COMM 2660 Assignment 3--Post Production

Samual Jamie Rogers

COMM 2660

2012.4.25

Assignment 3—Post-production

There are things in life that most people have a hard time admitting; instances when they are wrong, their own faults, weaknesses for particular junk foods, and appreciation of particular films. The latter is no exception for an adolescent high school boy who might not want to own-up to watching so-called “chick-flicks.”

            This was the case during the holiday season of 1997 when James Cameron’s Titanic first released into theaters. It was hard to admit then, but I did go and see the movie—several times. I suppose it could have been the same hype that was propelling the film to breaking records that pushed me to add to its near-$2 billion in ticket sales. I know for a fact that it wasn’t due to the persuasion of a cute girl that got me to the theaters, but there were plenty of the female variety in the seats, all of whom cried at the end of the movie, no matter how many times they had seen it.

            One thing that came with the hype was the work and the detail that was put into the production of the film by James Cameron and his crew. Titanic was the most expensive movie made up to that point and with the help of Leo, Kate, and Celine, it wasn’t the easiest thing to ignore. Production included the building of a 90-percent scale model of the ship in a 17 million gallon tank that was used for the flooding and sinking of the set. The post-production—which will be the focus of this blog post—included CGI, or computer generated imagery, that helped model how events occurred and also with complete the overall look of the film.

 Earlier this month along with the 100^th anniversary of the Titanic sinking, an updated version of the film was re-released in theaters in 3D. Among the dozens of interviews from cast and crew members surrounding the re-release, came the confession from Kate Winslet that the famous love song makes her feel “like throwing up.”

Another revealing detail emerged about the original release of the film—James Cameron got a couple things incorrect. First was the way the broken half of the Titanic that the lead characters held on to until the very last moment, sank. In an interview with ABC’s Nightline, Cameron said about the climatic point in the film, “…it wasn't quite as dramatic and as static as we showed in the film," he said. "It probably wasn't straight up. It was probably at an angle.”

Another mistake that was noted by astronomer was the alignment of the stars in the night sky that Winslet’s character, Rose, is looking up at from her floating door near the end of the film. The stars in the film were depicted as incorrect for that time of year in that part of the world. As part of the re-master and re-release of the film in 3D, Cameron promised to not change anything from the original, but did say the thought had crossed his mind. "There was a moment when I thought fleetingly I could correct the film and actually have it match what Titanic really looked like," Cameron said in the Nightline interview.

I suppose in what one could call “post-post production” Cameron’s crew consisted of over 300 computer artists to make the conversion to 3D and to make one, slight change to the stars in the night sky above the sinking ship. The filmmaker/historian also used CGI to render as close to exactly what happened as possible as the ship split apart and sank. In the special documentary filmed for the National Geographic channel—Titanic: the Final Word—Cameron revealed how the new CGI model differed from the original idea of how the ship sank and broke up in its descent. The CGI animation was made possible by dozens of trips taken to the sight of the sunken ship and by creating additional CGI models of the different debris scattered on the ocean floor.

This is what’s amazing to me. James Cameron is a known perfectionist and his track record of successful box office hits is proof of that. When it comes to “perfecting” the re-release of Titanic, the fact that he actually thought about changing the CGI and effects to make it more up to date with what is now known, is amazing to me. Just that the technology and rendering capabilities exist, is even more amazing. George Lucas, almost comically, edited his first three Star Wars films and added CGI and changed a few notable things around because the technology didn’t initially exist. Adding a few creatures and explosions here-and-there seems almost like child’s play compared to changing the entire way the most intense part of Titanic went down…no pun intended.

Not only did James Cameron think about it, but he could have pulled it all off! Yes, the film would have been more historically correct, and, possibly, less dramatic and Titanic-movie fans everywhere may have been in an uproar, but it would have been more perfect.

The 3D conversion and changing of the stars in the sky was the only additional post-production work that was done during the re-release. The ship’s sinking was not changed to match the CGI animation and Jack still died at the end. The first weekend of the re-release made enough at the box office to cover the $18 million in costs, though.

Essentially, the CGI update seemed to be a pretty standard task for the same director who turned Arnold into an android, made a man out of liquid metal, and created an entire planet of new types of species, especially the 10 foot tall, blue, type.

To me—only a new student of the film production—there is no substitute to capturing moments live on camera are priceless. No amount of post-production doctoring or CGI and effects can make a film something it’s not. It’s like I learned in my Converged Audio class: no amount of mixing can make a bad recording good. In my opinion, what the camera captures and the overall vision of a director, editors, cast, and crew is what makes up a film. CGI and effects is just becoming a more useful and realistic tool for artists to utilize.





References:
http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/national-geographic-channel/specials-1/titanic-100-years/ngc-return-to-titanic-2/
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/world/
http://gawker.com/5898584/james-cameron-alters-titanic-in-nerdiest-way-possible?utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_twitter&utm_source=gawker_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/james-cameron-mistakes-original-titanic-frame-changed-titanic/story?id=16014757#.T5fFM6uXS-a
http://www.usmagazine.com/entertainment/news/kate-winslet-titanics-my-heart-will-go-on-makes-want-to-throw-up-2012303

COMM 2660 Assignment 2--Production

Samual Jamie Rogers

COMM 2660

2012.4.17

Assignment 2—Production

During this semester I have had the opportunity to learn about digital film production in COMM 2660—an important part of which is the recording and production of sound. Along with what I have learned in this class I have also been able to expand on the subject of sound in another class, COMM 1560-Audio for Converged Media. COMM 1560 focuses solely on aspects of sound recording and production. The topic that has been particularly interesting has been that of recording and creating sound effects. In both classes there has been emphasis on the importance of sound in film production and that proper sound production can help define how an audience feels about a film. Of course, the capturing of sound on the set of a production differs from the creation of sound on a sound stage and for the sake of this blog post, I will lean more towards the off-set sound production and recording. In fact, this route would be more post-production than production, but I hope it will suffice as it is a topic that I have gained more interest in over the past months.

According to dictionary.com, the term that refers to the manual production of motion picture sound effects is “foley.” The term originates with the man who pioneered the art of recreating sound for productions, Jack Foley (http://www.marblehead.net/foley/index.html).

            Sound effects in movies have been interesting to me since before I really understood how shows were made. I saw a “making of” segment from the movie Twister and remember hearing how different sounds from animals, including pigs and camels, were used and modified to create the sounds of the tornados in the movie. Over the years I have been intrigued by the way foley artists use different items and improvise sounds from TV shows, movies, and video games. Movies such as the first Star Wars trilogy, the Alien series, and, usually, gory horror movies—aside from being fun to watch while growing up—also caught my attention with many of the behind-the-scenes extras included on the DVDs. Laser blasts from a Storm trooper’s gun were created with a hammer hitting a stretched cable; the sounds of the Xenomorph from the original alien movie was a combination of a man who could impersonate birds and a lot of KY Jelly; heads of lettuce, melons, and celery all seem to be acceptable sounding substitutes for the unknowing character in most gory, slasher movies. Creating the off-set sounds makes what is seen visually seem that much more realistic without having to put the cast and crew at risk from shooting a real gun on set, or requiring a volunteer to be stabbed to capture the perfect sound effect.

            One important aspect of sound recording that I’ve started to understand is that no amount of mixing or editing can make a bad recording sound amazing. The initial capturing of sounds, dialogue, sound effects, and ambient noise is very important. Knowing what microphones, filters, wind-screens, and amplifiers to use are all integral parts of getting the right sound for a production. In fact, recording the same sound with many various types of microphones and equipment could yield important differences that would be useful later in the production/post-production process. In fact, recording several tracks of the same sound or dialogue with different devices could prove to be beneficial if another source was corrupted or lost. Digital technology makes this possible without a considerable increase in production costs.

            A quick Google search produces various lists of famous, familiar sounds found throughout TV and cinema. Darth Vader’s breathing, Goofy’s yelling, snakes rattling, guns with numerous safeties releasing—all sound effects that can be heard every day. One sound, though, that stands out and is almost comedic when heard in modern context, is the Wilhelm Scream. Imdb.com lists the movie Distant Drums as the initial film that uses the scream and movies as recent as Captain America and Tron: Legacy as others that use the iconic sound. Peter Jackson, Steven Spielberg, and George Lucas have all incorporated it into their movies and even though the Wilhelm Scream is over 60 years old it remains a staple in film and audio production.

            One of the assignments given in my COMM 1560 class was to utilize a field recording device and capture a sound as it occurs and edit it as if it could be used in a film or radio ad. One night after a weekend of shooting, I was cleaning my handguns and figured its various components could be used to create a realistic sound effect. If there is a sound effect used today in media that is the equivalent to nails on a chalkboard, it’s the unnecessary sounds that are heard whenever a firearm is presented in almost any movie, TV show, or video game. A Glock handgun, for example, essentially has only one moving part that allows the gun to fire: the trigger. It is beyond my understanding to hear a gun, when it is shown on screen, make numerous noises. I decided to make a clear sound effect of what a Glock handgun should sound like. I loaded a full magazine into the gun, waited for the click of it seating, and pulled the slide back and, after releasing it, the recoil spring released, sending the slide forward and putting a bullet into the chamber. Of course, for the sake of the exercise I was using a safety device known as a Snap Cap that doesn’t actually fire if the trigger is pulled. After doing this several times at different positions around the microphone of my recording device, I was able to capture, what I considered, to be a suitable “gun sound” that could used in a production and have a realistic sound effect and reflect what could be actually happening on the screen. There were no clicks of additional safeties or invisible buttons and the gun didn’t sound like it was being reloaded every few seconds. It was a simple sound effect that I was able to edit in Adobe Audition as a standalone file and submit for my assignment.

            Although this was my first attempt to capture a sound as realistically as possible for the sake of editing, I was happy with it. Also, after my brief research of sound production in media, it has given me a new appreciation for what, both, sound mixers on a film set, and foley artists off-set, do for the capture and creation of sounds that make the overall experience more believable and enjoyable. In fact, if there was a job I would further investigate in film production, it would be working with sound mixing and re-creation.