An RMIT media student reflecting and blogging on her experiences at uni, on making and learning.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind was scored by John Williams, a regular Spielberg collaborator – but as much as I do enjoy a John Williams score every now and again, I’m not really going to talk about that in so much detail. What I always notice when watching the film, is how busy it sounds – there’s always some kind of action going on with the sound (scientists going about their jobs) and people talking over the top of other people. Perhaps it doesn’t feel as natural or as grating as something like California Split (Robert Altman; 1974), but I think it has echoes of that.

There is one scene that I absolutely love for the sense of urgency and tension that is created, but without the use of music at all – it’s quite early on the film, and it’s the air traffic control scene. It begins with a layered mix of various pilots calling in, routine calls, nothing really distinguishable. Then the film focuses on one controller, as a pilot radios in to ask about any traffic in areas 31. The rest of the control room becomes a hum in the background as the controller and the pilot try to work out what exactly it is that is flying in such close proximity to areas 31. As they give vague descriptions of the aircraft, several other controllers in the centre gather to watch the spectacle that is about to unfold. They start discussing amongst themselves what it could be (”I’ve never seen anything like that..”) while the controller in contact with the pilot relays directions on the UFOs position and trajectory. This is when they first start talking over each other – when I’m watching this, my instinct is to try and listen to the first controller, but I can choose to filter him out and listen to the others if  I want. Things are getting more urgent.

All of a sudden, the pilot says ‘Wait a second’, and there is greater urgency in his tone – the UFO now appears to be on a collision course, and an alarm (an electronic beeping) begins to sound. Everyone begins speaking a lot faster, and as the controller relays instructions (speaking quickly, but firm) everyone around also begins to speak – a supervisor orders another controller to call the army and ask if they’re testing anything. Nothing is overdramatised with music, but everything is tense and the scene gripping.

Soon, the tension lets up as we here the pilot say “It’s coming right by us, right now” and a distorted ‘whoosh’ sound comes through the radio, as the UFO sweeps past. They are asked whether they want to report a UFO officially, and the silence coming from the line is in stark contrast to what we previously heard. It’s almost like coming down from an adrenaline rush. The background noise of all the radios is still there, but it feels no where near as noticeable after the great flurry of activity that we just heard.

To end this post, I’ll refer to a piece of trivia I read on the IMDb page:

The John Williams score was created before the film was edited. Steven Spielberg edited the film to match the music, a reverse of what is usually done in film scoring. Both Williams and Spielberg felt that it ultimately gave the film a lyrical feel.

Although I personally dread the thought of editing a film to music, I can see why it was done, and it certainly didn’t have an adverse effect on the film itself (Close Encounters is one of my favourites). I guess the film does have a kind of lyrical quality to it, especially in scenes involving the five note tone that is used to contact and communicate with the aliens. This tone is repeated throughout the film on various instruments – a child’s xylophone; a theremin; human voices; a synthesiser; and finally that glorious finale in which the alien ship becomes almost an entire orchestra. That five tone motif ties the film together.

Before I move into my self-assessment, I just want to say quickly how fun I thought the seminars were (that is, at least the three I was able to attend were great, excluding the one that I was a part of running – the other two I missed for unavoidable reasons). Focusing the course on making real world connections and getting an insight into the industry was a really great direction to take it in, and contacting industry professionals was more fun than I anticipated.

On to the self-assessment:

• Contribution and collaboration – I was one of our techies on the day of the seminar (audio, as t’were) and in the lead up I attended every meeting I could, helped in the production of the trailer; brainstormed ideas, did the poster run for our group in the week leading up to ‘28 Minutes Later’ and tried to offer my help whenever I could. I was also the designated ‘liaison‘ to the Steering Committee.  Because we were such a large group, the tasks were divided fairly evenly, and everyone did their part.
• Proactive Learning – I’m afraid proactive learning here was not my strongpoint. Between organising our seminar, contacting people for my PNR, and work for other courses, I did not really seek to extend what was presented to us in the seminars, although I feel like I got a lot out of them all the same.
• Participation – Participation, much like contribution and collaboration, was a strong point for me. I attended nearly every group meeting, and was there to help film our promo video (I posted about our prep for it ‘here‘). I obviously attended the event itself, and three other seminars – Filmenstein, Digging Up the Truth, and Eventception. I unfortunately wasn’t able to attend Dawn of the Digital or It’s Alive: Radio due to commitments to PP2. I didn’t attend the post-production sessions because we decided as a group that due to it being a relatively simple job, only one of us should handle it. I engaged with and contributed to group discussions. Nothing really hindered me – I think after three years of uni I’ve become confident enough to offer opinions and ideas when I have them! I suggested a few guests, although we didn’t end up securing them. The ones we did get were excellent though!
• Connections and intersections – I feel that the seminar series, apart from being immensely entertaining, were immensely helpful. Hearing industry professionals speak to us about what it’s like and how to go about getting a foot in the door is bound to save us a lot of trouble in the long run, and make things easier for us in whatever career path we decide to pursue. Of the seminars, the Film seminar, Doco seminar, and our own TV seminar were the ones I was most keen on, and enjoyed in terms of content, so I’ve pretty much confirmed that these are the fields I want to work in! I know now that I can work well as part of a ‘production team’ and can handle myself in stressful situations (running around on the day of the seminar with the group, doing the last minute preparations was stressful, but we pretty much pulled off our seminar without a hitch!). I’ve also learnt my networking abilities are a bit more developed than I thought they were – contacting people for my PNR was a lot fun, and easier to do than I thought. I don’t really have any qualms now about mixing with/contacting industry pro’s about work if I need to.

Overal grade: HD 85%

Bye bye, Media Industries – it’s been fun!

Once I began, I was really surprised by how quickly I was able to gain the eighty hours that I needed. Working on such a wide variety of screen production jobs was, in hindsight, something that worked very well for me. I’d always wanted to work with film or television, and everything I’ve done has given me a better idea of what to expect when I go to work on shoots. I now have experience to fall back on for future work, including a significant increase in my problem solving/stress handling abilities! I would almost say it’s possible for me to quantitatively measure how much more confidence on a film set has increased. I even got a professional, paid job out of one of my work attachments.

The work attachment experience for me has been a highly positive one, and one that I now realise has incredibly benefits for all the media students. We are pushed and pushed and pushed right from the start to start finding real world experience and making real world connections as soon as possible – I can’t imagine what I would do if I graduated uni without all of this under my belt. I’ve done a lot of sound work, and I might decide in the future that it isn’t for me after all (though I still enjoy it thoroughly as of right now), but for whatever comes, I feel prepared.

This was my only office-based work attachment, and it made for a nice change up. End of October, through November in 2011, I was interning at Sportsbrand Media Group. The shows they produce are, as you might guess, spors related, and I spent my time there working on one show in particular, “Train to Win”. What was I doing on this show?

Logging and transcribing.

It’s the kind of stuff that gets repetitive, and it does leave you feeling abnormally tired sometimes, but it’s the stuff that needs to be done – it makes the editing process so much easier, and I got to see some pretty cool footage. I’d basically go through all the footage that had been sent back from shoots, label them in terms of what type of shot they were, duration, transcribe any interviews that happened, note down time codes and whether the shots were usable or not. Sometimes I’d get shots with audio that I couldn’t use at all.

Me: Umm, J (supervisor)

J: Yes?

Me: I don’t think you can use this sound.

J: What’s it like in the other takes?

Me: (checks)…still bad.

J: ….Hmmm….

It was a lovely atmosphere though. Everyone was either organising shoots, or editing, or doing what I was doing. I wasn’t difficult work, just time consuming, and it was definitely good for me to see the other side of the work – everything of what I’d been doing was production, with not a lot of thought as to what happens afterwards.

This coveted position was, ultimately, a really good experience for me, even if I had my up and down moments on set. Paul Ritchard contacted me saying that a local director, Darcy Yuille (who had lectured to us once on directing actors) was looking for a sound recordist. I was brought on board. Three long days of sound.

Fractions  (shot in October 2011), was the first shoot on which I learnt how to use radio mics – well, I’d already kinda used them on Phone Call, but John Wilkinson handled most of that. But this time I had to mic the actors up, monitor the levels, and boom, the entire thing. The second day I had a second person on boom, while I monitored the lapels, so that was quite helpful, and there was one day I couldn’t make where he did the sound, but otherwise it was all me. It was a daunting task.

It was on this shoot that I learnt how well I can handle a crisis. That crisis was that the mixer I had borrowed died. It needed fresh batteries, I changed them, but before my very eyes the battery levels deteriorated to nothing. Decided to get some more batteries. They also, brought no life to the mixer. I quietly tapped the director on the shoulder. I had checked everything I could think of, and nothing was working. In the end, on that first day we ran the boom straight into the camera, and the lapel mics into my zoom. The rest of the shoot, the sound was recorded separately to be synched later on. The mixer was never brought back to life by me. The first day of the shoot, I went home more than a little disheartened, but I think I can say that I kept any panic in check on location.

In July this year, I got a call from Darcy, who told me that a friend of his, with a corporate video company, was looking for a sound recordist, and would I like him to pass on my contact details. He also told me that he was still editing Fractions, but he was happy with the sound and things were going well.

I now have that job he told me about, and I’m very happy.

I worked this particular job with fellow student Verity Trott. She had been asked to film the National Breast Cancer Foundations annual charity auction and ball, and she needed someone to record some of the ambient sound, and some of the interviews that would be conducted with the special guests (one of the stars of Home and Away was there). I didn’t have my H4n Zoom at this time, so Verity borrowed a Marantz from uni for me to use.

We were supervised by the lady in charge of PR for the event from The Colour Reel - she had given us a list of things that she wanted captured and we got them, and she pulled us aside when it was time to record some of the celebs thoughts on the night, and conducted those questions. Otherwise, we were again left to capture anything visually interesting or cool. This was to be cut together for a highlights reel later. It was a relatively relaxed night for us, and my first experience of a more corporate type event. It was an entirely different atmosphere to a short film, and it was actually really enjoyable.

The final video only really used sound from the interviews and speeches, and employed a music track over a montage of all the other shots, which makes sense for the type of video it is. You can view it here.

Much like Phone Call, getting the role of ‘2nd Unit Sound Recordist’ on the final episode for the web-series ‘Tales From The Table‘ was a recommendation from a friend. A web-series created by a local production company, Aardvarks Anonymous, Tales From The Table was a fantasy series, and the final episode was going all out with a huge battle scene and lots of extras. I went to the outdoors shoot (two days near the Dandenong ranges) and the gear was provided to me – the 302 production mixer that we use at uni, and the nifty little Zoom H4n (I know own my own Zoom because of how much I loved using it on the shoot).

The head sound recordist on the shoot had pretty much worked on nearly all episodes of the series to date, and knew what he wanted and gave me a quick run down on how to run the mixer into the zoom. After that I was left to my own devices, in a sense. It was a very busy shoot, with a lot to get done, so we basically conferred about what needed to be captured, then ran off to get it. There was a lot of action, and a lot of moving around, and I not only had to record, but I had to boom at the same time. This shoot confirmed a lot of things for me – early starts, and waking up before sunrise, would become a norm; I should always wear sunscreen when working on outdoor shoots; shoots will be hectic, and stressful, but you have to keep pushing through.

About a week after the shoot, I got an email from the head sound recordist (who was also doing the sound editing), thanking me for the job I did – my sound was clean and it had made his job a lot easier! That was one of the biggest confidence boosts I have ever received, and felt incredibly rewarding.

It was shortly after we finished making Pipe Dream for Film-TV 1 that my friend Rikki (who was part of the Pipe Dream group) rang me to ask whether I wanted a job on a film shoot. We’d gotten to be good friends after working together in Film-TV 1, and she knew that I had developed an interest in sound recording because of it, so when a she heard a sound assistant role on a short film was available, assisting one of the industries most experienced sound recordists, she got me connected immediately.

Phone Call was shot over two days, in the Melbourne winter of 2011 (which made it a delightful experience when it came to the outdoor day, in the middle of the CBD, on what I personally believe is the coldest day I’ve ever seen). They were long days, but I think I can count them as one of the best learning experiences I’ve had. The film was part of the Raw Nerve initiative brought about by Screen Australia, where a young writer/director  was given a small budget to make the script they submitted. Three films were produced that year, and Phone Call was by the Daperis brothers, Daniel and Jared. A team of professionals with the some of the best gear on the market were at their disposal.

I was working with sound recordist John Wilkinson – I was a little in awe with the ease with which he handled himself, and at all the gear he owned – wireless this and that, even for the boom mic. We even had a little commlink set up between us, so he could talk to me and give me instructions while he did the mixing, generally in another room (his mixer was the size of a small fridge from my memory!). I boomed for those two days, and sometimes John would ask me to adjust the lapels or change the batteries. I’d help him set up and pack down the equipment and he’d talk to me about what it all was and gave me tips and tricks – since then, I’ve never done a job without having a spare set of batteries in my pocket for a quick change when needed!

I personally credit Phone Call for giving me a taste of what a non-student film set is like, and I know that if the experience had been a bad one, I would never have continued to volunteer my time on short films as I since have. It was also a new experience working with people that I didn’t really know (well, I knew the producers assistant from RMITV, but I didn’t really see her on set much). I’d been brought on by a recommendation, and I felt the need to really prove I could do the work.  I still remember John telling me that the film industry was like a weird ‘marriage’ – a crew comes together for days or weeks at a time, then they go their separate ways, and may not see each other again for ages, until they’re brought together months or years later.

I think that this seminar was always going to be the ‘underdog’ of the seminar series – Events, while something that is always happening, is not something a lot of people in this course would consider a career option. I will therefore call this seminar a success, and I rated them quite highly, due to the fact that even though I had never really considered Events something I wanted to move into, I still found the seminar highly engaging and entertaining, despite a few technical difficulties that occurred.

Those technical difficulties I mentioned were mainly audio issues, and having worked the mixing board for our own seminar, I do realise that it’s a bit stressful if something goes wrong! I’m not quite sure what their particular set up was, but there were some moments of bad feedback, and other moments were there was no audio from the mics at all. Technical difficulties aside, the hosts worked through them and were able to even get a few laughs out of the situation.

The main strengths were in the engaging guests that the Events group managed to get on board – Bruce Keebaugh in particular was entertaining and had a lot of anecdotes about his work with the Big Group to keep the audience entertained. Overall, they really had very similar things to say – things will go wrong, always have a contingency plan, improvise, keep on trucking. The similarities to producing on a TV show or a film really quite struck me (one of the more stressful roles I can imagine undertaking!)

In terms of set up, the Events group brought their own little touch to the day, as did all the groups – a fancy red carpet and door prize for someone who sat in one of the first two rows. All in all, a successful day.

Everything on the day went off without a hitch!

Beforehand I was almost at panic stations!

The night before we had a cancellation due to illness. A bit sad, but nothing we could do about it, and she was quite apologetic.

We got in, I was running around like a mad thing with Yoon and Stella setting up the chairs and organising cables. Then, I wasn’t sure how to set up the mixing board, and when I asked our group, they weren’t sure either! So I called Jason, and he helped me set it up, and then I was ready to go. Controlling levels? Easy! Ellie would have preferred for all the guests to be lapelled, but honestly it was too much hassle. Kieran had a lapel, and our guests had hand mics. I felt much more comfortable when they had wired mics, with far less chance of cutting out than a lapel.

There might have been one point in the seminar where I didn’t bring up a guest mic quickly enough. Matt Saville looked at me as if to ask “Am I on?” but that was the only major issue I think we had! It’s all a bit of a blur to be honest.

Still, we had a good crowd, guests that worked really well off one another (they were all quite funny, especially Lawrence).

As a group, I think it’s safe to say we worked together quite well. We each had our roles, with Ellie as the group coordinator, and everything was taken care of. We bounced ideas off each other, helped each other when needed, and I feel that I contributed in a worthwhile way. In fact, we all did, and I can’t thank my lucky stars enough to have the group that I did (although some people like Zach, Kieran  and Ellie went about and beyond!).

Now let’s see what the rest of the seminars have to offer!