MPSE Wavelength

14 I M PS E . O R G year due to COVID. So many clients needed to get their work fi nished and couldn't go to an ADR stage. So we came up with a way to hook up as many as 14 loopers on Source- Connect Standard at the same time and they come in on separate channels in Pro Tools. We can all hear each other just like a session on stage. We generally view picture with beeps over Zoom. I have used this virtual system many times now for live-action features, feature animation, and TV shows of all types. All my actors (talent) have their own home studios with pro equipment to give the best possible recording quality. We just fi nished working this month on Season 2 of Mandalorian, WandaVision, and Disenchantment." Editing in the time of COVID has caused all kinds of ripples in the industry—from new roles of COVID Compliance Offi cers to the editing and mixing rooms. We're all navigating this new world and as most of the industry is constantly changing and growing from the time it was born, sometimes we discover even better ways to do our jobs. I was recently hired (yes, hired!) to direct an episodic series and it will all be done remotely via Zoom—even directing! "Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy ride." (From All About Eve (1950) though Bette Davis actually said, "It's going to be a bumpy night." If you have questions relating to production (aka dialogue) editing, you can send them to wavelength@ mpse.org or join the Facebook page: Vickie Sampson-Dialogue Detective. Terri Douglas in her soundproof recording booth with her Neumann TLM103 microphone. There are cheaper mic options but she has never gotten a bad quality report back from the editors! STUDENT CORNER BY DAVID BONILLA MPSE S hortly after I turned 32, I became a student at Video Symphony studying audio in both music and fi lm. Before that, at 21, I served as a Marine in the Iraq War, then had a long history of odd jobs from acting to door-to-door salesman. I had just lost my job working for Elon Musk's SolarCity/Tesla. I didn't know what I was going to do with my life. One night, driving on Interstate 5, I was singing to a Whitney Huston song on the radio. I noticed I was breaking it down by song structure, instruments, plug-ins, and the mix. I thought to myself, "Damn, I really like this." I started watching TV the same way. I was listening for everything and trying to fi gure out how they did that. I knew I wanted to be in sound, whether it was music or movies. After researching for audio schools, I spoke with an alumnus from Video Symphony and enrolled. I used some of my GI Bill benefi ts for tuition which helped immensely. I believe having diverse work and life experiences helped me out signifi cantly and I was highly motivated to make this work. I took notes, asked every possible question, came to class on time, attended the same classes again if I didn't understand something and spent my free time on rigs learning how to do things hands-on, not just read about them in textbooks. I volunteered for projects, sat in on other students doing their fi nal projects and offered myself up as talent or crew on anyone's project that needed the help. It reinforced my knowledge of what was being taught to me, as well as gave me the experience I needed to get a good start. Just as I got accepted to Video Symphony, I also got accepted to a culinary school in Upstate New York. After graduating that program, I returned to Video Symphony and graduated. Culinary was fun, but it didn't give me the satisfaction that sound editing and mixing did. Then, the reality hit me that every graduate faces when completing their studies, "Now what? What's the next step?" I asked everyone for work. I asked my professors, other students and looked for gigs online. I even joined a recently formed military group called Veterans in Media and Entertainment (VME) that helps veterans transition into the entertainment business and I used that as a networking opportunity. I was still using the school's facilities to practice my skills when I got a call from the school's offi ce saying they had a person wanting to use a recently graduated student for work. I jumped at the opportunity and an hour later, I was in the studio again recording sounds for a Foley library my new client wanted to create. I did my job for the day and not too long later, I had another gig with their team. Little did I know that the client was Mark Sommerville, sound designer/supervisor and now creative director for fi lmmaker and illusionist Zach King. This time it was for a remake of Indiana Jones, but with dogs and cats. With a small budget and a lot of help from friends, I got the gig done on time. I would record myself on a Foley stage and editing it afterward. Later, I utilized some current students to Top: David Bonilla MPSE fi nally received his Daytime Emmy trophy on Oct. 12, 2020, which he won for Outstanding Sound Editing for a Preschool Animated Program for his work on Elena of Avalor.

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