Alan Stokes asked if  there was a time when the mix for stereo movies was done with dialogue quite low so that the M/E  was more impressive.

Pat Heigham

I fielded this query to the Post membership of The Association of Motion Picture Sound – a Guild most concerned with the quality of the audio element of films. Many of our members have been recognised with Oscar and BAFTA awards for their work.

Below is a distillation of replies.

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The Association of Motion Picture Sound replies:

John York

I have heard of the mistake of Stereo M&E Mix being played out (from Avid off Tape) with the Full Stereo mix when supplying clients review copies – being perfectly in phase doubling the Music and Effects levels in the mix and leaving the Dialogue relatively low – 6 db lower – but in Broadcast this would probably been noted due to serious high overall levels.

What goes on in Picture houses (such as mistake described above) now that Mixes are delivered by files only and not ‘Laid back’ to the Master tape in the Dubbing Studio is also another variable, especially with software plug-ins to ‘legalise’ a mix. But a Mix should be legal if it started as a ‘made for Broadcast’ film – but if it started as a ‘Film’ dynamic and ‘legalised’ – well maybe that could be an issue. I think things go on outside of the supervision of any Sound Professionals in Video dominant environments (with variable quality of monitoring).

A ‘Broadcast’ Mix would in general have less dynamic range – if one had been done on a separate pass – depending on time (budget). This could be argued that underscore music, ambiences and lower level spot FX may be brought up if done as a separate mix – normally by the original mixer – and would like to think in a sensitive way – as it is the Mixers work!

I suppose there is an argument that if you do a 5.1 Mix first with Dialogue Centre Only and Stereo FX and Music in the Left and Right only (relying on a phantom Centre image) most people with 2 ears should be able to ‘pick out’ the Dialogue from the Centre speaker – is which MAY allow Stereo Music and FX to be driven louder whilst still ‘picking out’ the Dialogue. If this is then mixed to Stereo via the standard Fold-down settings and not attended to then it could have consequences. I think the settings if ‘Pan Laws’ may come into play also.

Aside all of this, and having great respect of all my fellow professional Re-Recording/ Dubbing Mixers I think most of the ‘issues’ are Client driven in their choices made within the Studio or Theatre – where mostly they get what they want, unlike in the old days where the Senior Sound Supervisor was answerable to the IBA (Independent Broadcasting Authority – ITV’s governing authority) – I presume the BBC had the same situation, and as Sound Supervisor you could override Director or Producer ‘Creative’ decisions due to ‘Technical Standards’.

It works well having a separate person doing the Final balance, rather than being done by, say the FX Editors or the Composer – for the similar reason of most band members want their instrument loudest! The Mixer can take that overall judgement on the Mix. That is not to say that Supervising Sound Editors will have a major influence on the overall balance – but they have often employed their chosen Mixer for their skills of an overall good mix!

Most of the seasoned TV Directors and Producers I have worked with have wanted Dialogue clarity paramount – and they have wanted to hear the Mix on a TV. This seems to be changing from the stories that I hear.

Mumbling style performance is a major issue (which has been discussed at length before!) and fading this up loudest does not really resolve the issue!

Having said all that – I have heard some big budget US films from DVD on my TV in stereo and have struggled to hear Dials compared with Music “the Americans tend to mix hot” I heard a UK mixer say. I think they were referring to the amount of red clipping lights on the meter bridge on Action movies more than anything else.

Personally I think the story is mainly told in the words and therefore needs to be effortless to hear – and as we all know, we spend a lot of time and resources to achieve this. You only have to watch an M&E only mix through for an International deliveries (as all Mixers do) to realise there is only a skeleton of a story and emotion without hearing the words!

Mixers don’t start off trying to get it wrong after all!

I will be interested in any other angles on this from others, as it seems to be becoming a recurring subject

Richard Daniel

This document might be of interest to Feature Film Sound Dubbing Mixers. Although it is 10 years old and may not cover the detailed management of files etc it does clearly set out what should be heard “in the room” for large screen presentations.

http://www2.grammy.com/pdfs/recording_academy/producers_and_engineers/5_1_rec.pdf

With today’s multi destination formats – perhaps it is hard to please all the people all the time.

Regarding US TV series, taking “House of Cards” for example, the clarity and constant close up perspective became relentlessly tiring! – Just my personal opinion.

Al

Two recent examples of where the wrong mix has been broadcast spring to mind.

Most recently, “Fast Girls”. I saw it in 5.1, and it was definitely the theatrical mix. I had to turn it down 10dB from my usual to stop the FX and music annoying the neighbours, but turn it up 6dB above my usual to be able to hear dialogue properly.

A while back, C4 showed “Trance” in 5.1. The front Left and Rights were swapped with the rears. Whenever anything panned across the front, say L-C-R, it went Lsr-C-Rsr. If I switched to the stereo tail end fold down it was phasing. Unwatchable.

I’ve had films and TV that I’ve worked hard on getting a nice TV balance and pitch corrected, only for either just the stereo to be tx’d, or the non pitch corrected theatrical mix getting tx’d.

None of these are down to the tech ops – they have to have faith that they’ve been given a correct spec correct version programme to load into their servers. There’s very little that can be done once it’s started playing out – it’s completely out of their hands by then.

The major problem it seems is broadcasters not having their own QC depts any more.

John

I have noticed that when non-audio people say “the sound wasn’t very good on that film/TV” invariably they are commenting on the intelligibility of the Dialogue and less likely on the FX and Music (which may be rather good).

The valid point is they could not easily connect with the characters telling the ‘story’ – and part of that is the actors lack communication whilst also being in ‘the character’.

A common Editing style is to quickly cut to actors not speaking or a view of something else (for instance showing how the other characters are reacting – a visual story shown over the story in the words being spoken) The problem can be that we then rob the viewer of picking up other clues of what is being said in that actors face – and of course how there mouth is forming the words. We pick up the context in real life from face to face communication in a noisy environment all the time. We may not hear all the words but we keep up with what is being said (for instance in a noisy pub). All the more reason why in the world of the artificial way of presenting a dramatic story on a screen with creative picture there is more need to be supported with intelligible words.

I think all us audio people know that though – but it seems we are the ones blamed for what often is a performance issue or a ‘Creative’ mix wanted by our clients.

Dave

Never have trusted ‘others’ with fiddling with a mix they know nothing about, much prefer to do my own fold-downs and versions where possible.…..but it doesn’t all stem from damage after the mixing stage.

I have said to one or two clients in the past – “if you’re not careful, I’ll mix it the way you’re asking me to mix it!”
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Pat Heigham

My colleague who mixed the final tracks for 12 of the Bond movies, mentioned that for TV, there is heavy compression, and for a TV mix – reduced dynamics, and is annoyed when the commercial breaks come in with a perceived much louder audio.

Dave Plowman

One thing that seems to be ignored is just how the original material is transferred to the server. My guess is this is now done by ‘untrained’ personal, at least on some of the minority channels. So as regards relative levels, there’s more to it than how the source material was mixed.

Dave Buckley

I found the news item shown below in the “Daily Telegraph” 12^th Sept 2015. At last, the message has got home!

                  (Click on the picture below to see a larger or clearer version of this picture:
                   Click the “X” button (top right) to close the newly opened picture.)

Albert Barber

Amazing that the old system has returned. There was a quality control room when I joined Pres. Not sure where it was, possibly in Pres Control or near CAR.

They will come up with, as a new idea, to have a London set of production studios next, followed by a London Production centre. I wonder where it will be and what it will be called. My guess is “New Television Centre” – somewhere in North London with easy access to the M1 M4 and M5!

Peter Cook

Whoever produced “Doctor Foster” (2015) had not read the “Daily Telegraph”. Music levels were way above dialogue. And continuity was dodgy. The main character left an outdoor birthday party in full sunlight and drove home at high speed, knocking a door mirror off. The next scene immediately afterwards was indoors at home in artificial light, no daylight in windows, so one assumes darkness.

Martin Eccles

Back in 1974 Sypher 1, the first TV dubbing suite at the TVC had a button to change the sound output from the large monitoring L/S5 to the small speaker in the colour tele that the picture was viewed on. This was used to check what the home viewer would be hearing so there is nothing new.

The same Sound Supervisor who planned and mixed the programme in the studio or OB also did the dub after the VT editor had edited it to produce a coherent whole.

Perhaps recordings are monitored on huge speakers and at high levels these days and scenes are just edited together and not dubbed any more. Dubbing costs money and takes time.

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