Sound designer Tim Prebble has published on his blog some interesting notes and sound recording examples of his work on “Boy”, a Taika Waititis film that opens in New Zealand cinemas on March 24th.
Tim worked on the sound design during October and November, and also on the mix in December at Park Road Post.
One of the best aspects of being confirmed on a project early is it means you can start thinking about the creative challenges & what will be required long before officially starting work. When I first read the script I tagged one location as critical for sound, a corn field, as I knew by the time we were working on the film the corn would have been harvested & long gone. So I decided to visit Waihau Bay while they were shooting, and I am so glad I did. It is such a beautiful part of the country and while I have driven through there before I never had time to stop & explore it. And while my primary intention was to record ambiences I soon realised it made sense to try & capture as many of the vehicles in the film as possible, since they would all be there, available for the shoot.
Another bonus of visiting the shoot was getting to sit beside Ken Saville, the production sound recordist, and listen as he & his boom swinger Jo Fraser worked. After seeing some of the difficulties they have to overcome to record good sound I said to him, “Everyone in sound post should have to come visit the set & see what you guys go through” and he smiled wryly and replied “I think everyone in production should do the same with post!” Ken did a brilliant job on this film, recording genius multitrack coverage to a Fostex 8 track and also providing a huge range of ambiences & FX. I was so impressed when I listened to a dawn chorus he recorded, and about six minutes into it I heard the rooster wake up & start crowing. I surmised this was no accident, he knew what time the rooster started crowing & planned to get both a clean dawn chorus AND the rooster in one go!
Visit Music of Sound Blog for pictures of the recording session and details of the sounds of the film.