At the start of my second year at SAE we will be focusing on Sound replacement, post-production and live sound as general themes for the trimester. In this blog I’ll sort of delve into what I expect to learn and what I want to gain from these subjects, as well as aim to somewhat outline what each area involves from an industry standpoint.
Post production and sound replacement are two topics which tie in very heavily together, in the sense that sound replacement is an aspect of post-production. As a whole, post production in audio consists of several processes and aspects of a large scale production. Some of these processes include:
- Automated Dialogue Replacement (ADR)
- Sound Effects (SFX) design and editing
- Foley
- Music composition
- Mixing
Overall, ADR, SFX and Foley work are all areas of post production which tie into the sound replacement area, as when viewing a scene in a film or other visual piece accompanied by audio, clean dialogue and effects are necessary so that they can be mixed and mastered correctly [1]. From this area, I wish to gain knowledge and practice replacement of dialogue and learn to design and create my own SFX in order to gain a knowledge and understanding of how it is done at a professional level. By completing my first assignment using a lot of these post-production skills, I hope to achieve a great understanding for the world of post-production. This area is vastly different to live sound, as it is something that can be taken time on and not rushed, whereas there is always an extremely short deadline in live sound and things need to be as close to perfect as possible as soon as a band or performer comes on stage.
As with post-production, there are several requirements needed to make a gig memorable and run smoothly for the punters. Venues don’t sound great on their own, PA systems aren’t just magically configured and you’re favourite bands don’t just sound amazing out of nowhere. There are several jobs that are necessary to make a gig run smoothly. Some of these jobs include:
- Monitor Engineer – Operates a monitor mixing console and vastly mixes and looks after the stage
- Front of House Engineer – Mixes for the audience and others viewing from different locations
There are also many other jobs involved in live sound, including the set up of the stage, mics and sound systems, consoles and lighting and various other tasks too [2]. Ultimately, I would love to learn how each role within live sound works, and would love to learn how to set up and run a gig of my own.
There is a lot that I want to gain from this trimester at SAE and a lot of the skills that I learn will be critical to my success as an engineer in the future.
[1] Orlowski, M. (2018). What Is Audio Post Production. [online] Mpse.org. Available at: http://www.mpse.org/what-is-audio-post-production [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].
[2] Shaw, D. (2018). An Introduction To What Makes a Great Live Sound. [online] Enmore Audio. Available at: https://enmoreaudio.com/an-introduction-to-what-makes-a-great-live-sound/ [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].
Connor 