Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/711111
36 CINEMONTAGE / Q3 2016 must reflect that as well. Are his doors heavy and secure, or weak and squeaky?" Any time the scene moved from bigger events to smaller spaces, Akerson tried to find a sound to set it apart. "In the communications room, a tape recorder had a lazy scrape from an unbalanced reel," he explains. "Hamburger patties hit the grill with an angry hiss. Another signifier of smaller events I used were the sounds of tiny bells; these had been heard during a drug raid or as bodies were discovered hanging in a public square. While they didn't make literal sense, they deepened the horror of what we see through counterpoint." Early in production, it was established that the Narcos universe was one of congested streets, honking circa-1980s cars, motorbikes and street wallas —"the busier the better," DiMuro recalls. "Unfortunately, spotted effects are among the most time-consuming, especially when you have a show made up of several set pieces like gun battles or car chases. Obviously, the actions that are in your face must be finished first. "Since Narcos is mostly a library effects show, it helps that we had access to the incredible Soundelux library recently purchased by SoundDogs and leased by Technicolor," the sound effects editor continues. "When design was called for, it was generally created by the subtle manipulation of real sounds as opposed to stingers or whooshes." MIXING EN ESPAÑOL "The strength of the Narcos soundtrack is that it captures, almost in a pseudo-vérité style, the feeling of the characters' reality, environments and stressors," stresses mixer Elia. "So, instead of a perfectly cleaned-up track of dialogue, I was looking for editorial to pass on every usable recording capture of the scene in those tracks. We had the scenes built with both boom and iso mics, when available, and had very little, if any, noise- reduction processing or work done in the editorial process. This allowed us to have a track to work with that was very real, for lack of a better term, with all its textures and qualities intact. From that I could build a very visceral and real final dialogue track. The visceral quality helped keep the feel of the various stresses and jeopardies in the story up front." Mixing the Spanish language was actually a treat, according to Elia. "Hearing it without a total understanding provided such a unique perspective," he says. "The words and sentences came off as a much more musical string of sounds to me, because they were devoid of meaning; this left more room in the brain to just hear it. Every once in a while, I asked for guidance on a certain envelope of a word or phrase. I got help from our Spanish speakers as to where the pushes, accents, attacks or fall-offs should be." Music on Narcos fell under the supervision of composer Pedro Bromfman and music editor Michael Bauer. "These elements were delivered as many split stems and, as a result, we had a large amount of mixing choices available," Elia explains. "We could be dynamic in sections that were already piled up with lots of sound, because we could pick and choose individual music elements within the score to be dynamic when needed." Elia received 16 production tracks, eight loop group tracks, eight principal ADR tracks, and between six and eight tracks of X and PFX audio from sound editorial. "Steve Hammond and Erik Culp did a great job for us," fellow re-recording mixer Roache stresses. "Every week, they provided Foley tracks with perfect performance, perspective and character. It really elevated the choices of the actors and brought the mix to another level. Randy sat with us during the dub to guide the track so it met the producers' expectations. But Randy did much more than just accomplish spotting notes; he also had an excellent ear for clarity, purpose and flow. When something wasn't working, he was able to get to the heart of the issue very fast and present a fantastic solution." The locations and story events of Narcos created the perfect recipe for sound soup, according to Roache. "The drama unfolded with quiet, soft-spoken scenes and elaborate gun fights. Colombia has dense jungles as well as packed Narcos. ©2016 Narcos 2 Productions LLC. All Rights Reserved