Multimedia
Blogs
Forum
Affordable HD
Whitepapers
Newsletters
Events
Advertisers
DCP Directory
MillimeterSound in the City
Sep 1, 2003 12:00 PM, By David Weiss
Supplementing Sex and the City's rich visual style is a crystalline, punchy, and enveloping audio experience that's among the best on television today. Since Season One, it's been created at New York's Soundtrack Film & Television by a tight-working sound editing team overseen by mixer Bob Chefalas.
While Chefalas is the mastermind, he has plenty of sonic support from supervising sound editors Chic Ciccolini (sound effects), Louis Bertini (dialogue), and Dan Lieberstein (music). Making things even better is their brand-new facility — with two mix stages and an ADR/Foley stage — in NYC's fashionable Chelsea neighborhood that provides the team with the perfect environment for crafting the show's sound.
 The two-position Euphonix System 5 in the Jeff Cooper-designed mix stage at Soundtrack Film & Television, the New York-based studio that creates audio for Sex and the City. Photo courtesy: Tim Driedger. |
Working with a Pro Tools front-end and Euphonix System 5 digital audio console in his spacious, Jeff Cooper-designed stage, Chefalas has the process of mixing Sex down to a science. “Whether it's a TV show or feature film, the first thing I want to do is a dialogue mix,” says Chefalas. “Sex and the City has a lot of voice-over, and I mix it in the whole show in its entirety, going to each spot where there's a VO and mixing and EQ'ing it at the normal VO level from beginning to end. I found that if something came in later, I wasn't always being consistent, so [now] I go right from beginning to end and record dialogue at the same time.”
Careful handling of the VOs of central character Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) is a crucial task that calls for restraint, good taste, and precise handling of compression. “I try to make the VO a part of the show, not above it, almost like production dialogue. It's just a processing thing — you don't want to overprocess it or add a lot of bottom to it. It has to pop through TV speakers, so you find the frequencies that are little delicacies, reach for it, and that's what brings the VO to life.”
 Sound mixer Bob Chefalas tries to make Sarah Jessica Parker’s voice-overs blend into the production dialogue on Sex and the City. |
Chefalas is willing to share his secret weapon for getting a clean sound: the Waves L2 Ultramaximizer. “In mastering you can feed music through it, contain it and still make it sound loud. I use that on my dialogue to give it extra punch, but it won't go past what they'll allow. The compressors on-air won't start compressing my dialogue, so I can limit my dynamic range and not make it overly loud,” he says. “I use a combination of that and the Neve 33609 as a soft compressor, which with a 2:1 ratio is smoothing out the dialogue and not overly compressing it. Then the L2 will hit and contain any of the peaks.”
Chefalas' usual four-day schedule begins with production dialogue, where the toughest challenge is smoothing out the Manhattan traffic in exterior scenes.
“Then there's scenes shot on sets,” he continues. “We don't want it to sound like a set, so you add a little room to it with reverb, primarily the TC Electronics 6000. It's also taking out noises because in a supermarket or restaurant you'll end up with AC noise and fluorescent light hums, and you have to notch that out.”
The next day, it's time to attack the ADR and loop group, adding backgrounds of people talking and forks clinking, all done with unusual attention to detail, such as getting the right diversity among the many ringing phones. “I've tried boxes that can make it sound like a phone, but I've found those make every phone sound the same. I'll bring it through the System 5, use a highpass/lowpass filter, find out if it's a cell phone, answering machine, etc., then compress and squeeze it down a lot. I have presets to start off with, but each phone is a little different, even though it takes a little longer than plugging in a box.
 The sound crew for the HBO series. Photo courtesy: Craig Blankenhorn/HBO. |
“It's the same thing when we go to restaurants,” he adds. “Every show has a diner scene, but we don't just copy and paste a diner background — each one gets treated like new, with new ADR, new loop group, new backgrounds. For one diner scene, we may have six tracks of loop group: the dialogue, dish clinks, silverware clinks, background traffic noise, and Foleys for all the movement going on. The diner's activity comes out of the emotion of the dialogue. If it's a very upbeat, fast-paced dialogue back and forth, you'll find a very lively background. But if it's a very serious piece of dialogue, we'll treat it accordingly. You don't want all these happy people in the background for a sad scene.”
Once the mix is set it's time to do playback for the editors and producer Antonia Ellis, get their notes, tweak, and do a final playback for executive producers Michael Patrick King, Cindy Chupack, John Melfi, and Jenny Bicks. During the playbacks, Ciccolini and Bertini work at Pro Tools stations that flank the System 5 for up-to-the-second changes and easy collaboration. A 5.1 mix is generated with minimal fuss from the stereo mix via Dolby surround algorithms.
With almost 100 inputs to fuse together in the typical show, Chefalas depends on a surprisingly tight gear list to do his job. Supplementing the previously mentioned compressors and effects, for noise reduction he uses a Cedar DNS 1000 and Dolby 430 Background Noise Suppressor. An SPL De-Esser, dbx compressors, Avalon VT-737SP, and Eventide Harmonizer Orville are also used. Monitoring comes through Auratone monitors and the HHB Circle 3.
Now in his second season with the Euphonix System 5, Chefalas likes the sound of the console, as well as the visual feedback. “For example, when you go to EQ, you get a curve on the bridge that tells you where it is, so you can go down the board and see what the EQ is doing, and you don't have to read the knobs. It's the same for dynamics: As you start doing the threshold, you can see the knees and where it'll start to hit it.”
Chefalas finds that he works at the same pace whether his console is digital or analog. “Reaching for an EQ and finding it takes the same amount of time on analog or digital. The beauty of the Euphonix is it will back up and automate any bussing, EQs, and dynamics and remember your moves, so when you go back to make changes, it's all there for you.”
Although Sex and the City is now in its final season, Chefalas and crew don't have to wonder what they're going to be doing next. The mixing stage at Soundtrack Film & Television is already booked with feature film work through January 2004, meaning Chefalas will continue to have his hands full with faders and cue sheets. For a mix engineer with sharp ears, that's as sexy as it gets.
