Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/987065
24 S P R I N G 2 0 1 8 C A S Q U A R T E R L Y Asked about mentors, Vince says: "I was lucky to assist and learn from a lot of great and highly notable engineers—too many to mention, but I'll name a few who stand out because from them I learned useful techniques, or was given a chance to jump into the engineer's chair in their stead: Shawn Murphy, John Kurlander, Frank Filipetti, Joel Moss, Elliot Scheiner, and others. That said, there are a few who really encouraged and guided me, so I consider them mentors: Paul Goodman, Jay Newland, Tony May, Malcolm Addey, and Doc Kane. Without Doc's confidence in me and guidance, I would not have been able to jump into the engineer's seat on Walt Disney's Beauty and the Beast (1991), the first of my feature animated film credits." Music mixer Joel Iwataki previously won the CAS Award for Inside Out and for the XIX Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony (for which he also won an Emmy ® ). He has been nominated five times for the CAS Award. Joel took a circuitous route into mixing. "I came into recording music rather later in my life than usual. I was raised in Los Angeles but, after a couple years of college, I moved to Alaska and became a commercial fisherman. After two years, I had a small boat and a crew—and it was 10 years before I moved back to LA." Joel started to study music and was writing big-band arrangements for singers in Vegas, as well as scoring documentaries and educational films, which he always recorded and mixed himself. "Then a couple composer friends would ask me to help them record and mix their projects, which led to working with film composer Elliot Goldenthal (Alien 3, Interview with the Vampire, Frida). When I heard his music, it was exactly the music I wanted to work on and I knew I would not be able to compose that in my lifetime—so I became a full-time scoring mixer." Joel continues, "I was good at reading user manuals and I took a two-day SSL seminar at USC and learned signal flow, and I worked with the composer Craig Huxley, who owned The Enterprise Studio with two huge SSL's and a Neve VR, and who threw me in with any film or television composer who came in the door. That's how I learned the basics of recording and mixing music, but I really missed the experience of being an assistant engineer to great mixers. I'm still studying and trying to learn. And I've learned a lot from assistant engineers who have worked with the great mixers. "Working with Elliot Goldenthal really gave me the training in being a creative mixer and collaborator in the production of music. He showed me how important it was to think about the dramatic intent of the music. What is the feeling or emotion this music is supposed to affect? Try to determine what that sounds like. And then try to figure out how to execute that. "When I saw The Incredibles, I was blown away by the score. It was a big-band score that recalled the James Bond sound of John Barry. It had great verve and was so freely expressive and fun. And I really wished I had been able to work on that score. Nine years later, The Incredibles composer Michael Giacchino's first-and-only engineer, the legendary Danny Wallin, retired at the age of 85. Michael asked me if I would work on the score for Star Trek: Into Darkness, and now Coco is the 14th score I've been lucky enough to record and mix for Michael." Asked if he would like to thank anyone, Joel replied: "Vincent (Vini) Cirilli has been working with me for eight years as Pro Tools operator. He has made my life much better with his knowledge and skill. He makes the recording sessions run efficiently with his skills, and with his knowledge of how composers and musicians and engineers work together— keeping the pace of the sessions running smoothly. And he's a good engineer himself, so I often ask him, 'How does this sound Vini?'" Foley mixer Blake Collins is from Paradise, CA, a small town in Northern California. Blake has played bass guitar since high school and played alto saxophone in elementary through high school. "I've always loved playing and making music. I also dabble in electro synth core." He was brought to Skywalker to work on Cars 3 (for which he was nominated for the CAS Award) as his first feature with them. Blake explains: "I got into audio in high school, recording the bands that I was in on my white iMac (eMac back then). It probably weighed 30 pounds. I'd carry that thing around and plug a Mackie 12-channel live sound mixer into the stereo audio input of the computer and record into Garage Band. I went to CSU Chico for a couple years in the recording program, but it wasn't for me. Class sizes were too big and not enough hands- Tracking guitar parts for Coco Joel Iwataki