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Sound Designer V. Sound Engineer

What is the difference between sound designer and sound engineer?
If offered both positions in a film, which would be better to take if you were an artistic sound editor?
Does one position have more clout or "importance" to the film world?

Thanks for your help!
 
Sound Engineer is much too vague a description. It applies to the guys & gals who mix and record music in the studio, but it can also apply to those who mix live performances (usually referred to as FOH [Front Of House] engineers). Oh, yeah, those who design all different types of audio facilities - recording studios, Foley rooms, rerecording/dubbing stages, etc. - are also referred to as sound engineers. Sound or audio engineers can also be involved with the design of audio signal processing (software or hardware), Electroacoustics and Psychoacoustics.

A Sound Designer, on the other hand, is a very specific job; s/he is the person who decides on the overall soundscape of a film, theatrical production, video game or other media application. What should be noted is that a Sound Designer specifically works at merging sound with visuals.

When it comes to film production and film post production the job titles for those doing work on the audio of a film are fairly specific. On the set there are two or three people involved with audio - the production sound mixer (PSM), the boom operator (Boom-Op), and the audio assistant (sometimes referred to as a cable wrangler). When it comes to audio post most are editors - dialog editors, ADR editors, Foley editors, sound effects editors, music editors - or mixers - ADR mixer, Foley mixer, sound effects mixer, rerecording mixer. With the exception of the rerecording mixer(s) in the new digital age none of the mixers do very much mixing; they could more accurately be called recordists, but the old terminology still hangs on (sort of like dialing a phone number even though there haven't been dials on phones in almost a quarter of a century). One more audio post job that needs to be mentioned is the Supervising Sound Editor, who is the "manager" of the entire audio post team. The Supervising Sound Editor may or may not be the Sound Designer. There are other incidental audio jobs such as librarians and data wranglers plus various assistants, interns and gofers.

As a one-man-band audio post facility I do almost everything - dialog editor, ADR mixer, ADR editor, Foley walker/artist, Foley mixer, Foley editor, sound effects mixer, sound effects editor, music editor and rerecording mixer plus acting as my own librarian and data wrangler. I'm also the Sound Designer and the Supervising Sound Editor who supervises an audio post crew of one - me! When I have to the budget I will sometimes hire additional voices or a vehicle driver. I have even had an intern on occasion. As I do it all by myself my credit is usually "Audio Post By Bob Kessler;" it covers everything.
 
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