"40 Years of Sound for Film" Overview

In the excitement of the Academy Awards, I stumbled upon an event they decided to host this year. The Academy’s Science and Technology Council hosted “40 Years of Sound for Film” March 6^th. Luckily, Oscars.org archived the event hosted by sound mixers, Tom Fleischman and Chris Newman. You may have heard Fleischman’s work in films like this year’s Oscar-winning film, Hugo, Marley & Me, Goodfellas, and The Departed. Newman is known for his audio work on film greats like The Godfather, The Silence of the Lambs, and The Exorcist.

The two professionals offer some great advice as they walk you through the process of how audio is made, chosen, and put into films. They call the initial sound recordings the foundation for the rest of the audio. Newman says, “It starts with me getting crew and my myself to decide where to put the microphones, what’s going to work best, what’s going to work best for the particular director, particular actor, particular location.” A lot of people don’t consider all the factors necessary to get a specific sound right for a certain shot or film. Sometimes you may feel it would make most sense for a sound to be a particular way, but the director wants it to be completely different. At that point you may have to sacrifice your creative input for the sake of direction.