Post Magazine

April 2017

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DEPARTMENT www.postmagazine.com 31 POST APRIL 2017 design for the dragonflies. Since director Asbury was interested in exploring unexpected sounds, Sephton and field recordist Rob Nokes (owner of Sounddogs) recorded baby raccoons, which Sephton manipulated in post using Serato's Pitch 'n Time to create a language-like set of dragonfly vocalizations. "They didn't want the dragonflies to sound like dragonflies, except for the wings. So their articulation is not a buzz sound. It's not something you would expect to come out of the dragonfly," says Sephton. Similarly, Sephton and Nokes recorded the sound of miniature horses to use for the film's glow bunnies — a type of bunny that glows at night. In the studio, he edited and pitched the recordings to create sounds for when the bunnies talk. "Also, they have soft feet, so when there's a stampede of glow bunnies, it doesn't sound like a horse stampede. They sound gated like little hors- es. They have their own unique soft padded feet sound," he says. For the atmospheres, Sephton used his musical knowledge to build sound beds that suggested the magic and wonder of The Enchanted Forest, or the dark gloom of The Forbidden Forest. Gargamel's castle has a foreboding atmosphere, while the Lost Village sounds rich and woody. Each atmosphere has its own unique tone and mood. Using plug-ins like Celemony's Melodyne and software like iZotope's Iris 2, Sephton mor- phed and treated musical elements, namely windchimes and water bowls, and sound effects like howling winds. He layered those with tonal elements, like layering different notes to build a chord. Sephton says, "It could be a diminished flat, or straight minor or straight major in its tonality because each one of those imparts its own feel to the presence of what is happening, like impending doom or happiness for instance." STAR WARS REBELS The animated series Star Wars Rebels, airing on Disney XD, tells the tale of a group of rebels fight- ing against evil Imperial rule. Set in the Star Wars universe, the show is subject to the same sound treatment as the film franchise. Sound editor/ re-recording mixer Bonnie Wild, who has been on the show since the start of Season 2, says the sound design is built using elements from the Star Wars legacy library that's filled with sounds from the original trilogy films, the prequel films, and the Clone Wars series. "We have a growing library of reoccurring Rebels sounds as well, created by David Acord the sound designer. Anything specific we need designed for Rebels, we will have David do," Wild says. Typically, Wild is both the sound editor and the re-recording mixer on the show. At Skywalker Sound in Marin County, CA (www.skysound.com), she spends five days on editorial, cutting the ef- Star Wars Star Wars Star Rebels features sound elements from the film franchise. Audio post takes place at Skywalker Sound. Bonnie Wild

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