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Question about doing a sound mix.

H

harmonica44

The last short film I did, the sound mix cost a few thousand dollars and to get to sound good, and I took a hit... which is one of the reasons which I haven't done another one since. I was told on here to do a zero budget short, and just do the sound mix myself, but I haven been playing around with a lot of trial and error and find the sound mixing difficult to do.

I was able to learn a lot video editing and color grading on my own and feel I have gotten better in that department. But I find myself still struggling on how to do a sound mix. I got that book that was recommended to me on here before, "Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures: A Guide to the Invisible Art".

But I felt the book was more of a history lesson in dialogue editing, rather than giving actual instructions that would apply to a modern system. Plus of course, I want to do the whole mix, and not just the dialogue. Does anyone have suggestions on how to learn this stuff better, or any books that would help me do it on my own? Thanks for any input. I really appreciate it.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Yeah but I am just here asking for what method in premiere pro since this is a post production forum, rather than applying trial and error all the time.
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Are you finished with the picture? Is the film locked? If not forget the sound and edit the picture.

a couple of reasons for that.

1) the solution is to build the sound scape and that will make picture editing a LOT more difficult.
2) Premiere is a lousy sound program.
3) you can't do a decent job on the sound till the picture is done.

A $$$ film with a full crew doesn't often start serious work till the picture is heading toward a lock. The only reason is that there is $$$$$$$ riding on finishing on time so it's cheaper to waste a lot of time conforming and reediting that waiting. A film at say $1mill or so won't start sound post till the picture is locked, you shouldn't either.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Okay thanks. Well I tried a number of things in the audio, but it still jumps from one room tone to the other as it goes from scene to scene. What is the best way to get rid of that in editing audio?
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There are a few things. The first is it should change, it's a different space. But there should also be continuity because it's a related space.

How you make that happen has everything to do with the film and the cut.

If it's a hard cut to a different room then hard cut it. If they are walking from one to the next with the camera following then you probably would cross fade.

BUT (assuming you have finished all the picture editing and the film is LOCKED) the continuity is created in the sound edit.
Go away from the computer take the script and a note pad and write down all the things that exist in the world of that scene.

For instance. Is it in the suburb? With maybe a dog in the BG and maybe some birds or a car by, someone cutting the lawn? Midtown office with lots of city roar? Sirens, honking traffic?

Is it an office with people typing in other rooms? When does it take place? Are they typing on typewriters or computers? Phones in the BG, off screen conversations?

Whatever it is those are the layers you need to add to the sound track.

At your point, I would limit yourself to maybe 8 tracks or so of sound, it doesn't make a lot of sense to go all in on the sound unless you want to become a sound editor.

With out seeing it it is hard to get specific but generally if I was working on it in a film with a budget I would be planning on 20 to 60 tracks. Part of that is that you want to lay things out so you don't get lost so out of 60 tracks only 10-15 are probably playing at any one time. The point is layer in some "world" and it will glue it together.
 
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Okay thanks. Before on here, I was told that in audio mixing, the human ear can only process 3 sounds at a time. Is that true? Cause if the audience is hearing 60 sounds at the same time, at some point in the movie, could that be too many things to hear at once, or too much overkill? Or why 60 tracks particularly?
 
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harmonica44 said:
Okay thanks. Before on here, I was told that in audio mixing, the human ear can only process 3 sounds at a time. Is that true? Cause if the audience is hearing 60 sounds at the same time, at some point in the movie, could that be too many things to hear at once, or too much overkill? Or why 60 tracks particularly?
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Overkill used to be a real danger, but in december 2015 Lemmy died.
His advice was that the only way to feel the noise is to play it good and loud.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VNUyjRRjxM
 
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Well Al, I'm new here so he hasn't pissed me off yet. But you know you don't have to follow the thread if it bothers you.

44, you need to take a breath. Forums are fairly useful for specific advice they are not a way to learn how to make a film. I answered your question partly because there was some dodgy comments and this is the kind of very legit questions that come up than many people can use advice on.

But I am not going to play the two year old game of "why".

I gave you advice. You don't have to follow it but I'm not going to try and defend or explain everything that pops into your head or that you have been "told".

I was told Santa was real.
 
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Noiz2 said:
Well Al, I'm new here so he hasn't pissed me off yet. But you know you don't have to follow the thread if it bothers you.

44, you need to take a breath. Forums are fairly useful for specific advice they are not a way to learn how to make a film. I answered your question partly because there was some dodgy comments and this is the kind of very legit questions that come up than many people can use advice on.

But I am not going to play the two year old game of "why".

I gave you advice. You don't have to follow it but I'm not going to try and defend or explain everything that pops into your head or that you have been "told".

I was told Santa was real.
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2 year? Um, I think they hit that mark 4 years ago.

He will not follow your advice, only ask for more. That he also won't follow.

He does politely say "Thanks, but ..." and the vicious cycle plays on
 
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I meant "two yearold" as in toddler who constantly responds to any answer with "why?".

You may be right. Over at DVXUser there is one that as far as I can tell has yet to shoot anything but constantly asks silly questions and then challenges the answers. I have wondered if that person is just playing the troll game.

But as I said I'm new here and I like to give folks a chance. Sometimes they are just confused and don't know how to ask the right question. If not I just ignore them.
 
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Thank for your insight. Because of H44's insane never ending list of questions, I actually learn something from every thread he posts. Probably more than he learns!

He's not a troll, I don't think ... I just think he's lazy and would rather sit and talk and ask questions about something than get up and do it and learn from his mistakes.
 
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