The sound of: sixty seconds

My focus in sound design is to help guide the audience throughout the film; compliment the director's vision, accentuate the actor's performance, and emphasize the rhythm of the edit.

As a director myself, my sound design is very much an element of the storytelling. I like to create sound sequences which tell a parallel and complimentary narrative throughout a scene; elavating the atmosphere, raising the tension, and to provide the audience with an immersive experience.

Great sound design is the dusting of powdered sugar on a donut; it’s not the element you notice during the first bite, but you would miss it if it’s gone.

FIND YOUR FLOW: VIRGIN MEDIA

Cube Video brought me on board to design the sound for their virtual production brand campaign ‘Find Your Flow’ which they produced for Virgin Media Business.

As the character hops & skips to different locations (shot on a virtual set), the atmosphere needed to be built from ground up. The video features a living room, a kitchen, a tropical beach, a cafe, and more; it was my job to make sure it sounded real.

I’m particularly proud of the transition sound at 0:22. I layered milk bottles clattering, a fridge door slamming, and a whoosh element to emphasise the whip pan as it transitions to the kitchen. I wanted a sound which was instantly recognisable as a kitchen sound. I think the milk bottles clattering help the viewer settle into the new location in an instant.

THE ASYLUM GROOVE

MyRodeReel 2018 - Nominated for Best Sound Design + Winner of Best Educational BTS

Sunderland Shorts Film Festival 2019 - Official Selection

It’s in the nature of a dance film to play music on-set for the actors to perform the choreography. But unlike a music video or a dance film, this short still required diagetic audio.

Every sound in The Asylum Groove, except for the repeated line of dialogue (“mama”) which was recorded on location, was re-recorded in post-production.

I knew that matching the acoustics of the assembly hall would be a challenge. So instead of toying with reverb plugins, I returned to the location to record the foley art. Doing this meant that the genuine acoustics of the assembly hall would be baked into the recordings. It was risky, but it was worth it.

2 YEARS IN THE MAKING

The sound design on this project was all about the ‘ticking timer’ animation seen throughout the micro-documentary. The story shows snippets of a short film struggling to be made with the date eating away each day.

I wanted to design something which had a signature style to the date/clock/ticking animation, but it also needed progress. I didn’t want to copy and paste the sounds - I didn’t want to bore the audience or make the sound design stale.

I used a mixture of bicycle wheels spinning, beer cans cracking open, and mixed in a few wooshes and swooshes to empahsise the impact of the cuts in the edit.