Hi - Sound Engineer here

Hi, I am a sound engineer student from Scotland. I am looking to expand my portfolio for future work. I currently offer a mixing/mastering service for music, but expanding to an audio post production mixer for film/tv. This role would include cleaning up audio recordings, editing tracks/dialogue in sync with video and overall mastering in a mix.

My website - http://www.audiopeak.net

I hope to try find some indie films/shorts to start out my portfolio of work! of course i'd do it for free!

Do most indie creators here tend to mix the audio themselves or seek a person to do it for them?

AudioPeak said:

Hi, I am a sound engineer student from Scotland. I am looking to expand my portfolio for future work. I currently offer a mixing/mastering service for music, but expanding to an audio post production mixer for film/tv. This role would include cleaning up audio recordings, editing tracks/dialogue in sync with video and overall mastering in a mix.

My website - http://www.audiopeak.net

I hope to try find some indie films/shorts to start out my portfolio of work! of course i'd do it for free!

Do most indie creators here tend to mix the audio themselves or seek a person to do it for them?

Click to expand...

Hi David

Firstly, welcome to the forum, delighted you are on here and your portfolio sounds good - really nicely mastered, really liked it. Secondly, happy Burns night (I am still struggling to recover...)

Finally, I wanted to ask for a tiny little bit of help. I have an issue down in London as I am an amateur, no-budget film maker although just breaking into a point where the occasional person is offering me a little bit of cash. My sound issue is I am struggling with a piece of music which has been recorded (four times) and there is peaking all over it. My own, free, professional sound engineer unfortunately has a serious health issue (with his kid) so can't sort it out right now.

I am also shooting a short in March and will definitely need your help if you can do this for free.

Unfortunately, I cannot guarantee any future work because the biggest demand I have at the moment is live recordings for bands. At the 'unsigned' level, they have more tracks than they are able to master and I have been turning down requests for bands to shoot and record live (because I can't do the sound...).

In terms of my level, I am a primitive with very little understanding of sound. Personally, I have only just learned the basics of sound design... Bit embarrassing really...

So if you are interested, I could shoot you the recordings of the song (there are four recordings of the same song) for you to master and also talk to you a little about the sound on my next short which will be shot and edited in March (you could have the sound files end of March)

What are your thoughts? Could this work for you?

Hey,

That sounds fantastic!

If you could email me so I can discuss further that would be great. My email is on the website contact page.

Cheers,

Oh and ps: my name is Scott not David haha.

Hi Scott and welcome!

I notice that you're offering mastering, I take it you mean music mastering rather than audio post mastering?

G

AudioPostExpert said:

Hi Scott and welcome!

I notice that you're offering mastering, I take it you mean music mastering rather than audio post mastering?

G

Click to expand...

Hey, well it's something that I am going to experiment with in the coming months. Post mastering is something I would be quite interested in. I have been studying and researching recently on it. Have you got any pointers?

'sup & welcome, new audio guy.

AudioPeak said:

Hey, well it's something that I am going to experiment with in the coming months. Post mastering is something I would be quite interested in. I have been studying and researching recently on it. Have you got any pointers?

Click to expand...

In the music business, when we say "Mastering" or "Mastering Engineer" what we're usually referring to is "Pre-Mastering" (actual mastering is the process of cutting the master disk). In film the term "mastering" refers to "print-mastering", there is no pre-mastering and mastering in film as there is in music. Mastering is not something you're going to be able to learn by yourself or offer to potential clients. To be able to offer film soundtrack mastering you need Dolby certification, which requires a very significant investment in facilities (room dimensions, acoustics properties and equipment). You of course need at least a full range 5.1 capability as there is no stereo sound in the film world, although 7.1, Dolby Atmos or Auro 3D capability is becoming more standard for film audio post mastering facilities.

TV is a fair bit different, there is no mastering per se for TV, although some people refer to the process of re-recording (final dubbing) of the various deliverables as "mastering" or "print-mastering". 5.1 is becoming more of a basic requirement these days as more stereo broadcasts are being made from a 5.1 down mix. Fortunately, the equipment specifications and costs of construction of a 5.1 TV mix room are nowhere near as exorbitant as for a film mix room because you don't need Dolby certification, as big a room, a full range 5.1 system or anything beyond 5.1 (7.1, Atmos or Auro 3D). The main difficulty for TV mixing (outside of time constraints!) is the sometimes very long and complex list of deliverables required. This list of deliverables and the technical specifications of those deliverables varies from TV network to TV network. Eventually the new EBU R128 specifications in the EU (and the ATSC A85 specs in the USA) should simplify this to an extent but at the moment if anything it's actually making it more complicated, as networks change over and have delivery requirements which contain elements of both the old and new specifications.

Hope this basic info is useful? If you have any specific questions you would like answering, feel free to fire away.

G

Hey Man,

You might as well drop your studies. AudioPostExpert here will redefine the shit of your education.

Welcome .

Now we need Sound Designers...

TheArtist said:

You might as well drop your studies. AudioPostExpert here will redefine the shit of your education.

Click to expand...

Actually, you bring up an important point. University degree courses take a long time to develop, author, get accredited and then run. So they are always quite a way and sometimes many years behind what is professional practise. University courses are therefore designed to provide a general education of the theory, analysis of music and sound and provide exposure and a little experience of some of the types of equipment used in the music production/audio businesses. University courses are not directly designed to make a student a capable or talented professional but merely to put them on the right road.

G