Digital Changeover in Film Editing Pumps Up the Volume of Progress

A revolution is underway in Hollywood’s sound industry, but you have to be listening closely to hear it.

As movie studios and post-production houses quietly make the transition from analog to digital equipment, film sound is getting clearer and, in some cases, louder because the new technology allows greater volume without distortion.

Burbank-based Walt Disney Studios, which encompasses several film and television production entities--including Touchstone Pictures--is nearing the end of its digital transition period, at least in the area of sound. The company recently converted the second of four sound stages (one of the studio’s older theaters dates back to 1942) to digital.

That means in all four steps of a Disney movie’s life--production, editing, post-production and release--the sound is digital, recorded as data bits that can be stored on a computer, instead of analog recordings on quarter-inch magnetic tape.

As a result, sound mixers, technicians and editors have experienced a sea change in how they do their jobs. They no longer tote boxes and boxes filled with canisters of film reels, nor do they spend hours threading film into banks of sound-recording equipment. Now, they can access a piece of music on a computer and cut it in less than a minute, as opposed to 15.

“We started this move toward digital back in 1992,” said Chris Carey, vice president of Disney post-production services. “The first to change over was the sound-effects editing, but we weren’t digital in the mixing studios.”

As a result, the whole process was constantly shifting from digital to analog recordings.

“Now that we have a sound signal that never has to go to analog, what we’re realizing is that it keeps the integrity of the signal intact and that’s a huge advantage,” Carey said.

To the layman’s ear, it can be likened to the difference between records and CDs.

“If you were to listen to an action film done 10 years ago and one done today, you would notice a big difference,” Carey said.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that the sounds heard in a film--a bird chirping, a car engine humming, crickets chirping--aren’t the real thing.

“Sound has to start as an organic thing,” Carey said. “Each studio still spends countless hours going out to record sounds and then put them in a library.”

It’s just that those sounds are now clearer. And from the moment that the bird chirps, technology and skilled sound craftsmen take over.

Sound production begins with a crew recording as the film is being shot and ends with others mixing and editing in post-production.

For the typical sound mixer, the job often means sitting in a darkened theater and watching the same piece of film over and over, toying with the voices, background noises and music via a console and computers.

That process begins with what the studios term pre-dubbing, where the film--which has already been shot and edited--is getting all of its noises straightened out.

“We start by cleaning up the tracks, seeing what background noise can be taken out and what has to be looped,” said Elliot Tyson, a rerecording mixer who works as an independent contractor at Disney.

Looping involves bringing the actors back to the studio to rerecord their dialogue. It’s a part of the job that many actors dislike, sound experts say, but it can be crucial to the success of a scene.

On this particular day, Tyson and a crew of about five are working on “Duets,” a feature film starring Gwyneth Paltrow, Huey Lewis and Scott Speedman, due out next spring. Once all the sounds are cleaned up and put on film, the director and editors do the final dubbing. And that’s when everyone sees whether a film is working or not.

“When we were doing analog sound in post-production, it used to be so labor intensive,” said Terry Porter, a rerecording mixer and Disney’s executive creative director. “What’s happened with the advent of digital is that everything is easier now. Changes are easier to make.”

New sound or dialogue can be punched in with the click of a computer mouse, instead of having to physically splice it onto the film soundtrack.

This has created a new challenge for sound crews. Because their realm--sound, music and special effects noises--can change the nature and intent of a scene, giving the director the ability to toy with those noises is both a boon and a bane.

“Digital technology has allowed pictures to be in a constant state of change now, if the director so chooses,” Porter ruefully admitted.

And do directors choose to keep crews there after hours to experiment? You bet.

“Before, when a director wanted a change, it had to be well thought out. Now, they can just experiment,” Porter said.

Consequently, the one to two months allotted for post-production sound work hasn’t been shortened by the advances of digital technology.

But going digital has resulted in other changes--mainly for audiences. In the days of analog, directors couldn’t go above a certain volume level without getting distortion. That isn’t so anymore.

“The only limitations, now, are a director’s good taste,” Porter said.

But in that ongoing quest to add more excitement to the movie-going experience, directors are opting to increase the noise level, especially in action films. For sound veterans like Porter and Tyson, it has meant making some career decisions.

Porter chooses not to work on many big-budget action films. It’s just too loud, he says. Often, when the film is in final dub or mix-down, the director wants to hear the sound at the same level as the audience. That can mean listening to gunfire, explosions and car crashes over and over at ear-numbing volume.

“I want to save my hearing,” Porter said.

Tyson still works action movies but has his hearing checked annually.

At present, all of the studios are in the process of making the transition to digital, getting near the end of a decade-long process. In turn, many of the film industry’s unions have been offering training for their members.

“In addition to our subsidized training program, we also have . . . computers in the office for our members to practice on,” said Cathy Repola, assistant executive director of Local 700 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. The union represents 5,600 film editors, music editors, sound editors, rerecording mixers and engineers.

“What digital has done is just add more pieces to the puzzle,” Porter said. “We can do a lot more in the way of sound, but it’s still a talent-driven business: It’s only as good as the talent who is putting it together.”

And despite the long hours and ongoing technological changes, these sound technicians say they still love the work.

“You get to come in after the film’s been shot and cut and scored,” Porter said. “We step in and put all the pieces together and actually get to see it in its final stage. And that can be very rewarding.”