Production Sound & Video

Winter 2022

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36 PRODUCTION SOUND & VIDEO – Winter 2022 Willie Burton on Spider-Man: by Richard Lightstone CAS AMPS Marvel's live-action Spider-Man films have grossed more than $6.3 billion to date at the global box office. The most current iteration, Spider-Man: No Way Home, is to be released on December 17, and the fan anticipation is as strong as ever. The teaser trailer alone had a record 355.5 million views in its first day! Willie Burton CAS and Local 695 Boom Operator Adam Mohundro traveled to Fayetteville, Georgia, and the Trilith Studios to begin the film in November of 2020, wrapping at the end of March this year. The first thing Willie encountered was that he and his crew did not get a script, as Marvel is extremely sensitive about any plot leaks. "You don't know what to expect, and so in prepping for the show, you take everything. You can't leave anything out because you have to be ready for whatever they want." Willie continues, "You don't even know what's going to happen until you get a call sheet. But you can't read the script and prepare. They did give me sides, because they know that I have to follow the cues. They gave sides to my boom and utility person, but they blacked out most of the words. Anything that they thought might be plot information in the dialog was blacked out, so they had to look at my sides." Willie upgraded his package to a Zaxcom Deva 24 and the Mix 16 to be prepared for the additional tracks he would need. The majority of the show was shot on the sound stages and the backlot of Trilith Studios, where they had New York street sets. Willie's key microphones are the Schoeps CMIT 5U and the Sennheiser MKH50. "I love the MKH50 when the shots are not real wide," says Willie. "In our 'New York City' portion, we're able to boom a lot. Picture Editorial requested that we use the boom whenever we could because they wanted a good mix track. We had the wireless tracks, but they liked the mix track better with the boom. They said, 'The more you can, use the boom. So I decided to just go with the boom. I'm old school- new school, so I always like to use the boom first.'"

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