Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1515063
C I N E M A A U D I O S O C I E T Y. O R G 65 Steve B., how about your experience with She-Hulk and the creatures you were doing for that? SB: We did not have a voice artist. It would have been great to have had that. That's an amazing asset to have, because there's expression you can do. When you're pulling from a library, one of the first things that I would do with whatever I'm working on is really just look at everything I'm going to need. How often does that creature happen? What's the range of expression I'm going to need? Because, if you're pulling from animals and things like that, you probably won't have that full range of expression from that one animal. So, in She-Hulk, for instance, we had these flying demons, and I should give a shout-out to Tim Farrell, our sound effects editor, because he did a lot of amazing work on that as well. We were looking for things, and I immediately thought of vultures. They're kind of nasty, they're flying and grabbing at people. Tim actually did record his own voice, and that was one of the layers in that. Like you guys, using your own voice can often be a really great resource. It was a lot like stitching together tons of different things. Tiny little edits and super precise editing to make it all work at any given point. A piece of voice which you sweeten with a bird screech, making sure it's topping perfectly so it doesn't feel like you're hearing two or three animals going. I tend to think of creatures in three parts. You've got the vocals, you've got the movement, and you've got your footsteps. In this case, wings. Almost every creature needs these three layers. So, in addition to designing vocals, you're designing footsteps, and in this case, wings. I have a big, heavy leather jacket that I would like to shake around. And we have tons of wings stuff in the library, so I have that to pull from, too. I like to record new stuff because it's cooler to record new stuff, you know? But I do go to the library as well for stuff like that, too. LL: Sometimes with something like wings, if the library is not hitting the sync, I'll give them some sounds [does vocal wing flap sound]. I'll slow it down. And then they'll be able to just drop them in, in sync, and it'll save a lot of time on the mixing side of it. SB: But if that animal or a creature has to be really expressive, you're probably going to need somebody like Lex. Maybe with effects added in as well. ML: And then there were times where we didn't have the visuals or Lex would just throw in a wild track of his own. He'd go on for a minute doing whatever the sound was so I could grab it and move it around and have that extra stuff to work with, which was a great resource. As you can see, there was some great insight shared during this final event, with these conversations just being the early parts of the discussion. I encourage you to visit the CAS website to check out the whole panel— where you can actually hear the great sounds Lex Lang made! SA: For movement, if it's a really wet creature—and even a dry one—I've been finding that I use Reformer Pro and I'll use the wet setting, and I just blow into my microphone. So, I record blowing, and it comes out as movement. Recently, I did a Christmas horror movie. And there are a couple of ornaments that turn into monsters. One is a soccer ball. So, leather. There's a leather setting on Reformer. So, every time it rolled and moved around, I was using Reformer for that. LL: A lot of times in the layer process, it's important to remember that the creature can breathe—so you want the breath of that creature as well. That's where a voice actor can come in for simple things like [demonstrates a soft-creature breath]. Just a little soft plate rumble as it approaches another character. Those are often more difficult to find in your library. SB: Gary Rydstrom said to me recently, it's the breaths that sell. I think that goes back to the detail thing. When you're putting a roar in… ML: …he takes a big inhale before the roar… SB: That's that little extra that sells it. It's all those little details that make it work because we're so sensitized. I watch you talk and we're very sensitized to all the little details that come out of somebody's mouth. You want that same thing out of a creature. LL: And the way that they're miked—the amount of gain. Like right now, I tried to do a subtle creature sound. It really doesn't come through the speakers the same way [as] if I'm right on a 416 or a U87 and I'm just doing that soft breath. You can hear the little rumble of the soft palette. When the gain's cranked, it sounds like a very big breathing entity with the weight of the creature. ML: Yeah, absolutely. One of my favorite things to do with the big creatures when they full-on roar is [to] grab an engine—like from an offshore racing boat—and just throw that in there. It's really kind of a cool element. LL: I found that some plastic garbage cans actually work very well for doing different kinds of creatures. And if you ever want to do Darth Vader, just put a garbage can up and it really works very well.