Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1353865
54 I M PS E . O R G reputation for delivering on high- quality TV series production, to a smaller and unique sound design practice, delivering audio solutions across a new range of delivery platforms and channels. This new version of the company also had me offering my services as a production sound mixer on location, whilst being able to supervise a project's full audio post-production from two very well-appointed editing/mixing rooms in my own home—a Pro Tools track-laying room with adjoining voice studio and a Fairlight Xynergi mixing room. It gave me the luxury of being able to carry out pre-mixes at home, and then undertaking the final mixes, alongside my long-term re-recording mixer colleague, Pip Norton, at places like Air Studios for Here and Now (2014) and Pinewood Studios for Finding Fatimah (2017). These home studios were expressly designed to deliver high-quality audio solutions for the budget-conscious features, broadcast, and corporate filmmakers that we now served, whilst satisfying the exacting requirements of dialogue editors who still wanted to use us for ADR: a specialist offering that has become a regular source of income for this new version of The Audio Suite. Then, in 2015, underpinned by my experience of working on projects with complex workflow and delivery requirements, I added consultancy as a service for film and TV producers; as well as providing sports outside broadcast and event host broadcasters with commentary systems support, through an understanding of innovative production methodology such as Dante networking. Clients for this service have included the Olympic Broadcasting Services (London 2012, Rio 2016—and hopefully, Tokyo 2021); the Commonwealth Games at Glasgow in 2014 and Australia's Gold Coast in 2018; the UEFA Europa and Champions Leagues; the IAAF World Indoor Athletics championships and the Rugby World Cup. And commentary systems support typically means taking responsibility in venue, Commentary Control Room (CCR) or Commentary Switching Centre (CSC) operations. I went back to college in 2010 and commenced a self-funded, part- time PhD in sound design at the University of York, whilst continuing to work full time in the film and television industry. I was awarded my doctorate in 2019. I am a son, a husband, a father, and now (unbelievably), a grandfather. I am a sailor (a qualified yacht master); I own three lovely motorcycles (a 1957, 650cc BSA Golden Flash—the exact model my father rode long before I was born; a 1978 Suzuki GT750 water-cooled monster from my teenage dreams, and a 2001 Honda VFR 800—which I rode from John O'Groats to Lands' End in 17 hours and 59 minutes… (Qualifying me for membership of the elite motorcycling group, the 'Iron Butt Association.' The IBA is a real association, by the way!) I also teach karate, which I have been practising since the age of 11… And although I now teach, I still receive regular tuition myself; I know that even with several lifetimes, I still would not have total mastery! Whatset you o on the journeyto find a relationship between creativesound design and emotion? The journey to find a relationship between sound design and audience emotions really started for me as a 'happy accident' in the mixing theatre. It seems not that long ago that completing the 'deliverables' requirements for feature films and television programmes required separate passes of things like clean dialogue, clean effects, and so on; we didn't print the sub-mix stems at the same time as the main mix because even though we'd moved onto working with digital audio workstations, there simply wasn't the bussing and processing available to us 10 years ago to do what we routinely do now. And so, as I sat for hours watching entire programmes go through with an unfamiliar, stripped-down soundtrack, I became aware that when certain elements of the mix were given the space to breathe and were able to be heard in their own right, they often added a whole new context for what I was seeing on screen… And that became increasingly curious and fascinating to me. I'm not sure precisely when this became a 'thing' for me because I must have already been aware of this from years of track-laying backgrounds and effects, but that would have been for isolated scenes, not full-length soundtracks; and I'm sure that would be very familiar for effects editors who are used to hearing their work played clean against the pictures. During that period though, between 2000 and 2010, I was often overseeing the whole project on some really low- budget productions—and it seemed we were always facing a tight deadline; and so it was only at the mix stems playout stage that I had any time on my hands, usually in the dead of night; which was when I found myself reflecting more deeply on the significance of what I was seeing and hearing… Observing in a more open way than simply being focussed on the technicalities of getting material delivered to a director's satisfaction, or conforming to a broadcaster's standards, against the clock. To be honest, I remember it as a kind of 'trippy' experience when I first properly noticed it: and it was probably induced because I had got into the habit of working stupidly long hours fuelled by heart- pounding levels of coffee, saying yes to everything that was offered and catching sleep when I could on a client's sofa in front of the mixing desk. Not a great recipe for health or personal relationships of course, but familiar territory for many reading this, I'm sure; and like the rest of us, by then I was well schooled in the industry work ethic of meeting deadlines no matter how tight; and I earned my stripes for endurance over probably a decade of working through the night, editing, and pre- mixing and then starting over with a client on a different project the next day. For several reasons, I would not recommend it for any sustained length of time!