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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Shooting my Entire RED Picture M.O.S.?

Sean said:
I'm surprised no one mentioned Robert Rodriguez. Or if they did I didn't see it in the above posts.

He shot El Mariachi entirely MOS.

I saw another feature as well--a horror film from Asia--that was shot entirely MOS and dubbed for dialogue and sound. For the most part I'd never have known.

I'd be tempted to get some location sound, even bad location sound, however. And then you might still have to do a lot of sound and dialog replacement anyhow. But you'll have more choices.

Anyhow, good on you Tom. Where there's a will, there's a way. Do it how you need to do it. As long as you make your movie, you're about a million light years ahead of everyone else with a video camera.
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I'm with Sean - I too was going to mention El Mariachi being shot MOS. You seem to know what you're after, now it's up to you to make it work. I am a proponent of great sound, but I'm also a proponent of making things happen - even if it is against all odds, ground rules, or public opinion. Guess that also explains part of my admiration for Red.

One thing though - you have inputs into the camera, why not at least record a guide track. It will aid in post (ADR/looping/foley).

Cheers,
Dale
 
adaml said:
Have you considered bringing a sound designer on early and letting him/her determine your audio needs?
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Absolutely agree with this one! Get your sound designer involved in Pre-pro and then you can adjust your crew to meet your needs. I for one, would at least rig a radio mic or two for nat sounds (lav and boom) as the need arises. Even if you use for reference tracks, it will make the post sound much, much easier. This is all assuming that Red will have audio recording active, otherwise you have to add a double system recording to your package. BH
 
Apparently Rodrieguez didn't record any of the sound in post he did a separate take on set for sound fx and dialogue in order to save money on film which would be wasted on slates.
He just manually synced the dialogue in post and cut away if it didn't sync, he knew which shots wouldn't sync up in post so he had already worked around this in the shooting process.
 
Tom,
My initial reaction was like a lot of people, that this is basicly a bad idea BUT - I made a short horror film once in which the best take of the most important shot had no sound that was usable, so we had to use the dialogue from another take. It matched up, but it was really eire. Kind of surreal. You couldnt tell it was dubbed, but it just didnt look quite right, and in a horror film, it worked really well.

Dubbed dialogue has its own aesthetic. It isnt wrong per-se, but make sure you like it and think it is appropriate. It might serve to distance your audience just enough from the film, or make your characters seem a little unnatural. Do some tests.
 
The idea that on an indie project people would pay like $500 or more to have someone boom for them is really laughable to me. Almost any film school student who isn't a moron knows how to hold a shotgun mic properly to get nice production sound. On an indie project the beauty is you aren't bound by the numerous absolutely inane, stupid Hollywood crap, like unions, for instance, where you ask a guy to move a case and he can't move it because it's not his job or some crap. That kind of attitude will get someone kicked off my set. If you have a few spare hands, you can teach someone how to boom properly (if you know how yourself) in not too much time, and if you always make sure (as you should) to have plenty of takes and coverage, you should always have some good footage.

The only way I'd pay a guy $500 per day to boom for me is if I was doing a $50 million film where every hour of the shoot costs such an insane amount of money that we simply cannot have anyone but a complete professional doing the audio because it has to be PERFECT. But when you're on a small budget project that's almost never the case. Most people I know don't think it's rocket science to plug in cables, move lights, set up dolly tracks, use the boom mic, etc. I can do all of that (I'd rather not, though), my friend can do all of that, it's really not that difficult. The DP is the position that is worth every penny of what a good DP charges. Nothing is more important than getting a great image, IMO, and you can't skimp on that. But it's hilarious to me this industry will pay everyone else so much money to do simple jobs that your average Home Depot employee could pull off with 8 hours of training.
 
That's probably not far off from what union boom op guys make. Maybe more.

I definitely will involve the sound designer in pre-prod if I can.
 
adobeone said:
Yeah but that stock sound has to be paid for, you hire the location sound guy you own the output. So next time you need lake waves it's in your library. Then you can sell it to some else.

Work smart not hard young pat-a-won.

By the time I'm done with you, your going to name your kids after me.
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Adobeone, when you first posted in this thread I thought you were just a horse's patooty fharting oats. But your second post made sense.

I also can understand Tom's position about not getting throun out of a National Park where he sees a need to film. So, this is how I expect to foley my movie which i hope to begin in a year, maybe two. I oun numerous mini dv cameras that I have just hung on to since they wouldn't bring much return anyway (older Canon stuff, mostly.) I plan to put directional mikes on each one of them (to keep the camera sound out of the audio) and place them stategically around the set, out of sight of the camera. They are small (a couple of original Canon Opturas, a GL 1, maybe will use a couple of Sanyo MPEG 4 recording Xacti's). This should cover any Foley needs and possibly suffice for 5.1 surround. This amount of gear should be easy to carry and should not alert any picky Ranger that Tom's crew would be a danger to the natural beauty of the Park. If either you or Tom (or anyone else) see a problem(s) other than less-than-perfect sound from a mini dv etc. camera, I would be interested in hearing what it or they might be.
 
My objection number6 is that you need to pay 3 union boom guys $700 per day otherwise you aren't really a professional. People have to eat, and since everyone else in the entire freakin' world makes like $125 per day, you should understand a union boom guy eats special food that requires he make $500 per day at least for a job that's not even as difficult as cleaning toilets. Come on number6, be professional! ;)

lol, just joking with you. I have basically zero tolerance for the way the big guys make movies or anything else. I think it's laughable.
 
just boom the small dialogues yourself you lazy bastard... M.O.S. sucks. It always have and always will. And don´t get started with fellini or herzog, because the mos is definately not what makes their movies great...
 
JonathanLB said:
My objection number6 is that you need to pay 3 union boom guys $700 per day otherwise you aren't really a professional. People have to eat, and since everyone else in the entire freakin' world makes like $125 per day, you should understand a union boom guy eats special food that requires he make $500 per day at least for a job that's not even as difficult as cleaning toilets. Come on number6, be professional! ;)

lol, just joking with you. I have basically zero tolerance for the way the big guys make movies or anything else. I think it's laughable.
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You're right, of course. Didn't mean to starve anyone. Besides, the extra people could become bear food! Bears gotta eat too!
 
number6 said:
Adobeone, when you first posted in this thread I thought you were just a horse's patooty fharting oats. But your second post made sense.

I also can understand Tom's position about not getting throun out of a National Park where he sees a need to film. So, this is how I expect to foley my movie which i hope to begin in a year, maybe two. I oun numerous mini dv cameras that I have just hung on to since they wouldn't bring much return anyway (older Canon stuff, mostly.) I plan to put directional mikes on each one of them (to keep the camera sound out of the audio) and place them stategically around the set, out of sight of the camera. They are small (a couple of original Canon Opturas, a GL 1, maybe will use a couple of Sanyo MPEG 4 recording Xacti's). This should cover any Foley needs and possibly suffice for 5.1 surround. This amount of gear should be easy to carry and should not alert any picky Ranger that Tom's crew would be a danger to the natural beauty of the Park. If either you or Tom (or anyone else) see a problem(s) other than less-than-perfect sound from a mini dv etc. camera, I would be interested in hearing what it or they might be.
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If you have the gear sounds reasonable to me, I'm not a sound engineer. Make sure you wirelessly mic yourself since you'll have all that behind scenes footage for your promo pack, and the DVD bonus features.

A two car garage in the boones isn't the ideal Foley stage, but it works in a pinch. Use good mics you would be surprised.
 
JonathanLB said:
The idea that on an indie project people would pay like $500 or more to have someone boom for them is really laughable to me. Almost any film school student who isn't a moron knows how to hold a shotgun mic properly to get nice production sound.
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I'll have to vehemently disagree with this one, Jonathon. Imho, the boom op is one of the most important people on the whole production, and just as important as the mixer. Actually, the mixer and boom op should function as a great team.

A good boom op is such a delight to work with, and a bad one can be a terrible curse. Ditto, once you get to post.

As for Tom's particular project, he might actually want to forgoe a full sound team, but I'd recommend that he catch it. Imagine having to loop Martin Sheen saying: "found a toaster," in Badlands.:whistling:
 
my last repy should read . . .

my last repy should read . . .

. . . that he should catch it with a one man sound team. Or maybe have "someone" boom it, notwithstanding my opinion to the contrary that generally someone "very good" should boom it.
 
jimarri, I totally agree with you about having someone experienced on boom. booming was one of the ways i first got myself on to movie sets, and it took me a good 10 solid days or so of booming AFI shorts and various projects before I really got decent at it. Having a noobie on a boom can be a big nightmare.

One thing I was thinking about is asking one the young film school guys who is going to be working on my project to pick up a few boom mic gigs between now and then off craigslist, to get some boom experience.
 
Yeah, I think you are making a good decision getting a professional sound team.

As far as El Mariachi is concerned, I think whoever bought it probably paid a grip in post for sound. I heard hundreds of thousands but I could be wrong.

Anyway, I really like your ideas for the film, having a love triangle in an epic setting, sounds original and very cinematic!
 
Don't shoot MOS. You will literally want to kill yourself in post. You will be sitting there, and then boom, you'll say "that's it, I can't do this aymore" You'll take a gun a splatter your brains all over the sound studio or maybe your basement.

Someone else will be required to clean up the mess. They'll have to go out and buy some industrial cleaner or hire some professionals - and it will be a messy job. Hopefully there's no carpet, cause forget it. They'll just pull it out and replace it - but only after trying to bleach out the mess from the concrete floor. If it's a wood subfloor, well, that'll have to come out as well.

Some poor SOB will be on his hands and knees scrubing his knuckles to the bone and wonder why they hell he's there. He'll have no idea it was all because you shot a feature MOS and tried to patch stuff together in post. That concept will be lost on him.

If you have a brinks truck full of money buried in the backyard, then I say go for it! :)
 
Kubrick shot his first two features MOS and spent more money in post creating the sound for them than he did shooting them.

And there are obviously price levels between hiring no sound crew and hiring the best and most expensive union guys in the industry.

Like any movie, from tiny to large, you have a budget... and you decide how much you can afford for crew people and you make an offer and hope you can get the best person for your money, hopefully someone who normally makes more but is willing to work on the movie.

Recording sound for a low-budget movie is not one of the biggest hurdles to deal with.
 
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