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Re: OT: final mixing and mastering of film score....hints?
Title: Re: OT: final mixing and mastering of film
score....hints?
Hi Mark,
Congrats on the film score! I'm a professional mixing
engineer, and in the last 30 years I've mixed thousands of records and
hundreds of film and TV scores. I've been following the thread
here, and I am a bit concerned at some of the advice you've been
given.
The reality is that there really aren't and "tricks"
per se, and all that you really need to do is use your ears and
your heart to evoke the most emotion from the score.
When dealing with sample based string and brass, the mixing
process is considerably more involved than it is when a live ensemble
with an experienced conductor and orchestrator is involved. The
key is pacing and dynamics. The orchestrator will annotate the
dynamics and the conductor will work with the players at each section
to get the score to really "speak". Dozens of takes
are sometimes required to get just the right mood.
When mixing a low budget score which uses VSL or other sample
based orchestrations, I work the mix automation HARD, every phrase is
sculpted and crafted until the proper interaction is achieved.
It is simply hard work, and takes longer than when mixing live players
because YOU are the player, orchestrator and conductor.
As for the sonic aspects, less is more. Keep things simple,
focus on the big picture. As you've pointed out, the
volume level of the music is going to be very low in the final
product. Check your mixes at extremely low volume level, and if
possible, while running the dialog and sound design elements at their
normal levels. Please do NOT employ any "tricks"
involving inverting the polarity across any stereo pair, as this will
wreak havok when the mix hits any AC-3 or Dolby surround encoding.
No professional mixer would do it, and neither should you.
-Chuck Zwicky
New York
At 11:32 +0100 12/2/12, mark francombe wrote:
No looping content hence OT. (there IS
some looping in the music Im discussing, but thats not to point.
Background: I am in the middle of producing my first "proper"
film score. (Scoring music for short corporate films is my day-job,
but this is ART!) Not a big production (ok a very small production, in
France) so no budget foe calling int some professionals.
I am pretty happy (musically) with the score so far. And prettu happy
with the sound choices and sampling I have done. Its mostly orchestral
in genre, but quite minimal, with a few uses of unusual
instruments, to weird it up a bit.
My question regards the final stages I am approaching now. In order to
give it a "live" feel or less programmed feel, both in terms
of final programming tweaks and eq/effects tweak. What Hits or Tricks
would some of you Prs use.. I know some of you are either extremely
advanced in recording techiniques (per etc, who I would like to thank
for almost 24 hour email service when Ive been stuck with things.) or
professional composers (Daniel Im thinking of here now.. I think..
terrible with names).
Things I doing right now..:
1. tweaking attack times on strings... the first attack of a legato
section can be a long attack but sounds more natural on follow up
notes to have little or no attack.
2. Moving "top" lines of string sections to be there own
solo instruments, the string parts were all written with a generic
ensemble patch, but its better to move the highest musical melody line
to a solo viola or solo violin patch.
3. indivisually increasing amounts of velocity of notes.
4. My sample allows for slight random variations in pitch and volume
(pitch can get a bit far out, but is ok in sections)
Any more "live making" techniques?
The next process (that I am terrible at... always use to use an
engineer for) is mixing.. I really want to make all the music sit well
together, I expect that the Film Director will drop the music VERY low
in the mix ofr my tastes, and often what tends to happen with my
mixes, is that one hears ONE instrument stick out above the films mix.
Do I REALLY want to slap a big old compressor on the end.. It ruins
the mix for me! And the music sounds good loud.. how can I avoid this
instrument seperation... I feel its This problem, that (if im not
careful, I dont think Im in this ball park yet ) can make a good piece
of music start sounding all er.. "General Midi-
ish"
Reverb?? I usually like to use as few different reverbs as possible,
just one short one, for increasing the size of instruments, and one
Hall reverb to emulate that all the instruments are in the same room.
Is this the right approach?
Any other tips of tricks.. ( feel like theres a professionals
trick Im missing here) Like someone with say " Well Mark, you
HAVE cut the whole mix at 1k havent you? and boosted the Sub?
Its very hard to guage, the film dialog mix is terrible at the moment,
all different levels (even jumps from left to right haa ha.. with lots
of background noise (wind in trees mostly)
The final job is to score music ontop of a song that an actress sang
live on set... yikes.. no click track microphone walked all the way
around her following the camera... think Im gonna have to go to Paris
and get her to dub it.
All hints n tips will be very much appreciated..
MArk
--
Mark Francombe
www.markfrancombe.com
www.ordoabkhao.com
http://vimeo.com/user825094
http://www.looop.no
twitter @markfrancombe
http://www.flickr.com/photos/24478662@N00/
--
...
http://www.zmix.net
http://www.esession.com/ChuckZwicky
http://albumcredits.com/zmix