hey what's up guys lewis here with

shutterstock tutorials and today we have

a good one for you we have a

professional sound mixer with us who's

worked across all the major british tv

channels and today he's going to offer

some of that knowledge that you won't

find anywhere else

i think there's a common misconception

about what sound recordists do i think

when we look at behind the scenes videos

and behind the scenes photographs and we

see them operating the boom pole i think

a lot of people just associate that role

to

doing that but i guess there's

inherently a lot more to it

than just holding a boom pole yeah so a

lot of people think it's just someone on

set that just holds on to the boom but

there's you know there's a lot more to

it we we like to think of ourselves

we're part of the whole process and it's

important for the sound department to be

involved early on pre-production to

because you know we can help with

locations and knowing what kits and

surprising the creative ways that the

sound apartment can actually help a

production

but for instance on a drama you'd have

the sound mixer who takes all the tracks

in and mixes them down and is following

the script and trying to make the right

calls so that it you know sounds great

and then you usually have two assistants

your second assistant sound and your

first assistant sound and they're akin

to the sort of camera assistant second

ac and first ac you know the second

assistant

sort of does second boom and we'll also

on a lot of sets

do the radio mics as well which is such

a big thing now because

on all dramas anyone that speaks gets a

radio mic and you get the boom and it

just gives you that backup but the

boomer operators you know they're akin

to the first assistant camera you know

the focus puller they're

they're on set they're learning the

lines they're trying to find where the

lights are they're trying to find the

best possible way that they can you know

capture the sound and any sound dead and

needs to be done so it is an important

role and it's often overlooked and

with what you just just described a lot

of people assume that the

sound quarters and sound mixer is just

all the one person with the boom port

but on a more professional

set that would be split between two or

more people yeah so it depends on the

genres for instance i work a lot in

factual and non-scripted and for that it

tends to be one person on their own but

the reason that is is because a lot of

it now is done on radio mic so i do a

lot of shows whereas mostly radio mics

and the boom comes out now and again so

it can sort of be managed on its own but

anything scripted

i would say you need at least two people

and on some dramas you can have as many

as four or five people because it does

make a big difference having

someone there on set

you know operating the boom getting all

that stuff and someone separate being

able to mix follow the script so that

you know what's recorded can be used

straight away in the edit and no

or very little extra mixing has to get

because we all know how long things can

take in post-production that we do okay

so you've got your gear on

and that looks

a lot more complicated than what i have

and what i have seen can you explain to

us what this is and kind of why you need

it

yeah i suppose it'd look a bit

intimidating if you've never seen it

before but

in essence i've got

microphone

you know in a in a windshield because do

a lot filming outside and there's a

shotgun mic in there it's an ntg3

and then

coily cable got 11 coin cable and that

comes into the mixer here which is the

santa fe 664

and

basically this allows me to mix

the boom mic with radial mics and vice

versa

these guys here

radio receivers um so they're connected

to the radio mics and then these guys

here the fins they look a bit dramatic

but it's basically instead of having

individual aerials for all the radio

mics and it gives me not necessarily

more range but it just makes it more

stable and down here this little guy

that's a little transmitter um so

that'll send the signal lens to the

camera so instead of being connected to

the camera right it goes wirelessly so

that

both myself and the camera operator are

free to

move around as as and when

so even with all this gear

typically we know that

with sound specifically

external noise can be a hindrance even

for the most amateur filmmakers just

like a fridge buzz and so forth

how does that

accommodate with with this kind of gear

you able to block it out are you able to

kind of

like lower that noise that i couldn't be

able to do on on my sort of gear or are

you still faced with the same problems

we're quite often faced with the same

problems i mean your best bet with

external noise is to

either do a record or get in there early

and try and get rid of anything you can

and yours if there's a gardener next

door speak to them politely and you know

most people are very accommodating um

the weapon that everyone sort of has is

a shotgun mic for outside you know and

that does help to

remove i should say any you know

extraneous noise but it's not a

catch-all um

my gear doesn't have any sort of noise

processing there is equipment now that

will try and de-noise

but it's important to remember that you

don't want to just record the de-noise

sound so people that have those mixers

and recorders that can do that they'll

record unprocessed so whatever's coming

out of the mic and they'll also have a

track that records with a little d-noise

on because you want to give the edit you

know both options you'd want to be

sending process sound to the edit

because what sounds good to you and your

headphones might not sound great on the

speakers but yeah we all have the same

we all have the same problems

so i've done a video on recording

directly into a sound mixer and the

difference is recorded into a camera

this is my mixed pre-six i love this

device but looking at your device

um it's inherently a lot smaller and

when we think of cameras and when the

price increases of a camera or the size

of the camera has a lot more

functionality the picture

is usually a lot better than a smaller

or a less inexpensive camera does that

translate across into the audio world

too so the mix pre i say straight away

is i think a crack and piece kit and

it's it's a little bit newer than my

mixer but the big difference you can see

is you know the mixed the amount of

inputs on this compared to the mix pre

you know i've got 12

possible channels that i can take in and

also the outputs on i think on the mix

pre it's

there's a three and a half mil output

whereas on this i've got xlrs i've got

three and a half mil i've got ta3 which

is your mini xlr so there's there's a

bit more flexibility in terms of the

gear that's not to take away from the

mixed pre and it certainly has its place

but i think for ease of use and

flexibility you know this is this is

kind of the mixer for me but you know

when you do look at the size of that

compared to the size of this mixer my

back does maybe think that you know the

mix pre is the way to go

it's just the feature set sound devices

have new mixers which have got auto

mixers built in and denoiser plugins

built in and you can use dante which

puts audio over ethernet cables so

there's a lot more features coming out

and i think that is the big difference

is the sort of feature set and quality

okay that you get that that is the

difference between maybe not necessarily

these two but maybe this compared to a

handheld zoom or tascam recorder

so here i have a shotgun mic it's got a

hot tube cold shoe adapter on it to sit

right on top of your camera which is

great for when you're vlogging or if

you're doing self-presentational work

however in drama and in tv we see that

the mic is kind of coming up and down or

under and so forth it's always at an

angle but like why is that and kind of

what is the importance of the position

it's

it's more about the mic positioning so

for example even if we're filming this

today pop that mic on top of the camera

over there

you would notice a big difference like

today we've got a boom up above us

and

you know we've we've brought it closer

by probably six feet yeah in total which

is a huge amount and you know you always

you know you hear those like phone

recordings or those old video recordings

and you can just you can kind of hear

the person but you can hear a lot of

reverb and a lot of echo okay that's

what you're gonna get if the mic is too

far away which is where the boom comes

in because it allows you

to not be in shots

and bring the mic in like that mic now

is probably one one foot maybe two feet

away from us is there like an optimal

distance where you want the boom to be

in terms of like to say like meters or i

mean

a lot of people think you want to get it

as as close as possible which which i

suppose is is correct but it very much

is it's a combination the sound

department aren't aggressive and we want

to get the mic as close as possible of

course we do but we we want to work with

the camera department so if you're

filming a big wide shot

you know you're never going to be able

to get the mic in super close

it's working together you ideally want

the mic as close as you can get it

um but you know you need to work with

the camera department on that sort of

thing and that's again why it's good to

have the sound apartment in early to

sort of in pre-production to discuss the

shots and you know a big thing now is

that if you have multiple cameras you

can shoot both the wide and tights so to

you so for us we could have a wide two

shots and then singles of each of us at

the same time

that obviously caused a major problem

for sound department because they're

pushed out by the wide okay but then

when the when the edit cuts to the

singles

you know it kind of looks a bit odd for

the audience because you're in close but

hang on it's kind of sounds like we're a

bit far away so yeah again you need to

you need to work with the sound

department for for that to make sure

that you can get the best possible sound

because ultimately that's all we want is

for the best possible

you know product at the end of it so i

think it would be fair to say in this

day and age um everyone sort of

gravitates towards the camera everyone

wants to be a cinematographer or a

director

you know how exactly does someone

get started as a sound recordist or

sound mixer because when we think you

know everyone is into their visuals the

camera the cinematography they want to

just capture cool content and camera's

obviously low priced but you have your

audio files and people who just love

sound and might want to venture into it

within filmmaking and tv how does that

happen say first off it's fair amount of

luck and being in the right place at the

right time

so i

didn't want to do this job i went to

university and interview over

like like most people in the sound

department i can probably say this is a

generalization

most of them will be musical in some way

um but myself i play corner and i play

trumper and dabble with guitar and all

that sort of thing and i originally

wanted to work in recording studios

recording bands i went off to uni did

all that and sort of towards the end i

thought oh i don't really know if i want

to do this and you at the time

were making

a web series and short films and he said

you know

you do sound in uni you must know how to

do sounds on a film set when i come and

help out and i didn't have a clue but

yeah we muddled together and using the

kit we had at the time which i think was

tascam a mix pre that microphone and

that ntg3 yeah um and so it's sort of

from there doing the odd short film and

that's important it's just to get a bit

of because i came out of uni thinking i

knew everything and what experience

you've got everyone's got to be familiar

with this where's your experience so did

a few short films and luckily there were

some training schemes in place with

channels so you could go on as a trainee

and sort of

help out in the sound department and

learn the ropes um but really a huge

amount of luck

in that i've sort of started buying my

own kit which as everyone knows is

massively expensive it's like getting a

cobbling a few bits together i managed

to get a job on a on a show that's on

the tv every single day

and just by having that credit

really opened doors to me instantly

because working with people in the

industry and i was able to say well i've

worked on this show as opposed to when

you're approaching a broadcaster saying

well i worked on my major short film

you know yeah that is helpful but you

know it's all about getting that first

break and i'm sorry to say there's no

yeah do this this and this it's a fair

amount of luck

email at the right time and just just

kind of expanding your network that's

the biggest thing that's open doors for

me is just speaking to people other

sound recorders you know it's a very

friendly community and i always call it

that as community because you speak to

somewhere speak to sound recorders you

get to know them and they can't do a job

and say oh make money you can do it and

it it's just about knowing people and i

know that's you know is you have to know

someone that works there but you just

need to expand your network and just

reach out as far as you can but there is

no as far as i can see

if you do xyz you'll end up working in

in sound yeah so i mean i guess it's

just that classic principle of like if

you have that end goal and you just keep

going for it yeah at one point

luck's going to give way yeah precisely

i mean i think we started doing stuff

i don't know what 2000

2008 oh my god

so we started doing stuff then and at

the time i worked in a shop as a retail

assistant and i think i left that job to

do this full time in maybe 2016 and all

that time was spent sort of building up

contacts and

you know as a lot of people know you are

freelancer you're self-employed and

being able to have enough work to say

you know what i can leave behind my job

that pays whatever a month however good

or bad it is

and go into being a freelance sound

recordist full-time you know and i did

that in 2016 and i haven't looked back

but it is

there's a fair amount of luck involved

i'd say and just having a good attitude

and and you know

knowing people in the industry also

helped cool so this has been lewis we

have shutterstock tutorials with guest

sam nixon sound recordist matthews and

we'll catch you again in the future with

a whole host of new toys

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