Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/869840
www.postmagazine.com 39 POST SEPTEMBER 2017 BUSINESS fter 26 years in New York City, delivering sound and post services for film, television and advertising, we decided at Buttons Sound & Post that it was time to remodel our 45 th street fa- cility. Famous for originating such projects as the six-month delivery of Episodes 1 through 52 of WB's Pokemon in 1999, Buttons was looking to accommodate a goal to expand into larger scripted con- tent projects. We learned from talking to members of the post New York Alliance, that we need- ed additional edit rooms to accommodate episodic requirements, and we also heard from commercial clients that, with edit rooms and high data rate central storage to provide higher, faster paced demand- ing digital content deliveries, we would be considered for full turn-key post cam- paigns that require four to six animators, compositors and graphic designers, with sound and color. This expansion goal is a step to- ward a planned larger growth vision to build a SoHo home for our ever-grow- ing Digital Warrior team and New York City's increase on post production needs from the 30 percent New York Post Tax Incentive. The new remodeling serves as a prototype of expanding on its sustain- able philosophy of maximizing billable space with small rooms large enough to serve the highest quality customers with flexibility and comfort, but not so large as to increase financial overhead and thus production costs. With our vision we realized we needed an acoustic consultant to help the rooms be as isolated as possible, so we retained NYC approved noise consultant, Steve Vavagiakis, (Nitrous, Mandalay Sports media, Blue Man Group, Hoboken Library) for the renovation. The current office space was converted from a single room with door and front desk access stone bar, into two individual, 6 x 12, windowed edit rooms. We wanted each room to have the large acoustic win- dows, and planned an angled wall to allow this option due to the building footprint. It was also important that each room have an adequate AC feed, and that the rooms be acoustically isolated from the AC Unit noise as well as sound from adjoining rooms. The two new edit suites were isolated from the HVAC by hanging a 2 Gypsum ceiling from a truss grid installed around the AC unit, floated by hat channel and Kinetics hangers. The dividing wall between the rooms was a staggered stud, double gypsum, floated wall. The larger control room was reinvent- ed into a Dolby Cinema Mix stage layout. With Steve's help, we lowered the room tone nearly 40 decibels, by re-blocking exterior windows, adding two additional floated, three-layer gypsum walls inside the exterior control room walls, adding double underlayment, floated floors in control room and ADR record room, and raising the hung ceiling with extensive bass trapping and additional custom AC silencing. The console was moved toward the rear of the room and a four-person producer's desk was elevated behind the mixing position. The 12 x 17 stage accom- modates seven people. There's also a DaVinci color and online edit room that were renovated and now functioning to their full potential. The second recording studio was also renovated with new acoustic treatments and a new producer's desk and smaller recording console were installed. This room can now accommodate six produc- ers comfortably. The entrance closet was converted into a two-rack tech closet for the Network, Fibre and 10Gbt distribution. Through the new glass door ISDN box connectivity can be observed as well as easy access to all connectivity, servers, and 48TB of Facilis TerraBlock. All 10 facility edit systems have TerraBlock access. The closet houses a 2.5 ton AC unit for cooling. A rear ac- cess door from the building floor AC unit allows maintenance access. The lobby was changed into a kitchen and bullpen with hospitality cabinetry, management iMacs and a large bar for flexible, as needed, easy client setup for laptop work and video assist editing. The cosmetic design was chosen to be a combination of deep grey tones, steel hardware, indirect hidden lighting and beautiful light grey wood laminate floated flooring was installed throughout all rooms of the facility for a cohesive ambiance. Recently, we recorded ADR with Jake Gyllenhaal for the feature film Life, Danielle Radcliffe for the feature film Jungle, Elizabeth Moss for the TV Series, Top of the Lake. We recorded Kevin Bacon for EE commercials in the UK, and produced 13 digital media commercial animations for Discover that were used on Facebook, Yahoo and the Discover Card Website. Additional ADR was recorded for BET's The New Edition Story, the Netflix hit series GLOW and Este Lauder radio spots, which were produced for broadcast nationwide. RENOVATING A STUDIO BY RICH MACAR CEO, ADR MIXER, SUPERVISING SOUND EDITOR, RE- RECORDING MIXER BUTTONS SOUND & POST NEW YORK CITY BUTTONSNY.COM RECENT REMODEL BOOSTS STUDIO'S SERVICES A Buttons' Edit 1 suite The company's recording studio A