You are recording sound on the 8th take of the second to last shot of the day and, of course, the shoot is behind schedule. The Director calls “action” and as the actors run through their lines perfectly with incredible emotion, an airplane flies overhead. “Cut”, says the Director, “brilliant…what emotion”. “Great for camera”, says the DP. “Uh”, you say, chagrined, “there was airplane noise, that audio is not going to be usable.” Running late, the Director makes the same inevitable decision. “Moving on. We’ll fix it in post.”
You cringe inwardly, mentally sigh, shake your head and of course, do what the Director says. Move on knowing that the audio on the take is not usable and can probably only be solved using ADR or by using another take’s audio and hoping the lines can be matched up when editing.
This articles in this blog are going to be about the best ways to get audio done correctly in the production environment so you never have to fix it in post. An impossible task, but a worthy goal. For more info about hiring me for your next project, see my webite, www.locationsoundmontana.com.