Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1351516
C A S Q U A R T E R L Y I S P R I N G 2 0 2 1 37 up our young actors' and female voices and had an easy off-axis response for bigger dialogue groups, along with the needed reachability. It also performed very well in "live" rooms, helping to separate the voice from the room delay, since we were working indoors in makeshift warehouses! The key to succeeding at this type of show also lies in solid communication within the team. Having boom operators who are confident, capable of executing the plan, finessing sound for perfection, negotiating the sound department's needs with others, and having a passion to deliver led to our success on set. Unlike shows where we mix multiple wireless lavs and focus more on getting the wires quiet, time is now taken to perfect sound reinforcement and eliminate unwanted extraneous sounds while perfecting the cueing of the boom and plant mics in order to produce a more natural soundtrack. The choreography of hand offs from boom to boom to plants and back to booms made mixing more enjoyable with a focus on submitting a natural sounding product to post. On the second-to-last-day before we wrapped, we had a scene with seven actors speaking in three different zones. John and Alexandra were covering two of the zones and I put a plant mic hiding behind the hand of a statue in the third zone in order to capture the voice of the actor. The idea was that the mic would be painted out. Unfortunately, our background and foreground extras were crossing the mic at the last moment which would make painting difficult. It was one of those moments when it seems that everyone in the room is waiting for you and everything goes quiet. But it was also a perfect situation for me in some ways. I'd discovered that in the 2½ months of working in a boom and plant mic- only manner, that a lot of this approach was about finessing the hell out of ideas until they could work. I took a deep breath and looked again at the statue. I suddenly realized that it was bending its arm. I quickly grabbed an omni directional Sanken COS-11 mic and placed it in the hollow of the elbow. I couldn't help but smile at the idea that the Sanken COS-11 is one of the traditional go-to lav mics for actors. But, although I was using a body mic on my boom-only show, it was planted on the replica of human being made out of foam and paint! The irony... As a sound purist at heart, I believe the origin of capturing sound starts with the microphone head. This is where it all begins. Perhaps the multiple award-nominated production sound mixer Nelson Stoll CAS has it right when he booms many of his own shows with modified microphones. It's a wrap now and looking back, it was a renaissance approach that worked masterfully and provided superior sound results. Ironically, it took COVID for the producers to support capturing sound without the use of body mics. The end result was so much more rewarding knowing we did it the old-fashioned way—the way sound began in cinema. Alexandra Gallo and John Sheridan booming from above From top: Boom op John Sheridan sandwiched between two cameras; John's dialogue road map.