New Year, I'm not at NAMM and Les Misérables
(originally posted January 25, 2013)
It's 2013 and I suck at blogging. I've been really busy with work while gaining a few pounds over the Holidays. Don't worry I'm on a "diet". Anyway, I will be blogging more....really!
I now understand why social media exist - to make you jealous when someone is tweeting or updating statuses or sharing pictures from events that you wish you were attending. (as well as providing a platform for narcissism, self deprecation and photos of cats) NAMM is going on right now and I'm not there. Saw some really cool new toys so far, you can follow @NAMMShow if you want to feel sad with me.
I listen to Pro Tools Expert podcast every week and follow their blog, they really post some great stuff. One of their latest episodes is an interview with Simon Hayes who was the sound mixer for Les Misérables. Quite a few sound websites have posted on this already but the process Simon and his team used to record Les Misérables was so fascinating. 99% of the movie was recorded live which is no easy feat. The only scene the actors lip sync to was in the beginning while singing in water with waves and wind crashing around them. For playback actors wore in-ears and there was a pianist off set playing along, following the actors lead. Since there was so many wireless packs on at the same time, the sound team used an induction loop around the set to send the feed to the in-ears.
The director had 3 cameras going all the time with a wide, mid and tight shot making it hard for the boom operator to get close to the actors. Lavs were used on the actors to be able to record everyone. One thing I learned for sure from this podcast was that the English way of saying lavalier sound way cooler than here in America. They say la-va-li-ay instead of la-va-lier, you can hear it for yourself in the podcast. Anyway, they used DPA mics and Pro Tools for the recording.
Really a great podcast, hope you check it out as well as see the movie. Below are some behind the scene footage and interviews.
Cheers!