Speaker 1: Communication doesn't happen as much as it should between production and

Speaker 2: post-production teams. We're capturing the producer and director's vision. To be able to really bring the story to life. Get the right microphone, in the right place, at the right time, and at the right level.

Speaker 1: My first gig, I accidentally erased Digibeta. Yeah.

Speaker 2: My name is Fernando Delgado and I'm a production sound mixer.

Speaker 1: My name is Frank Schering and I'm a sound editor and re-recording mixer.

Speaker 2: But how great would it be if people like you and I spoke before a project?

Speaker 1: Do you ever get to talk to the post sound team?

Speaker 2: Most of the time there isn't one. By the time I'm, like when, usually that person comes on later. Unless it's a production company that does all their own post. Then they might have some staff people that you can talk to and they kind of have a formula on how they like things. Usually I don't get to talk to a sound person. Usually it's a post-production supervisor. But then we'll talk about track naming, file folder structure. How are you getting, what's it all going to look like? You know, are we shooting a movie where everything is set up in scenes? Are we doing a reality show where, in a lot of cases in a reality show for example, or a documentary, we'll do daily folders opposed to scene folders. In that same vein, the file naming, right? So if we're doing a small show, we might just name the file the person's first name, right? Easy to find, all the data is there. But for a bigger show, for example, if they're editing on Avid, you can name your files in such a way to where they show up in playlists rather than individual tracks, right? But it's all about how you name the file so that when they do the import, now, so instead of having let's say 30 individual tracks, you've got three tracks that each have 12 playlists. Hmm. And it makes it easier for the editors to then be able to go through and pick mics and stuff like that. So we'll talk about stuff like that, you know, how can we name the files so that you can find them easier and access them easier and improve your workflow. That's awesome. If you're not talking to the

Speaker 1: post-sound team, you're only talking to a post-soup, you've got a script, you've talked to the director or producer or whatever. So if there's a scene where you're outside but there's an intentional car going past, like, that's part of the scene, right? Are you just as a professional going to go and, okay, I'm gonna get that car too, I'm gonna get this and this and this? If I have time, if

Speaker 2: I have the, if it's the kind of shoot where, okay, this is what we're shooting and lights are gonna take an hour and this is gonna take a bit of time and figure it out. Okay, great. Well, I can tell by the script I've only got X amount of people with lines. My recorder has X amount of tracks. Let's try to fill it up. Let's give post as much as we can. Nice. So if I have the time, then absolutely, I'll go and I'll do that. And we'll label up all the tracks, you know, if it's a car sound, we might try to get interior, exterior sounds and stuff like that, doors closing, any kind of action that's going on. But sadly, in a lot of cases, we don't have the time. So our first priority is always going to be dialogue. Sure. And then anything that we can collect beyond that is a bonus. I had a

Speaker 1: film last year that I was supposed to do. I ended up not doing it, but when I was talking to the director ahead of time, before they shot anything, I was like, I would love to talk to your production sound team. They were like, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I'll put you in touch. Never ended up actually talking to them, of course. And I had read the script and I was like, for this scene, you need to get this, this, this, this, this. And like I said, I didn't end up doing it, but I was sent the files to take a look at because there were problems and they didn't get

Speaker 2: any of that stuff. Yeah. I did a movie not that long ago with an Oscar nominated production sound mixer and I was his utility. And one of the reasons I took the gig was because this guy was mixing and I wanted to just see how our styles differ. Like, what is he doing that makes him so awesome, right? And we're about a week into the shoot and I asked him, when's the last time you talked to Post? And he looked at me with the most serious look and he's, he, he's like old enough to be my dad. And he's like, son, I haven't spoken to anybody in post-production in 45 years. And, and it was really interesting because that was like the, I had a real aha moment there where it was like, that's what we do different. And even though he's really good at his skillset, he hasn't evolved with the business. He hasn't evolved with technology. You know, he was still doing handwritten sound reports. Yeah. But it was really interesting because that's how the business has grown is now we have the ability to communicate with people and to provide all this extra data in the recordings to make your job easier. You know, and when he, when he said that to me, I was like, what? The movie had a lot of, a lot of CGI. It was a movie about dogs. And so they had these little dolls for the animal stand-ins. Right. And, um, but we still had actors on set and the actors had lines. And sometimes we'd have scratchy mics and I'd be like, yo man, can I go in and adjust that microphone? And he'd be like, no, don't worry about it. They're going to ADR everything later. And it just irked me because if the actor is showing up to deliver a performance, that means we should be showing up to capture that performance. Right. Not just to record a scratch track so that they can do it again later. You know, cause it's like, well, think about, you could save this actor a day of work by just showing up and adjusting the microphone so it sounds good. And save the production a

Speaker 1: lot of money. Right. And hassle. Yeah. So I thought that was really interesting.

Speaker 2: It's like, and I learned this from somebody that's been doing this for almost longer than I've been alive. Right. Isn't that a trip? That's crazy. So there has to be a culture shift. My first gig was an interview for ABC News World News Tonight. National spot. I had no idea what I was doing. I stopped the shoot because back then they had beta cams and you could hear the time code bleed through the headphone outputs of the cameras. And so anytime you listen to the output of the camera, it sounded clean and then the camera person would hit record and you'd hear, right? So I'd take my headphones off. I'm listening. I don't hear it outside of my headphones. Ask them to stop. Probably 20 minutes or so. I'm trying to figure out what is this noise? What is this noise? Finally the camera guy who hired me actually puts the headphones on. He goes, that's time code you idiot. Hit record and we're, we're back in business. We're, that was my

Speaker 1: first job. Well at least you only stopped him for 20 minutes. Yeah. No big deal, right?

Speaker 2: Yeah. It was good. I was there for about a year. It could be worse. In my first gig I

Speaker 1: accidentally erased a DigiBeta master. Yeah. Yeah. Audio only, thankfully. I didn't arm the video track. It was stupid. Both tracks? Yeah. Yeah. My, my boss actually called the editor and well, when I did it, I noticed it like recorded like 10 seconds of silence and I was like, oh crap. And I went and I told him what I had done and he goes, erase the whole thing. Like what? He's like, just go in and erase the whole thing. So I erased the whole thing. He calls the editor. I don't know, there's no audio on this tape. But then I had. What a jerk. That's awesome. Wow, somebody liked you. Yeah. Holy crap. That's awesome. Actually, you know, it turned out to be a blessing in disguise because he made me drive the tape to the client, was in DC, and I drove down and the editor was like, I don't understand. I checked it. And she was so frustrated. And then she laid back the audio on the tape. And while she's laying it back, we're sitting there talking. And then maybe six or eight months later, she moved up to be a producer. And I started working with her. Oh, nice. Hundreds of hours of shows. That's awesome. It's funny how those things happen. You said you don't get a location scout until you show up most of the time. Most of the time. So when you get hired, say an independent film, right? So you get a phone call. How do you determine how long it's going to take or how much it's going to cost to budget all that when you don't have a location scout? And I mean, are you talking to the. A lot of times I'll talk to the producer

Speaker 2: first. And then if it's something that I'm going to end up doing, I'll talk to the director and then I'll talk to the post-production supervisor if they have that person yet. And then and then that's when we'll kind of come up with a plan. We'll figure out, OK, well, how big is our cast and what kind of you don't need to tell me exactly where, but what kind of an environment are we shooting in? You know, are we shooting indoors, outdoors? Yeah. So I would use, let's say a medium or a long shotgun mic outside. Where indoors, I might use a short shotgun or or something else. If I'm in a car, I might plant a lav in a visor or near a steering wheel or, you know. What about hiding mics? You have to wait for

Speaker 1: that? I mean, if the set's set, can't you just go in and. It depends on what the

Speaker 2: action is. So if it's a scripted thing, for example, on a high budget show, they'll have a second unit, which is basically stand-ins for the actors to read through the lines and to go through all the action so that the cameras can rehearse their shots. So a lot of times we'll sit and we'll watch the first couple of rehearsals and then decide, am I putting a microphone on a person? Am I planting a microphone someplace? Are we just going to use boom? You know, just like what's the sequence that's going to happen? And then what's the best way to

Speaker 1: capture that? You know, changes based on how many actors there are. Right. How big

Speaker 2: the location. What it is we're shooting. Inside, outside. Right. If it's a scripted thing, I'll really scrutinize the script to decide. Because if I don't have to touch the actors, they have enough stuff on their mind, I'll put a mic on them as a last resort. But generally, if somebody is delivering a performance, I try to just stay out of their world as much as I possibly can. That way they don't have to think about me. I'm not disturbing their flow or getting into their head in any way. So I'll try to plant mics or whatever. If we're shooting a documentary or a reality show or something where nothing can be anticipated, then we're putting mics on everybody. It would be nice to have a

Speaker 1: loft sometimes. Even though I prefer booms for dialogue. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it

Speaker 2: sounds better. The mic is bigger. You don't have to worry about burying the mic or hearing a buried mic underneath the clothes. Sure. Well, as long as the positioning is good. The most important thing, right? Putting the mic in the right spot so that it's quiet. It's close enough to the source, whether

Speaker 1: it's a voice or something else. Now, when you're doing a lot of your stuff, do you

Speaker 2: how much time do you get to set up? I usually get very little time. In fact, a lot of times, depending on the production, if it's a bigger budget thing, they'll bring in lights and camera a couple hours before me. And so a lot of times when I get there, I have to hurry just to get my stuff set up so that I can be ready to roll when the cameras are ready. And so a lot of times it's a lot of prep before I get to set. You know, making sure I read the script and I have an idea at least what's first up. And then I'll always talk to the first AD as soon as I get to set. What's first up? How soon do you need me? And then we'll go ahead and plan from there. But most of the time, I don't even, I don't get a location scout until I show up most of the time. Like, oh, we're shooting, we're shooting in a restaurant with all sorts of refrigerators and compressors and stoves. On a busy city street. Right, right next to a fire station. Right. Across the street from the airport. Hey, you know, nothing but the best. So you have to stay out of the way of

Speaker 1: like lighting and everybody else that's setting up before you can go in? Or can you be setting up at the same time? Well, a lot of times if I, if I start setting up

Speaker 2: before the lights are set, I will have to move. Like, it's, it's like this thing with sound people where we kind of already know where the mic, where the lights are gonna go and the lighting guys don't. So we'll set up our stuff and then they'll go, oh, you're where I need to be. So now I'm packing all my stuff up and moving because lights are more important. So a lot of times I wait. I'll just fall back and I'll sit and I'll, I'll wait. I'll see, okay, where, where are you putting the camera? Where are your lights gonna live? And then I'll talk to the crew and figure out, okay, you're general, you're kind of there. Now I can start

Speaker 1: setting in. One of the things that drives me insane when I'm cutting dialogue is right at the end of the scene, the director, and cut. Yeah, stepping on lines.

Speaker 2: Like, right, right when the actor finishes a line. That's the time that I usually have to ask for another take. So you're paying attention to that and you're saying, hey, let's do another one. I'm like, yo man, you totally stepped on the end of the line. They're like, no, no, it was fine, it was fine. All right. I just type it in my notes. Yeah. Ask for another take. Period. Denied. That way when it goes to post, you can read it, and the director is sitting right behind you. You're like, oh, there's got to be another take. Nope, that's it. It says here that the sound mixer was denied. I've never seen that on a report. That's awesome. Yeah, anytime I ask for something and I, and I don't get it, I always put it in the notes. That way if, if there's a discrepancy there, the person can at least read. It's, it's not that I suck at my job.

Speaker 1: It's that I wasn't given an opportunity to do, to do my job. Right. I just did a handful of films for a network. And in many scenes, it's the same director for a couple of them. In many scenes, there's no dialogue, but there's action taking place, right? The main characters in the kitchen, doing something. And instead of just recording, because like they're moving dishes around and whatever, instead of just being quiet, the director's like, okay, now pick up that bowl and take it over here and turn on the sink. And you're just like, oh my God, shut up. Yeah.

Speaker 2: We wouldn't have had to Foley all this stuff. We wouldn't have had to do anything. If you're able to get natural sound effects, would you say that that is sometimes better? Always better. Never better. Always better. Okay. See, that's what I would think too. Always. Even when I do reality shows, for example, I've done cooking shows and I've done all sorts of different fight shows and stuff like that. And a big part of our sound design was like, if it was a cooking show, we'd plant mics near the stoves so that if something went, you know, we'd hear the fire, we'd hear the sizzle, we'd hear the clanking of the utensils and all of that stuff. And I guess it's interesting, right? Because on your side, if you don't get it, that's really frustrating. Absolutely. On my side of the world, if it doesn't get used, that's equally frustrating, you know? Sure. I can see that. You spend a lot of time getting these. It's completely understandable why it doesn't get used, but I think that's a big reason why a lot of people don't do that stuff. They just kind of assume that it's never going to be used. And I think that's also probably why people in production feel good, feel okay speaking or making noise in general if there's no dialogue.

Speaker 1: A, it sounds better if it's there on the set where the dialogue was recorded, right? So when I'm cutting dialogue, I'll go through and I'm like, okay, they're talking here. At this point, there's no talking. I'm going to take that. I'm going to put it down on PFX tracks, right? Production effects. And so I do that. And as much of that stuff throughout the whole thing that I can cover with PFX, A, it's less work for Foley, less work for sound design or editing or whatever. And then just process it the same way as I process the dialogue. So it sounds like it's in the same room, you know? So we should do that more. Absolutely. All right. Adding more mics to the kit. That and making sure you're paying attention to the director saying cut too soon or whatever, because that little bit, right, we can use as room tone. And then you don't have to stop the

Speaker 2: whole crew to get room tone. Right. One thing I do is I always roll early because there's always a lull right in production. So you'll hear the set AD, okay, lock it down, lock it down. You know, everybody's ready. But then there's always that before roll camera. Right. So as soon as I hear the set AD say lock it down, that's when I hit roll. And that's when I slate my take. So he says, lock it down. I hit roll scene 101, take whatever. Right. I'm slated. I just let it roll. I just throw the boom up. If there's an actor on set and they're not saying anything, they're just waiting. I'll pop them up. And then when it's time to go, and then what I do in my notes is I put the time code where the slate clap hits. That way, you know, anything before that can be used for ambience. Oh, that's smart.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Is that something you learned early from somebody else or you just

Speaker 2: kind of came up with it and started doing it? I think a combination of both. I think working with film people, that's generally the type of notes that would hit a sound report before things were digital. Right. It's like when it was still on tape, you needed that time code value because you're scrolling through linearly to find each take. Right. So that was always kind of part of the sound report. Anytime I did any scripted anything. But then rolling early, I think that was a product of working in news. I did a short little stint where I worked in news. And anytime you ever do an interview in news, as soon as a person that you're interviewing walks in the room, you hit record. That way, if anything happens, they say anything that the news can use. Right. Even if it's off axis, it doesn't matter. They want it. So I think just from working in both of those worlds, it just made a lot of sense. Plus getting room tone is frustrating. You're waiting till everything is over. And as soon as they say moving on, everybody's moving with equipment being as quiet as it is today. Is that necessary with somebody just starting out? Is it better for them to be more conservative?

Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, the noise floor issue isn't really an issue. So better to be low and safe and not clipping than have to redo it.

Speaker 2: Yeah. See, that's good because I've never done that. I've always.

Speaker 1: But what do you record to? Like what's your number one record?

Speaker 2: My go-to field mixer would be, well, really anything sound devices, but like a six series recorder. But in most of their preamps, they sound better when you really give it some juice. So I tend to be really aggressive. I'm plenty happy mixing in the red as long as it's clean.

Speaker 1: Well, but that's the key. It's clean. Right. So you've got a lot of new filmmakers out there doing indie films. If they're looking to get really good sound, what would you say to them?

Speaker 2: The advice I would give to an indie filmmaker, somebody just starting out would be to get the right microphone in the right place, the right time and at the right level. And I think that would be a really great start. What about you?

Speaker 1: Yeah. Right sound in the right place, environmentally at the right time and right level. I think that's great. Yeah.

Speaker 2: Yeah. It's a good start. There's still a huge gap in communication between production and post-production. Sure. But like you said, with metadata and all that, it's easier for people like me. Right. But how great would it be if people like you and I spoke before a project and you knew ahead of time exactly how I was going to lay out my files, how they were all going to be named, how the folders were going to show up for each of them. Right. You know, that way on day one, you're not trying to figure out what I've done. Right. You've already got it. Yeah. It's already there. No, that would be a first. Maybe we should work together.

Speaker 1: We should.