Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1521235
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S 91 that I recall required pushing back to keep the process on track. I know that not every assistant has avoided those situations and I realise how tremendously lucky I am. I have found that the film business is filled with some lovely, creative people, all doing their very best to make each film a success. Looking back on all the great films you've worked on, what have been the most interesting, fulfilling, and/ or challenging? Master & Commander is easily my favourite film project. Not only am I a huge fan of the Aubrey-Maturin books but an even bigger fan of Peter Weir. Peter has made some of the greatest films in cinema and is also a lovely human being. Master & Commander was still early on in my career, and I was completely star-struck! I could never have Andrew sporting his pandemic beard, Tenet, 2021. Photo courtesy of Andrew Bock. Recording sound FX, Andrew & Eric Potter, The Sea Beast, Warner Bros. Ranch, Burbank, 2022. Photo by Randy Torres. imagined working on films of this calibre. The film is so meticulously crafted and brilliantly executed, and I feel privileged to have witnessed a master filmmaker like Peter Weir at work. The film feels like such a unique and extraordinary movie. When people say, 'They don't make 'em like that anymore,' this is the kind of movie they mean. Master & Commander was a labour of love and certainly changed the trajectory of my career. That film led to us working with another of my filmmaking heroes, so I would add Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds to that list. This film presented some huge technological challenges for all of us but particularly for me. At that time, picture editor Michael Kahn famously still cut on film. Sound editing was fully digital by then which meant the sound team had to jump through hoops to complete the film. We developed procedures for logging single-stripe mag audio, converting it to digital friendly metadata, and marrying that to the digital-sound dailies for dialogue assembly. An added complication was that visual effects were coming in very fast and waiting for them to get filmed out so that Michael could cut them into his edit meant there was huge lag before the sound crew could cut the VFX. There was not even a dedicated Avid editor outputting videos with latest VFX for our sound team. Our crew needed access to the latest VFX immediately so that we could prepare for the mix without waiting for a new film edit to get telecined and distributed. The only practical solution was for me to assume the VFX editor duties in addition to my sound assistant role. I purchased Final Cut Pro, taught myself how to "There is something thrilling about working with a group of talented people doing incredible work; it is infectious."