Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1259912
60 S P R I N G 2 0 2 0 C A S Q U A R T E R L Y Finding Fame arose, I was desperate to work on it—I'm a massive Bowie fan (isn't everyone). It was a co-production between the BBC and Showtime so, fortunately, the production was based in the UK and subsequently it posted in London. We were able to make the project budget work and it was brought to Molinare for full post-production—I was the chosen mixer. I met the editor and director during their offline so that I could be thinking about the project way before it was due to start. How much time did you have for the mix and was anyone else involved at this stage? The running time of the program was just over 90 minutes. We had four days of track-lay*, two days premix, and two days final mix. The track-lay was split between myself and sound designer Kim Tae Hak, who is part of the Factual team at Molinare. I did the dialogue editorial and music editorial in two days. Kim had two days to do the FX track-lay. These were long days as it was a tight schedule, but doing my own dialogues enabled me to get a headstart on the premix. I did the premix and mix using the following 4-5 days. It was being shown as a press preview at the Soho Hotel straight after the mix, so there really was no time to waste. Following the preview, there were some minor tweaks and then separate versions with different editorials were created for both Showtime and the BBC. Were there many sound effects and backgrounds cut for this show or are most of the sounds from the interviews? We always try to create a rich textured soundtrack and so the track-lay was quite extensive with a great deal of sound design in places. We really wanted to bring the archive and musical sequences to life. So, a large track-lay was needed to really bring out the detail in the predominately mute archive. Sound design was also used a great deal in the opening montage and throughout the film. Of particular pleasure to me was the "Theremin" sequence, which was also shot mute. So I recreated the Theremin sounds, sweeping tones by automating the internal signal generator of Pro Tools and re-recording it back in! One thing that was amazing was that we had access to the splits of some of the David Bowie songs—both early recordings and his hit songs which we used throughout the program. For example, the "Space Oddity " sequence was remixed from the stems, bringing in different elements as Gus Dudgeon and Tony Visconti both described how they created the original sound right up to the culminating crescendo of the chorus. Please describe your workflow and any problems you encountered. As workflows go, it was pretty straightforward; track-lay, premix, and mix to the offline whilst the grade and online were going on in the background. The time factor was most challenging, but as it was such a fantastic show to work, it really didn't even come into it. What was the most challenging aspect of working on this project? I find every project challenging. Every project is different and I'm forever tweaking and experimenting to get the most out of every mix. To that end, I'm my biggest critic. The poor-quality archive of hidden Bowie recordings was challenging to restore and bring to life and the weaving in and out of interviews, sound design, and music editing was tricky to get the best effect, but that's really the job. And in all honesty, to be able to work on a film about David Bowie was like a dream come true. Any amusing stories about this project? I did have a laugh at the bits of the show that showed the areas I frequented as a kid and I nearly fell off my chair during the musical driving sequence when the camera panned down my road and nearly showed my house—I was half expecting to see myself putting out the bins! *For those not familiar with the term track-lay, I will explain. Track-lay is a term used in England for the process of editing the dialogue or music or the sound effects. As you see in the article, Greg had two days to do the dialogue edit and edit the music (no dedicated music editor it seems). The offline editor, Ged Murphy, originally edited the music, but then Greg cleaned up his edits. The sound designer, Kim Tae Hak, also had two days to do a sound effects edit—apparently with a fair bit of sound design in it. Greg Gettens