Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1448505
42 I M PS E . O R G ERIC MARKS MPSE: Dane, thank you so much for joining me. When you go to watch something new, what excites you in terms of sound? DANE DAVIS, SUPERVISING SOUND EDITOR: I get excited about any kind of subjectivity. Sound has a way of subjectivizing the experience for an audience without them being aware of it. For me, if I can give the audience that experience without them noticing when the shift is happening, that's a freedom and a responsibility that music doesn't really have today. Most movie watchers are pretty sophisticated about music. But even they don't realize how they're being steered, inspired or manipulated by sound. EM: Where do you look for inspiration in your own work when you're starting on a project? DD: For me, it's about how deep the main character is going to dive into a universe that I'm helping to create. I've always felt like my crew is the aural half of the art department. To a great extent, my job is enabling the audience to suspend their disbelief enough that they go there with the character, no matter if we are thousands of years ago, or in the future, on another planet, or inside their head. If I can't suspend the audience's disbelief, then they're aware that they're sitting in a chair, watching a movie. That's what every aspect of the filmmaking team is trying to avoid. If I care about the characters, their journey, then I can enable the audience to care about that character's journey. EM: What's your approach to recording sound effects, and how has that approach evolved over the years? DD: One of the things that I do when I start a movie is figure out what the primary materials are in that story. And then I think, "what are all of the Dane Davis and Bryan Watkins recording metal sounds for The Matrix Revolutions The Abyss, 1989, 20th Century Fox Dane's recording session of glass