someone with the rare compliment of skills this job would require, two people came immediately to mind, but neither of them were in the industry anymore. I gave it a shot anyway. To my delight, one of them was all in. Tim Boot became my first crew member and he would turn out to be phenomenal, as I had expected. Next, we needed someone to primarily assist Tim with mic’ing all of the instruments each and every day, making sure the off-camera musicians had all the elements they needed for their headphone mixes, handing out earwigs, and other less-than-glamorous tasks. We needed someone to hold it all together, someone to keep us out of trouble. Along came Cristina Meyer. She too was phenomenal and truly invaluable to both Tim and me throughout the shoot. In fact, on Day One, even though Tim and I had only been working with her for a few hours, she was doing such an incredible job that we convinced her to ditch a scheduled gig so she could stay with us for the entire Jersey Boys shoot. What a relief!

Now that we had a team, I was excited to get to it. It was definitely the largest sound/music department I had ever worked in. On the regular music days, the combined department consisted of six people (three sound personnel and three music personnel). However, we had eight sound/music people working together on the really complex music days. . There were a few days I specifically recall from the shoot because of their complexity or it was a completely new experience or the amount of work we did in one day was greater than what I had done in an entire week on other shows. Let me tell you about a couple of them.

Day One: For some reason, I always remember the first day of a show. I remember this first day in particular because I got to meet Clint as we were setting up. (That was cool. He was cool.)

The location was a bar. There were four singers and a drummer on a very small stage. In an adjacent room, Tim and I had our systems set up. Tim used Boom Recorder on a Mac Mini and I used a Pro Tools HD Native Thunderbolt system on my Macbook Pro. Beside us were the guitar, bass and keyboard players. All of these off-camera instruments went through direct boxes. This gave us very clean recordings and created no extraneous sound on stage (above the foldback mix) to interfere with the acoustic recording.

To mic the drums, Tim used this wonderful set of miniature DPA microphones. He and Cristina developed a fantastic system of attaching the microphones to the rims (or sometimes the shells) of the drums and to the cymbal stands away from camera so they wouldn’t be seen.

For off-camera monitoring, we set up a small mixer near the offcamera musicians so that they could adjust their own headphone mix. The outputs of their direct boxes were split. One output went to Tim’s console to be recorded and the other output fed the headphone mixer. Since Tim was feeding me submixes of all of the instruments, I then routed whatever instruments were on stage (in this case the drums) to additional channels on the headphone mixer so the offcamera players could also hear the on-stage musicians.

The vocal microphones were another challenge. Since the time period of this film ranged from the ’50s into the ’90s, Props was going to have some pretty old microphones for several of the performances. Walt and I went through as many microphones as we could before we started shooting. Luckily, many of them worked well and sounded pretty damn good for being so old. There were a few, however, that were completely unusable for recording purposes. In these cases, Gail Carroll-Coe and Randy Johnson of the Sound Department did a fabulous job of attaching lavalier microphones to the faces of the old microphones, with great results. Then, since we did playback when the cameras went on stage to shoot the audience, the lavaliers would not be needed anymore and we removed them.

All of the vocal microphones were split at my cart. One set of outputs went to Walt for recording and I recorded a second set. I also sent a mix of the vocal microphones to an additional channel on the offcamera headphone mixer so those guys could hear the vocalists.

Finally, I hid a few speakers on stage so the performers there could hear their vocals and, most importantly, the off-camera instruments. That tied it all together.

As you can imagine, we had a pretty extensive setup each day. I initially asked for three hours and wasn’t sure even that would be enough. We weren’t just setting up a simple multitrack live recording, we were setting up a dual system multitrack recording session linked between two different rooms with a headphone monitoring system in one and a completely independent foldback system in the other. We just made it on Day One. Of course, we became more and more proficient with our setup as the show progressed. I think we may have cut the setup time down to an hour by the middle of the shoot. We had the process dialed in.

The most important thing was that the actors could hear everything they needed to hear in order to give their best performances. We had to provide whatever they needed to feel comfortable on stage.

Eventually, our setup was complete, and we did our first shot of the show. It was the songs “Apple of My Eye” and “I Can’t Give You Anything but Love.” We were all pleased that it went well and I must say, I was certainly a little relieved.

As we went along, there were, of course, minor adjustments/additions to the initial system design. The musicians that were hired were absolute professionals, but the first few performances were recorded completely free-time. No click (metronome) was used. Clint made it clear in the beginning that there was to be no click track. We weren’t even allowed to say the “c” word on set. The drummer was amazing. He truly kept as solid a tempo as anyone could. However, in order to help in the editing process, the producers wanted to be sure that the tempo did not slip between takes. As a result, we began sending a click to an earwig for the drummer. It was also fed to the off-camera musicians to keep everyone in time. The only problem that arose here was the drummer’s inability to hear the click through the tiny earwig. As anyone who’s ever used earwigs knows, they are best for hearing cues when the rest of the environment is relatively quiet. With the noise created by the drummer actually playing and the foldback speakers putting out a decent amount of level, it was understandably rather difficult to hear the click through the little earwig. Many times we had to give him one for each ear. This wasn’t a problem because there was hardly ever a close-up of the drummer.

As I’ve already said, it was rarely the same thing twice. Musicians were constantly being added to the ensemble the-morning-of just prior to shooting. Sometimes they were off-camera, other times they were to be on-camera. We learned to expect and be prepared for anything, and being prepared simply meant being prepared to change.

There were certainly many other notable days on the shoot. A few of them occurred during what the 1st AD called Hell Week. Ha! That was an understatement.

During this week there were going to be three absolutely crazy days. Two of those days, each at a different location, would have multiple performance areas, and one day would have a single performance at each of two different locations. Yup, one day we were going to have performances at two different locations. WHAT? It takes us close to three hours to put together our basic setup. How are we going to have time to break that down, pack up, move everything, load into the next location, and set it all back up again? Not only that, this particular day was to begin at one location with our basic four-piece band/four-vocalist setup for “My Boyfriend’s Back” and “Walk Like a Man.” Then, we had a company move to a location where we were going to shoot a twenty-piece big band performance of “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You.” Were we going to have another three hours to set up at the second location? I thought, we are going to need a bit more than three hours for THAT setup. We would later be informed that, in addition to the twenty-piece big band, there would be a separate three-piece off-camera band at the same time. YIKES!! That day was going to be huge.

Our saving grace was that we weren’t shooting the day before. It was a holiday, and we were able to pre-rig the second location as much as possible. This meant setting up Tim’s gigantic Yamaha DM 2000 console, plugging in and testing over 40 microphones (which then had to be disconnected because the set wasn’t finished), and putting up some extra speakers and amps I luckily had that wouldn’t be needed at the first location.

The plan was for Tim to immediately break down at the first location as soon as we entered playback mode and get any gear he needed over to the second location as fast as possible. I think we actually had Cristina transport a few of Tim’s things over there during the first part of the day when they were no longer needed at the first location. Cristina would follow him and they would begin reconnecting the big band microphones, setting up the off-camera band microphones and headphone system, and preparing everything they could before the rest of the company arrived. I was left behind to do playback for our final shots of the audience.

As soon as we were finished at the first location, I packed up and moved my gear over to the next one as quickly as possible. Tim and Cristina were flying through the setup. I dove full on into connecting my system to Tim’s, verifying signal flow from his console to mine, and making sure that the on-stage foldback system was happy. I happened to glance around and was amazed at how much gear we had at that location … and on the show itself. I remember having to pull something out of my garage in the middle of the project and thinking to myself how empty it looked. By that time, I had brought in just about every piece of gear I owned, and we used every bit of it at one point or another.

We were moving right along. Tim was going to be recording 48 tracks, so I quickly filled up and surpassed my self-allotted eight-track band submix limit for playback. Happily, there was only one vocal microphone.

Once again, we had barely finished our setup when the 1st AD called for the first rehearsal. There was so much equipment, so many microphones, so many cable runs, electrons flowing and neurons firing. When I think about it sometimes, with all of the thousands of components and interconnections, I am amazed and relieved when it all just works.

We eventually started shooting and everything went as smoothly as on Day One. It was really exciting to be involved in such a grand production. I felt proud to have been chosen to be a part of it.

As it would happen though, I had been so busy that I didn’t fully absorb the spectacular musical creation that had just taken place. Only after we had entirely finished the live recording segment of that location did it begin to sink in. It was time to go into playback mode and put together a nice mix for everyone to listen to while we did shots of the audience. I finally had a chance to breathe and something happened: I was now actually listening to the full mix of the performance. I wasn’t zoning in and soloing individual microphones to make sure the signal was clean. I wasn’t monitoring recording levels to be sure there weren’t any overloads. I wasn’t riding the vocal channel to be sure “Frankie’s” vocal level was consistent for him in the foldback speakers. I was now listening to over 20 musicians playing as one with “Frankie Valli” singing his heart out, and it sounded incredible. I was only listening in mono through a four-inch monitor on my cart, but it truly sounded amazing. When we did the first playback on the big speakers, I literally got goose bumps. The dynamics of the band, the smoothness of “Frankie’s” voice, the energy of all those involved was absolutely thrilling. All through my career there have been moments like this that have brought forth powerful and electrifying emotions I’ve never felt in any other line of work. To experience feelings like these on the job is my definition of success. As I had done so many times before, I thought to myself … there is, without a doubt, nothing else I’d rather be doing.

That day was the most exhilarating and, at the same time, most technically challenging movie-making experience of my career. Tim and Cristina did an exceptional job and would continue to excel throughout the rest of the shoot. I couldn’t have found a better team and can’t thank them enough. It was an absolute pleasure working with Walt and his team. They were always willing to lend a hand if we needed it.

In the end, it really felt great to have accomplished all that we did. To my knowledge, what we had done had never been done before. I am so thankful to Walt Martin, the producers, and Clint Eastwood for allowing me to join them in such an extraordinary adventure. As I was packing up on the last day, the producer, Rob Lorenz, said to me, “Thanks, Mark. Thanks for making it work.” That meant a lot.

Recording Production Sound for Fury

Recording Sound For Fury

By Lisa Piñero

In June 2013, I was called to do a series of reshoots for Sabotage, the David Ayer–directed film that I’d worked on the previous fall. While shooting, I learned that Dave’s next film, Fury, was gearing up to shoot in England. I wanted in.

I love working with Dave; his unconventional shooting style and focused vision on End of Watch and Sabotage, the two films on which I’d previously collaborated with him, forced us to find creative ways to capture the dialog along with real-time sync tracks of actual environmental sounds.

But Fury was going to be different. This was a passion project for Dave; he had written a story that had attracted a fantastic cast, including Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman, Jon Bernthal, Michael Pena, Jason Isaacs and Scott Eastwood. It was set in the battlefields of World War II, in Germany near the end of the war, and would be shot on 35mm anamorphic film by Roman Vasyanov, the Director of Photography I had enjoyed working with on End of Watch. Dody Dorn was onboard to edit and Andrew Menzies, whose work I had admired on other films, would be the Production Designer.

For this film, Dave planned a much more conventional visual style. Although the idea of a conventional visual style may imply a comfort zone of a familiar process and “old school” sound recording techniques, this is never the case on a David Ayer project. Dave challenges everyone involved in his films to push the limits of their craft. He strives for a sense of reality in his work that forces us to re-think our assumptions about the filmmaking process.

Once I knew I was headed to England, priority one became finding a crew that could handle the job and that was able to work in the UK. I immediately thought of Ben Greaves, who I had enjoyed working with earlier in the year and who I knew had the demeanor and skills to get the job done properly. Ben currently works and resides in Los Angeles, but he has a UK

passport, a flat in London and the contacts to pull together a good local crew for the show. Ben came aboard as my Boom Operator and we brought on local London Production Sound Mixer Tarn Willers to handle the sound utility position and act as our Second Unit Sound Mixer. We also brought on Tim Surrey to work as our fourth, along with Sound Utility Frank Barlow, who came in frequently as our top dailies hire.

At the end of August 2013, I set off for a month of prep at Pinewood Studios. Packed in my bags were manuals and notebooks filled with photos and diagrams of actual World War II tanks and tank crew field gear, including communications systems, along with actual pieces of US surplus Sherman tank communications gear, including plug-in BC-606 comm boxes, throat microphones and helmet headphone wiring. Forty-five cases of sound gear were shipped and on the way to Pinewood Studios, and a new sound cart, designed with our shooting environment in mind, was being built for me by Malcolm Davies in Manchester, UK.

Early in prep it was determined that we would have essentially three shooting scenarios involving tanks:

1) Exterior Tank Action, in which tank commanders would perform scenes with each other and need to speak/hear one another on one channel (tank-to-tank), while tank drivers (specialist/stunt drivers) would have to be on their own channel with our tank coordinator in order to hear commands and cues. In these situations, we would record our cast only through production microphones. We would wire all cast members and use either helmet or body-mounted microphones (DPA-4061 or DPA-4071).

2) Exterior Process Vehicle, in which our cast was riding in or on a custom-designed tracking “process vehicle.” This vehicle was essentially a highly detailed, life-size fiberglass model of our Sherman tank Fury, attached to the base and suspension of a heavy‐duty military tracking vehicle. It featured a large steel platform apron, suitable for mounting up to two Chapman hydrascope cranes, lots of camera, lighting, and grip gear, and necessary crew. In this case, as above, we would wire all cast, and the tank coordinator would be in direct communication with the process vehicle’s driver seated at the front of the vehicle.

3) Interior Tank, in which our cast played out scenes inside a gimbal-mounted interior tank set. Here, we would wire all the cast and either boom or plant microphones for production dialog. We would also find a way to record the cast through the microphones of a modified vintage tank communications system.

In our first discussions regarding this project, David Ayer indicated to me that, in addition to our production microphones, he wanted to try to record dialog tracks through the vintage microphones used in the original Sherman tank communications systems. Many World War II Sherman tank crews used a SCR-508 turret bustle-mounted radio/interphone system that allowed the five-person tank crew to communicate with each other (interphone) as well as allowed the tank commander to communicate via the FM radio set with other tank commanders and military personnel outside the tank. The tank crews had communications components, including their headphones and microphones, integrated into their military-issue apparel. The headphones were wired into the tanker’s helmet and connected to a push-to-talk switchbox and a throat microphone that was then connected to a communications box at each man’s station in the tank. The tank commander uses the same style helmet; however, his microphone is a push-to-talk handheld microphone. Dave asked me to look into options for recording our cast’s battle scene dialog through these microphones, using either vintage radios in our tanks or through modifications that would leave the outward appearance of the vintage gear intact.

Before leaving Los Angeles, I had acquired several sets of T-30 throat mikes. T-30s are essentially two small carbon microphone elements encased in rubber that are attached to an elastic strap and worn snugly around the neck. The capsules should be positioned on either side of the Adam’s apple. The microphone was designed to pick up sound vibrations through contact at the throat; this was more effective than relying on sound waves transmitted through the air in the extremely high noise environment of a tank’s interior. I needed to hear what these microphones sounded like; however, sadly, the mikes produced a very low-level and noisy signal. After more research, I learned that, over time, the carbon powder in these old surplus microphones solidifies into a solid mass, which does not allow the carbon granules to vibrate as they should with sound pressure in order to change the electrical resistance between the elements’ plates enough to significantly modulate the signal. These old microphones weren’t going to work without some modification.

There were other complications with the surplus vintage gear as well. The connectors used in these systems were specific to military systems and in some cases very rare and difficult to locate. Also, some elements were considered expendable in the day and not field repairable, which made them difficult to modify. We investigated the possibilities of using the actual radio systems in the tanks, but were dissuaded by our period tank mechanics, who recounted stories illustrating the extremely unreliable performance of these old tube radios. We needed a clever, resourceful engineer who understood the filmmaking process and was interested in tackling this project. I called Production Mixer Chris Munro for ideas, and he immediately assured me that he had the man for the job: James McBride.

Jim is royalty in the sound recording world, yet he is such a humble man you would never know it by meeting him. He was a valued studio engineer and an important technical contributor at the legendary Olympic Studios in London during its heyday. Jim designed and built the facility’s Studio One recording console. Many of the most important acts of the ’60s and ’70s, including the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin, recorded their most famous records through the consoles at Olympic. (http://www.soundon sound.com/sos/aug12/articles/keith-grant.htm)

Jim has become Chris Munro’s go-to man for designing and building custom sound equipment for specific applications. One of Jim’s recent projects was finding a way to build a radio mike transmitter directly into a space helmet for the film Gravity. (Editor: See Gravity and Captain Phillips by Chris Munro, CAS, 695 Quarterly, Spring 2014)

Jim came aboard Fury, and after numerous meetings with all departments involved, we had a plan for our interior set vintage microphone recording scenario. Jim would modify enough existing vintage elements from the cast costumes, props and set dressing to give us a signal path from the vintage microphones (T-30 throat mikes and T-17 handheld mike) used by the actors to the inputs on my recorders. He would also modify the interior tank plug-in comm boxes (BC-606) to accept a return signal from my cart, so that each cast member could hear the mix-minus feed I was sending them via wireless monitoring from my cart. The actors would only have to plug in to what was now modified and practical set dressing in order to be recorded through their vintage microphones and hear each other (minus themselves) through their vintage helmet headphones.

In order to make this happen, Jim and his assistant had to meticulously modify equipment that was manufactured to be expendable and certainly not accessible for modification. In the case of the T-30 throat mikes, Jim carefully sawed through the very small Bakelite connector material and internal contacts in order to replace the old and unusable cable. Then, he glued it all back together so it was impossible to see that they were different from the unmodified pieces. He used a similar surgical technique on the flexible rubber piece that contains the carbon throat elements and replaced those with new elements that, while not high fidelity, replicated the sound of the originals when they were new. He sourced and found all matter of parts, including new cable for our cast PTT switch boxes that looked exactly like the original; a new SM-58-like capsule to fit inside the T-17 microphone that our tank commander would use; and small headphone speakers that could be glued to the sawed-off back of the visible part of our vintage headphones, so that they would look original but work as practical for our cast. The list goes on and on. I asked him for miracles, and Jim delivered them time after time.

Jim also worked on the exterior tank communication with the wireless company hired by the production company. Wireless Works had been hired to work out a duplex radio system for all the exterior tank operations. They were responsible for three huge areas: the communications between the tank coordinator and the tank drivers, the communications between our cast of tank commanders during exterior maneuvers, and all RF coordination on our sets. Jim worked with the Wireless Works onsite technician to help them integrate their duplex equipment into modified vintage equipment that the cast was using. Jim’s ingenuity and tireless work made it possible to incorporate vintage communication equipment into the production process on this show.

I should also mention the invaluable assist provided to us by Rob Lihani, who also happened to be the EPK Producer hired by Sony Pictures to document the making of Fury. Rob is ex-military and an expert in World War II militaria. He utilized his many contacts in the world of military surplus dealers and collectors in order to help us acquire authentic pieces of unused military surplus parts and equipment when no one else could find them.

When it came to production dialog, we knew that we would be dependent on wireless microphones whenever the tanks or process vehicle was moving. The tanks are LOUD and cast members might be in any number of positions while the tank was moving, so it was important to test various wireless mike positions before we started shooting. Tarn Willers and I spent several days at the tank training grounds testing a variety of lavalier microphones and mike positions on subjects as we placed them in different positions on the running tanks and the tank process vehicle. We tested a number of microphones in various positions, including several in the cast tanker helmets.

The results:

1) The tanks were really loud.

2) The tank process vehicle was even louder than the tanks, and dialog recorded on it would in all likelihood have to be replaced.

3)The DPA-4061 sounded best when used in the helmet flap position and the DPA-4071 sounded best when mounted to a chest position.

I came onto the project fully understanding that tanks are loud and that a group of many tanks are louder still. The fact that the “process tank vehicle” was much louder than an actual tank was somewhat disheartening. I discussed this with Dave, and although he knew it was a challenge, he felt very strongly that a towed process vehicle would not move like a tank and was even more problematic than having to ADR some dialog scenes shot on the current tracking process vehicle.

Given our challenge, we started to look for the best alternative solution that would give us the best results.

Our costume technician, Mark Wyndham, worked with Ben to modify the hero cast helmets for permanent placement of a DPA-4061 in each. The microphone was fitted into the helmet’s leather lining and exposed through a hole that was punched through for the purpose. Ben had our textile specialists dye Rycote Overcovers to match the helmets, and in the end, it was difficult to see where the mike was located, unless you were looking for it. Richmond Film Services modified these microphones with screw-on extension cables, so that the helmets could be removed easily without de-rigging the microphone cable and transmitter from the actor. Alternate mike placements were worked out on all our regular cast members’ costumes.

Meanwhile, Tarn and I worked on fitting out the cart that Malcolm Davies built for me. The cart was based on a frame made of small diameter speed rail, with shelving and accessories designed and manufactured by Malcolm in his shop. Malcolm builds many carts of this style for the BBC and other production mixers in the UK and Europe. It was Ben Greaves who urged me to investigate this style of cart based on his experiences shooting in the wet and mud of the English countryside, where weight and unwieldiness cost valuable time. The cart was fitted with my gear, including a Sonosax SX-ST, Deva 16 recorder, a Denecke GR-2 Master Clock, two Lectrosonics WBL Venue Racks with a total of 12 VRT modules, a Marshall dual HD monitor rack and a Sennheiser EW-300 stereo transmitter, all powered by a Remote Audio Meon LiFE. My follow/support cart is a Backstage Equipment cart fitted out with a top shelf and an SKB case filled with foamed out rack drawers that hold microphones, transmitters and other sensitive pieces of gear. Our sound trailer was provided by English film production transportation provider Translux, and Ben worked with them to fit it out properly for our sound equipment. It was stocked with expendables, snacks, and, most importantly, a teakettle—that essential piece of equipment in British culture. For transporting our gear at location, the production company built us a small covered trailer with a ramp for our follow cart and gear along with a Gator to pull it with.

As shooting began, we received huge support from our 1st AD, Toby Hefferman, regarding a standalone mobile shooting platform for sound and video. We were given a 4×4 insert car vehicle with a driver. A “room” was built on the rear platform of the truck using a speed rail frame covered with a fitted weatherproof cover. An antenna rack was attached up high over the rear rollup cloth door and a Honda generator was rigged to the front of the truck. Voila! We were a powered off-road sound & video follow vehicle, with a wall of director’s monitors hung along one side. This setup allowed us to track with moving tanks over any surface and to be instantly ready to record as soon as our truck landed for static shots. The “sparks” (that’s British for “electricians”) wired a box next to our onboard generator, giving us the ability to kill it and receive quiet power from their blimped generator when we weren’t tracking with tanks. For shots when the tanks weren’t moving, Ben had our guys run cable out for boom and ambient microphone positions. There was a lot of shouting and gunfire, and good ol’ copper gave us the best signal-to-noise ratio along with more dynamic range than that available using radio mike transmitters. I developed a huge amount of respect for our crew as they unflinchingly ran hundreds of feet of microphone cable through deep, flinty, clay mud day after long, wet and cold day.

But we still had to solve the challenge of the extremely high noise environment of the working tanks. In the end, after a number of false starts at other solutions, we hired a truck designed for location dailies screening. We had construction soundproof it further and Dody Dorn, our Editor, found ADR Mixer Jon Olive, who would bring a portable ADR setup and would do all the prepping required for the necessary ADR sessions. Once the sessions were prepped, our ADs would schedule cast members into our ADR unit for Jon Olive to record. One of our Boom Operators was always on hand to mic the ADR sessions. We used exactly the microphones and mike placement we used in the shot; we added a boom microphone and encouraged our cast members to take the positions they were in during their on camera performances. Using this method, we were able to get clean dialog for most of those scenes aboard the tracking process vehicle.

It was also extremely important to Dave for us to document the sounds of the many extremely rare, vintage World War II vehicles that we would be using in the production. The British Tank Museum’s German Tiger I tank was a particularly important subject. The last surviving operational Tiger I, we had this tank at our base camp for only a few days and its use was severely restricted to a certain amount of running time, all of which David Ayer wanted to use on camera. We needed to bring in someone who was familiar with the workings of vintage military vehicles and was skilled in sound effects recording. That man was Eilam Hoffman, who has traveled the world seeking out and recording effects. He has an impressive reel of multi-track sound effects recordings that includes many of the rarest military vehicles in the world. Eilam and his assistant scheduled several sessions at our Bovingdon Field base camp and the British Tank Museum in Dorset, and they were on set to record the Tiger tank on the day we shot it, so he could get Dave the sound of the tank’s tracks as they ground through the actual muddy field surface we were shooting on. His recordings of this Tiger are the only known multitrack recordings of a working original equipment Tiger tank. Eilam was a pleasure to work with, and yet another one of the dedicated film sound professionals I had the honor of working with in the UK.

Fury was an amazing experience and adventure. I am incredibly fortunate to have had the opportunity to meet and work with such a talented group of filmmakers on such a remarkable project.

Remembering Walt Martin

In his long and varied career as a Production Sound Mixer, Walt was proudest of the fifteen pictures he did with Clint Eastwood starting with True Crime in 1999. He was Oscar-nominated for Flags of Our Fathers and recorded sound for Best Picture winner Million Dollar Baby and Best Picture nominees Letters From Iwo Jima and Mystic River. He was a longtime member of the Eastwood team and is affectionately remembered.

CLINT EASTWOOD (in a phone interview):

We completed American Sniper, everybody went home, and then we got the news after a couple weeks that Walt had passed away. It’s like losing a member of the family. Walt was a terrific guy and the easiest person I’ve ever worked with in my life. He brought no antagonism or clumsiness to the work; he was just always ready.

He was an interesting guy to shoot with because, you know, most crew members, you see ’em periodically, but you could go three or four days and not ever see Walt. He had a way of finding a spot for himself where he’s out of everybody’s way. I sometimes shoot quietly [especially] when working with children or active people who aren’t experienced. I would just wave and the boom operator would whisper, “They’re shooting.” I never heard him and it worked really great. Of all the people I’ve ever worked with, he was the most unobtrusive, still getting the job done and in fine fashion.

I’ll miss him on the next project. It’ll be like a missing link, missing part of the chain, because he was that good and that reliable.

GAIL CARROLL-COE

I had the good fortune of doing eight movies for Clint Eastwood with Walt Martin and a few other projects in addition. He began his career by shooting documentaries with his father who was a missionary. I think everyone knows of his accomplishments, but thought I would share some personal things. We traveled quite a bit together for some of the projects. In each location, he made sure he experienced every location to its fullest. The last project took us to Morocco, albeit being difficult, he made the most of it. Walt loved traveling with his wife Elena and his daughter Claudia. He took along his mother-in-law and sister-in-law as well on some trips and made sure everyone had a great time. He loved gardening and sharing his fruit from his trees with others. He loved the Beatles and every Sunday spent some time listening to a program that played their music. Lastly, he loved recording sound.

JONATHAN FUH

Working with Walt was a highlight in my career. He was quiet, unassuming and professional. He loved his family and was loyal to his friends. His wife Elena likes elephants. I remember, on his day off, while on locations, he was looking for elephant motif souvenirs to bring back for her. He will truly be missed by those of us who were fortunate to have worked with him

RANDY JOHNSON

I came to know Walt late in both his career and mine. I was familiar with his large body of work and awards so, when he called to ask me about filling out his sound team on Jersey Boys along with Gail Carroll-Coe, I jumped at the chance to work with him and, of course, with the man, the icon, Clint Eastwood. Working with Walt was a pleasure every day. He had a big heart and was a gentle soul. His sharp sense of humor made the days go by quickly. He was never afraid to laugh at himself and I think the crews sensed that and held him in high regard as a bit of a father figure.

His work on Jersey Boys was multi-layered and thorough. With the help of Mark Agostino and Tim Boot, the task of capturing the live performances went very smoothly. As difficult and challenging as Jersey Boys was, it was still a local shoot and a stage show. Mr. Eastwood’s next project, American Sniper, demanded much more physical effort from Walt, but he embraced the adventure wholeheartedly. He had to climb on vehicles tethered to the top of Humvee’s but I think he was proud of his ability to do whatever was needed to capture the performances. Very sadly, it was his last adventure but one he was very proud of. His talent and humility are his great legacy. I will miss Mr. Walter B. Martin.

Review: Sound Devices 970

Review of Sound Devices 970

by Richard Lightstone, CAS

Evolution/Revolution:How we got to now When I began mixing some forty-four years ago, we shot on film with one camera. A second camera only came out during big stunt work scenes. I mixed on a mono Nagra; recording to ¼ audiotape and the production track I delivered to editorial was THE only track of dialog.

Production changed in the ’90s when two cameras were used for every setup. This usually meant simultaneous wide and close shots. Suddenly, we were using more wireless microphones and there was a need to have both mix and iso tracks of each wire in use.

There were several professional twotrack audio tape-based recorders available then: the Nagra and Stellavox. DAT recorders from Fostex, Stellavox (the Stelladat) and HHB soon supplanted the analog machines and some enterprising Production Mixers embraced the technology of the music industry and started to use the newer eight-track recorders, either the Tascam DA-88 or the Alesis XT-8.

When Zaxcom, led by Glenn Sanders and Howard Stark, introduced the first portable four-channel hard-disc recorder in 1996, it revolutionized location recording. Sound Devices brought out their version of a nonlinear recorder in 2003 and we’ve rapidly come to the present where eight channels is the minimum. Some shows now expect to have individual tracks available for everyone in the cast and even eight tracks may not be enough.

I use a Yamaha 01V96 console (since 2004) and have always wanted to be able to record up to sixteen tracks if and when required. Previously I could achieve that only with a kluge of eight AES and eight analog outputs. But the new Sound Devices 970, an audio-only version of the PIX 260i, offers capabilities that greatly simplify high-track-count recording.

Features

The 970 is a half rack, 2U device capable of recording up to sixty-four tracks to multiple drives. There are two front-panel drive bays and two eSata drives accessible from the rear panel. The drives may be configured for simultaneous or sequential recording as needed.

Eight line-level inputs permit connecting devices directly but full use of high track capabilities comes with connection to a mixer that can supply Ethernet-based Dante or either optical, or coaxial MADI connections. The 970 will also accept eight tracks of AES via a DB-25 connection.

Dual power inputs through standard 4-pin XLRs provide operational redundancy. In the event of a failure of both sources, proprietary PowerSafe™ circuitry provides ten seconds of reserve and an orderly shutdown.

Sound Devices continues to use the rock-steady Ambient Recording Lockit timecode technology offering sufficient accuracy and stability for use as a master clock.

A large five-inch screen provides visual metering up to sixty-four tracks and fast, intuitive menu control. Many of the same button actions on the SD 788T are duplicated here on the front face of the 970.

For example, pressing the STOP + FF buttons increments the Scene or Slate. Pressing STOP + RW buttons allows you to delete false start takes. A window asks you to confirm the action, YES or NO, before proceeding.

Similar dedicated keystrokes give access to the Metadata screen where scene number, takes, notes and other functions may be rapidly edited. Commonly used phrases may be selected and edited from a list manager.

By pressing AUDIO + FILES or pressing Ctrl + P on an attached USB keyboard will create a CSV file Sound Report on the current folder for all applicable drives.

The real clincher to me was the ability to use the Audinate Dante network of up to sixty-four tracks!

Yes, far more than I might need, but I always believe in future proofing my investment. Combined with a Dante card for the Yamaha, one Cat 5E cable gives me 16 x 16 I/O to the 970. I simultaneously record to both an SSD and CF card, which are mounted via the Sound Devices PIXCADDY and PIX-CADDY CF respectively.

The 970 also features an embedded Web-based control panel, PIXNET, for machine transport and setup control over Ethernet-based networks, as well as file transfer over the data network with SMB.

File metadata editing of scene name, take name, notes, track names and reel folders can be done across all drives during, before and after recording.

The 970 may also be controlled through an RS-422 port and GPIO (General Purpose Input/Output).

Use in the Field

I picked up my 970 in early April and, after installing it on my newly reconfigured cart, I had about two weeks of “sea trials” before beginning production on a television series in May. Having never used a PIX or Audinate Dante, I wanted to be comfortable with it well before I was on any set. This included familiarizing myself with the operation of the 970 and the routing of the Dante network.

The Dante Controller on a PC or Mac is the master for all the I/O to all the devices on the network.

The series shot for five months and the 970 worked flawlessly every day. I powered it on about a half an hour before call and shut it down at wrap. That added up to at least twelve hours a day of constant use.

My I/O setup was built around the Dante network. As I mentioned previously, I added the Dante MY16-AUD card to my Yamaha 01V.

I run the Dante Controller from a Mac Mini on my cart. The Controller routes the I/O from the Yamaha to the 970 (and any other Dante device on the network). PIXNET also runs from the Mac.

Each day I would create a new “Reel #” or folder. The 970 offers “Custom” (default) or “Daily.” Choosing “Custom” allows the Reel to be edited with any alphanumeric value. “Daily” will automatically generate a value derived from the System Date. i.e., YYMMDD.

Aside from our most important responsibility of mixing great tracks, we have the added duties of accurate metadata and arming and disarming of tracks. These operations are available both directly on the 970 and via PIXNET.

Pressing the AUDIO button on the PIX and rotating the Control Knob allows me to scroll to a track. Pushing the Knob highlights my selection, for example, arm a track. Scrolling further I can edit the Track Name. These features are duplicated by an attached keyboard as well as on PIXNET.

Conclusion

The most important part of any new HD recorder is how it sounds; the answer to that is the 970 sounds great, like all of the Sound Devices recorders. Sound Devices is known for rigorously testing their products before introducing them for sale in the marketplace. They are also fast to respond and fix any software bugs reported by users and owners. This is a personal testimonial; they have my back.

The 970 is definitely a fixed installation recorder, not a bag-type machine, as it has no on-board mixing capabilities. However, its small footprint will easily fit any cart configuration.

With over five months of daily use, I can safely say I really enjoy the 970. It is reliable, well designed with an easily accessible menu and does the job it was designed for.

Images of Richard Lightstone and his cart are courtesy of Richard Lightstone. Images of the 970 recorder are courtesy of Sound Devices.

Anchorman 2

The Serious Side of Comedy
On the Set of Anchorman 2

This account of the very complex business of building and operating a largely functional TV studio for Anchorman 2 was drawn from an interview with Todd Marks, Jeb Johenning and Perry Freeze on June 1 and an interview with Ben Betts on July 5.

It began, as these things do, with an availability check. The primary task was to build a functional CNN-style television studio circa 1980, and the secondary task would be to acquire and create era-specific video playback content for the studio.

The call went to Todd Marks; he would be the Computer and Video Playback Supervisor. Recognizing the scope and complexity of the assignment, he immediately set about assembling a team of Local 695 Video Engineers. He brought in Perry Freeze as Video Playback Coordinator, Jeb Johenning as Video Playback Engineer, and then Ben Betts as Supervising Engineer. Later, he added Chris Adams and Phil Haskell, who provided invaluable support.

Among the first tasks was to draw up a budget, an assignment made more difficult because they had yet to be entrusted with a script. There were general notes of what might be needed but no scene plan or comprehensive gear list. Todd and Ben had experience putting together a fictional television studio, working together on Deep Impact and independently on several other shows like Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. They had some of the necessary elements and collaborated on a speculative budget. Jan Pascale, the Set Decorator, had a strong working relationship with Todd from their work together on The Internship. This helped as they wrestled with determining the needs and sourcing all the era-specific equipment. Perry worked with Todd breaking down the extensive list of graphics and playback content as the Art Department provided more details.

To dress the GNN studio, the fictional start-up news organization, they would need more than 125 CRT monitors of assorted sizes, four electronic lighting panels, four electronic control panels, four satellite trackers, four audio mixers, four video mixer boards, three studio news cameras, six portable news cameras and a bunch of other support gear.

Much of the gear would come from Ben’s company, Digital Image Associates, but they also drew on the resources of History for Hire, Todd Marks’ company, Production Suppliers, and Jeb Johenning’s company, Ocean Video, as well as from Playback Technologies.

Making a complete television broadcast studio is difficult enough but this was a period story, set in the early 1980s. In the video world, thirty-year-old equipment is antique and getting it all to work well enough to at least appear functional was one of the challenges of the project. To assist in this process, the team recruited John Monsour, a self-taught video engineer of legendary ingenuity.

Todd Marks: John is one of the original twenty-four-frame engineers. He’s the one who did the original Apple commercials. He’s the one who figured out how to take the Mac Pluses and modify them to go twenty-four frame.

The pedestal cameras rented from History for Hire had been gutted and were really just empty shells. Just to get an image to appear on the video viewfinders required reinstalling functional camera circuits within the empty boxes. They ended up fitting a smaller and more modern box camera within the empty lens housings. But then there was an issue of rigging control cables to the lenses of the cameras so that the operators could run the zoom lenses from the controls on the pan and tilt handles. The focus controls from the period were manual rather than electric and operated from lines similar to speedometer cables. Two factors made this complicated: first, the original thirty-two-inch cables were not long enough to reach within the camera shell and be routed to the replacement camera in the lens housing and, second, the original lines drove Fujinon lenses and these were Canon lenses with a different coupling. Longer cables were unavailable from any regular source but John Monsour found a Venice Beach supplier of speedometer cables for hot rods who was able to fashion a cable and coupling at the needed length.

By long tradition, movies are projected at twenty-four fps. Video is normally distributed at 30 fps (actually 29.97 frames) so, to avoid seeing a noticeable and distracting strobe effect on CRT monitors, some means must be found to reconcile the discrepancy whenever video monitors appear in the image. The workaround is to process the video so that it runs at exactly camera speed and can be locked to the camera, one frame of video to one frame of camera image. (We call this video sync.) This same practice applies even when an electronic camera, like an Arri Alexa, is used to make the movie, although the speed for a digital camera is 23.98 frames per second rather than the 24 frames of a film camera. This sort of alteration is necessary to allow the production cameras, the Alexas, to photograph the functional prop video cameras and also see the images on their viewing monitors. It’s also needed whenever the output of the functional prop cameras must appear on a monitor.

So, everything must be changed over to twenty-four frames to be filmed by the production cameras. But not quite. There are several points in the routing process where a traditional image may still be needed. The vintage signal processing units were designed to run at thirty frames and would balk at a lower frame rate. These were used to provide Chroma Key or to insert “lower third” or period-specific graphics.

John Monsour came up with an effective but complex scheme to address this need for different frame rates. He modified the cameras and their genlock circuits to scan the CCD at 23.98 fps, instead of 29.97. This involved a custom circuit board, tightly integrated into the entire camera system, attached to the side of the existing box camera. The cameras were genlocked back at the CCUs via a custom 23.98 sync generator. The 24-frame composite video signal was then fed into the 24-frame matrix video router. The RGB signals were scan-converted back to 30 fps and fed into the 30-frame router. The CRT viewfinders in the vintage cameras had been replaced by History for Hire with LCDs, so it was necessary to send a 30 fps signal back to the cameras, strip the chroma out and then re-color correct them within the camera housings.

The cameras were further modified to have “tally” lights that could be activated on demand. For a long time, studio cameras have been fitted with a red light, called a tally light, that would identify the live camera for the talent. For use in the movie, where dramatic needs might not be exactly in sync with the operation of prop cameras, the tally lights had to be custom-wired. Relays were built and wired to a controller at the CCU station, so that the tally lights could trigger following the GlobeCaster switcher or be manually turned on/off.

Since they also incorporated video monitors, it was necessary to apply this same clock-rate adjustment to the teleprompters.

The first budget, providing for all of the capabilities Todd and the team thought would be needed, landed in the production office with a thud. Immediately there were questions like “why do we need this?” and “what’s that for?” Todd and Ben set about grinding the budget down to the bare essentials.

As luck would have it, they had a scene on the first day of production in a smaller video studio set. They shot a sequence with Will Farrell (Ron Burgundy) and Christina Applegate’s character, Veronica, at WNBC, a working television station in Atlanta. This smaller studio served as a good shakedown for all of the gear and also provided production with a good opportunity to appreciate why these particular elements and capabilities were important to the overall film.

About three weeks later, the team returned to Atlanta, with gear optimized for the task, at least as much as these things can be worked out in advance. They had shipped the gear ahead by rail, 3,500 pounds on six pallets in the first shipment and more than double that in the second. The total shipping weight was more than four tons! The engineering work and operational functionality of this equipment gave the show capabilities that enhanced the whole process.

They had ten days to get everything wired and functional in the fictional GNN studio. There were many difficult moments due to the age of the gear, and the amount of graphics and playback necessary for Day One in the studio. Then the real work began. There were two aspects of this: operational and content.

Just keeping everything routed correctly, cued and ready to play in a constantly changing environment is a huge task. For instance, the vintage CRT monitors were all about thirty years old and tended to be balky and erratic; some days they’d work fine while other days individual units would refuse to work or would show color differently from their companions. Not all of the monitors were vintage CRTs; some of the camera viewfinders were LCD displays. Each design handled visual data a bit differently so keeping it all evenly illuminated, period-consistent and simply operational demanded constant attention.

Todd Marks: And also because we’re dealing with CRTs which are inherently finicky and these are twenty-, thirty-year-old machines sometimes—what looked good on one would look completely out of scale on another or the color was completely screwy. We went through, before we started the production, and tried to match as closely as we could but…

Jeb Johenning: Isn’t that what NTSC stands for? Never The Same Color twice. Reasoning that the start-up of a new TV network might experience some glitches, Todd and Perry devised a clever way to cover the occasional slip-up:

Todd Marks: …in the news offices, in our “wall of fifteen,” the day before they go on the air, we set the horizontal off on [the bottom corner monitor] so that it was kind of rolling slowly [and] we put an extra in front of it pretending to tweak it…

Little tricks like that could cover the occasional glitch but, for the most part, the gear had to work flawlessly or it would draw attention away from the story. More than one hundred monitors had to display images in some shots, wall monitors had to show matching color, video camera monitors needed signal to be converted to black & white for period authenticity and everything had to be locked synchronously together.

Providing content for all those monitors was a large part of the assignment. This seems simple enough for the material generated by operating the functional prop cameras but it was still necessary to route the signal appropriately, sending the 29.97 signal to the right place for Chroma Key or Schindler processing, send the 24-frame version to the monitors that needed the slower frequency and keep it all coordinated. But there was also the matter of providing additional content beyond just the camera feeds.

A credible TV news center has more images up on the monitors than just their own anchors in the studio. There are reporters posting stories from the Mideast, from Washington and from across town. They needed images of those reporters; the baseball games they were covering, advertisements that would play between news stories, in short, anything that might play on a TV network. Just like the real television network, the fictional studio is a beast with a voracious appetite.

When they weren’t actually filming in the GNN studios, the entire playback crew was preparing a repertoire of clips to show on the monitors. They would pose their newspeople in front of a green screen and then composite in the Taj Mahal or the Capitol Building in the background. They also made fake period commercials:

Ben Betts: [For] one of the commercials Todd mocked-up in his hotel room, he literally bought a can of beans, put them into a saucepan, shot it with his camera, [and] that became a commercial that we used. I mean, they had no budget for most of this stuff.

Sean had some stock footage. He made a fake airline commercial just out of stock footage. He added graphics and cut it together. [This is] on a Saturday, in Perry’s hotel room, working on little pieces trying to come up with more material ’cause we didn’t want to get caught with our pants down … ’cause commercials are a great thing for something like this. [When] you need to cut to something, a couple stock commercials gives you something that’s safe to roll to. It doesn’t tie you into any part of the story.

It is possible, of course, to burn-in images to all the monitor screens throughout a scene. Production will often gravitate toward that solution because it means that they can postpone decisions about what should appear on the screens. Doing it live on the day requires considerably more planning and coordination, but there are good reasons for making that commitment. First, it simply looks better and more natural to have all the elements together in one place.

Jeb Johenning: I mean, I don’t think it ever looks as good when you burn-in an image versus doing it for real because there are these subtle little things like just even the glow of the monitor reflecting onto the desk or onto a glass or all these little glints or some such—you know, again, like you said earlier, something’s just off.

Also, a task that’s pretty simple, inserting one image into one monitor face, becomes considerably more complex when a single shot requires fifty or more inserts.

Todd Marks: No, we want to do it live—as much as we possibly can—so as long as it’s not something that we’re supposed to be on the television that we haven’t shot yet, which is impossible for us to do, we try to do as much [as we can] practical because it makes it better for the director, it makes it better for the actors, it makes it better for the editors, you know, even if they have to go in and sweeten things a bit later…

The live interactive video performance makes it possible for the actors to react and improvise within the scene. One of the most iconic interactions in Anchorman 2 would not have been possible without this flexibility:

Ben Betts: The fact that everything works was great. ’Cause they really had a teleprompter there and the twenty-four-frame teleprompters were really used by the cast, just like they would in a real broadcast. We had that one infamous scene in the movie that was just a little throwaway thing in the original script, that just became hysterical.

[Steve Carell improvised a scene predicated on his weatherman character wearing green pants for St. Patrick’s Day and then discovering that his legs disappeared from the composite image.]

Ben Betts: It was one of the first trailers for the movie. Because Steve Carell got out there and just ran with it. An improv comedian and a green screen opens you up to a lot of possibilities…

This is the kind of thing that’s really only possible if all the components are working and interacting so the actor can see the effect and play with it. Done with images composited in Post, many of the comic possibilities would have gone unrealized.

Keeping all the elements running and coordinated live on set puts heavy demands on the agility of the production crew. Jeb Johenning and Perry Freeze and Ben Betts and Sharouz (Shawn) Noushinfar, the GlobeCaster TD/Engineer, and also Chris Adams and Phil Haskell, were kept scrambling every day.

Todd Marks: …we had to be on our toes during the studio stuff and we had to change things up on the fly and, you know, they’d come up with stuff two days before and say, oh, we’re going to have a scene where they’re talking, Ron’s talking to four different people at the same time. And so, their thought is—well, we’ll have to shoot these individually and cut them and do it all in Post. And we’re like, no, we can do it all live.

Perry Freeze: It was a lot of planning and a lot of work going in—on top of all the other daily stuff that we were shooting in the studio. And then, I think they said, “Action!” and then did a couple takes—they were over and done in twenty minutes.

This determination to handle as many components as possible live requires planning and commitment but pays dividends in spontaneous performances and an authenticity in the performances. For Anchorman 2, Todd and his team were up to the challenge.

Todd Marks The Computer and Video Playback Supervisor, Todd was the leader of the Anchorman video team.

Ben Betts As Supervising Engineer, Ben assembled the necessary gear and worked to make it, and keep it, operational.

Jeb Johenning His responsibilities as Video Playback Engineer were to have all the needed elements on hand and cued as needed. Glossary for highlighted words

Perry Freeze As Video Playback Coordinator, he assisted Jeb Johenning, as well as being Todd’s right-hand man.

John Monsour John came on the project as a Consulting Engineer and was instrumental in rebuilding old, sometimes gutted, equipment to run in a production environment.

Chris Adams, Phil Haskell and Sharouz (Shawn) Noushinfar provided support on location.

Glossary for highlighted words

Schindler Imaging Standards Converter Custom-designed scan converter that converts, color corrects and genlocks 30 fps computer/video signals to 24 fps or 23.98 fps signals.

GlobeCaster The Broadcast DVE system and Production Switcher that switches live video signals, triggers tally lights, performs various key functions (Down Stream Key, luma/chroma keys) and Digital Video Effects.

Chroma Key A process for compositing two images so one appears atop the other. One figure will be photographed against a color background, often green, that is not represented in the second image. A computer drops the green background and affects a seamless merger. Typically used to superimpose a weatherman over the weather map.

NTSC The National Television System Committee is responsible for specifying technical standards for broadcast television in the United States. The 120-volt, 60 Hz electrical power in use in the US requires different configurations than are in use in Europe and other places using 220-volt 50 Hz power. The term “NTSC” often refers to standard definition 30 fps (29.97) video signals.

Lower Third Literally, the lower third portion of a television image. Graphics, station IDs and text crawls are often placed in the lower third of the image.

CRT Short for Cathode Ray Tube, it denotes the older technology of televisions, before flat screens.

Features

House of Cards and Digital Boom Removal

The Traveling Road Show on Mad Max: Fury Road

The Osmotron

The Sound of Birdmanor (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

Glossary

Glossary of Y Classifications

Growing Up With Boyhood

Bruce Bisenz: His Personal Best

A remembrance of the The American West

Production Sound for Gone Girl

Video Assist

Recording Sound For Fury

Remembering Walt Martin

Review of Sound Devices 970

Features

Use in the Field

Conclusion

The Serious Side of Comedy On the Set of Anchorman 2

The Sound of Birdman
or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

The Serious Side of Comedy
On the Set of Anchorman 2