Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1547041
or most of my career in advertis- ing and post production, sound usually enters the process near the end. By then, the edit is nearly locked. The temporary music has been there long enough that everyone thinks it is irre- placeable. The schedule has somehow lost a week. Then, the sound team arrives and is asked to add scale, emotion, humor and clarity without disturbing anything already on-screen. This way of working can produce excellent results. But it also means sound is often asked to finish an idea after most of the interesting decisions have already left the building…or sped away. That is beginning to change. Sound design and music are showing up earlier in production bids, in director treatments, and, occasionally, while the project still exists as storyboards. It works closer to feature-film processes now. Sound is considered while the world is being built, not only after the picture has been assembled. Advertising has generally treated audio more like the final coat of paint: useful, important, last. But some of the change has very little to do with creative ambition. It starts with money. Production companies are bidding more projects "soup to nuts," bringing production and post under one larger scope. Clients want a clearer view of the total cost. Everyone would prefer not to discover a missing budget line three days before delivery. Fair enough. The interesting part is what happens next. When sound is included early for practical reasons, it gets to participate creatively almost by accident. Instead of asking only how a finished scene should sound, the team can ask what sound might do to the scene itself. Is music driving the pace? Would less sound make the joke funnier? More furious? Those questions matter most while the answers can still change the work. We saw this on Häagen-Dazs' "Not So Fast, Not So Furious" Super Bowl cam- paign with Nice&Frank. Our involvement grew out of an existing relationship with the agency creatives. They brought us in while the commercial was still being worked through in storyboards. We started by building playlists. Not exact- ly a high-speed entrance. But, it gave everyone a way to feel the pace before there was a finished edit. That mattered because the entire idea depended on slowing down the Fast & Furious universe. Too fast and the contrast disappeared. Too slow and the joke stalled on the side of the highway. The music helped us find the space between those two things. It gave the storyboards a pulse. Or, in this case, a very controlled idle. We also developed audio Easter eggs connected to the larger franchise. We made them, tested them and enjoyed them. They did not make the final com- mercial. That was not entirely a creative decision. This was a Super Bowl spot for a major global brand, built around one of Hollywood's biggest franchises and eventually shaped by a licensed song. Every choice traveled through layers of approvals. There were a lot of people in the fami- ly, but the work was not wasted. When a creative team explores early, some ideas are supposed to disappear. The point is not to force every clever thought into the final cut. It is to learn what the piece can hold before the doors start closing. By the time the final song was selected, we had already spent time thinking about rhythm, tone and where the joke needed room. The track gave the spot its struc- ture, but the conversation did not begin with the track. It had started much earlier. That is the real opportunity. Not more meetings. Not a grand new title for the sound department. Just a chance to contribute while sound can still change something. We are seeing the same shift in direc- tor treatments. Sound used to receive a paragraph near the end, promising an "immersive soundscape." Everyone likes an immersive soundscape. It sounds ex- pensive and commits to almost nothing. Now, sometimes, we help shape the actual approach. Does a transition begin in picture or sound? Should music push the edit forward or pull against it? Could silence do more than another 12 layers of design? These are small questions, until one of them unlocks the piece. Short-form and social work make early audio thinking even more useful. A :06 or :15 film has almost no runway. Music and sound may carry most of the storytelling. One hook, one interruption or one well- timed drop can be the entire idea. You cannot always build the hero film, cut it down and assume the rhythm will survive. Sometimes it does. Much like cer- tain characters in the franchise, despite all available evidence, often it does not. None of this means audio needs to join every meeting from day-1. Nobody needs another square on the video call. Earlier collaboration should make the process more focused, not more crowded. The goal is simpler: bring sound into the conversation before every meaningful decision is locked. Sound may still be one of the last things an audience consciously notices. That is fine. When it works, they should feel it first. But the creative team should not wait until the final quarter mile to start thinking about it. THE BENEFITS OF EARLY CONVERSATIONS BY ZACH FORTIN EXECUTIVE PRODUCER MR. BRONX WWW.BRONXAUDIO. COM SOUND'S ROLE IS NOW SHOWING UP IN BIDS, TREATMENTS & STORYBOARDS F SOUNDTRACK