mr steve productions

I am very pleased to see that one of the first feature films I completed  here in South Australia since emigrating from the UK has done so well in the festival circuit . Highlights of  the awards picked up  by Gods Own Country so far are:

• Jury Prize for Best film in Berlin,
• Best British feature film at Edinburgh
• Best Director for Francis Lee at Sundance

This weekend I’m flying out to the Melbourne IFF  to catch it while it is playing locally. More info below the trailer

I worked on it as foley artist and foley editor, alongside Duncan Campbell (Foley recordist) at the SA film corp foley studios. It was an exceptionally challenging gig but very rewarding. The film has front title music, no other score until  well into the final reel and the lead is not a big speaker. There is wall to wall foley. Challenging scenes involved making sounds for dry wall building, delivering lambs, driving a cow into a trailer etc etc.. I’ve written about the foley sessions in an article downloadable here

You can buy tickets from the film website here. It  is currently on  the world wide festival circuit and is released in America in October

The Marker was the first Feature I worked on Since Moving to Australia. It has it premier at  Edinburgh IFF in June

I worked from the SA Film Corps foley room as Foley artist and  editor alongside Duncan Campbell (Foley Recordist). Interesting use of sound it  flicks from being very upclose   and personal to abstract as the lead’s mental state deteriorates.. My brief from Justin Edgar (Director) and Vincent Watts (Supervising Sound Editor) was to cover material as usual, go big with the hits, fighting and splats for gun shots- add textures tomake people relly feel it,  but also give an additional layer of sound design which could be used rather like the sounds of a Sergio Leone- opening to Once Upon A Time in the West etc. I had a lot of fun covering a gruesome point blank head shot with a watermelon, spaghetti rings and cornflour thickened water, there was also some pretty gruesome neck slashing- a lot of action- think I got it sounding pretty brutal. There was also playing with finger tapping, skipping ropes and trying to get a signature rhythm for the lead with a Butterfly knife.  I believe it has a couple of sales in the pipeline  and I will update as and when I hear more

Foley debris for a point blank headshot. (Photo by Duncan Campbell 2017)

Excuse radio silence.  I’ve emigrated from UK to Australia and I had  fair amount of hurdles to clear: I sold my London house, got a permanent visa, shipped all my worldly possessions over, and was about to get stuck into building a foley/audio post studio and carry on working as before via fast fibre when the Brexit vote happened so I slowed things down  and waited for things to settle in the UK while developing contacts and projects elsewhere.

I have been slowly gaining a new client base, working on US and Australian material as well as keeping up with my UK work . Some work is still under a media blackout- will update when I am allowed. I have a sound proof/treated room I am working from with my trusty Protools rig, 5.1 Genelecs and  Schoeps mics+foley props and have been hiring the foley suite at the SA film corp for feature work. Now I have enough work am in the process of building a larger studio of my own. More on that as it comes online.

I’ve also started to develop a few  side projects and am interested in moving this site away from being purely an online CV.  I will update as these come online.

‘Fear Of 13’  goes on cinema release on Friday 13th November. It follows the true story of Nick Yaris and opens with him on Death Row, asking to be put to death. The film is a compelling monologue with lots of stylised flashbacks. I worked on the dialogue edit plus premix and covered a  few bits and pieces of foley for this one (Vincent Watts handled the final mix and sound design). I watched the premiere  at the London Film Festival and was well received which is always pleasing. Click here for link to the film website for more info/ screenings etc..

‘Warriors’- a feature doc I mixed is touring UK cinemas in November. It follows the journey of ‘A team of Massai Warriors battling against FGM and gender inequality’. . Follow this link for more details via the website.

Have been pretty busy on this one. Cleaning up 70s archive sync sound shot in the middle of the Bering sea by Greenpeace activists- who may or may not be under the influence- as they seek out and confront Russian waling vessels was challenging but rewarding. The film has already picked up prizes on its festival opening at Sundance and got into loads of festivals where I think it will do very well. It is Playing simultaneously about 160 cinemas in Uk and 400 in USA/Canada on 9th September. I will post links for finding venues below. Cheers & see you West End if you’re there. Steve

For the UK: http://howtochangetheworldfilm.com
For the US: http://www.fathomevents.com/#event/how-to-change-the-world

Departure is a coming of age film set against the backdrop of  the implosion of an English nuclear family in their holiday home in France. The film has done well on the Festival circuit, picked up a fair few prizes and got cinema releases right across Europe, click here to see the various posters for different languages. More info available on the Film Facebook page

I worked on it nominally as foley supervisor/editor and I also recorded the ADR and mixed  the M&E/supplied  deliverables afterwards (I usually handle the deliverables and-time allowing- am involved in the ADR of most films I work on ).

Foley was recorded at Aquarium studios with Meltem Baytok as foley artist  and Rob Price as foley recordist. I enjoy being involved in foley sessions as I learn so much from watching other people at work, Meltem and Rob are a pretty slick team.  I speak decent French  which helped when I was shooting/ editing ADR for the French language scenes.  Andy Stegell- director- is an accomplished theatre director and gets good performances out of his cast but was- at this time less experienced with ADR.I believe he managed to raise performances  in the studio as well as covering the technical nuts and bolts which made for a satisfying session.

The thing I found hardest was getting the various mixes to hit broadcast spec- nowadays most countries work to an average loudness spec. The theatrical version had an extremely wide dynamic range- some loud shouty scenes and  long passages of comparative stillness and minimal dialogue  in the French countryside sometimes underscored by  very delicate classical scoring which doesn’t react well when the dynamic range is squashed to hit broadcast spec. It took longer to produce mixes which both ticked all the technical boxes and were faithfull to the original theatrical mix, but I believe i got there in the end. Nice to see the film do so well.

I handled the clean up and 5.1 mix for this fun comedy short. The on set performances were great and we really didn’t want ADR- however it was shot in an airport car park. This made for a lot of work but I think it was time well spent. The film is doing really well picking up prizes allover the place on the festival circuit. More details on the film website.

Here’s a trail for a BFI backed comedy feature film I mixed. It was shot in West London- which is never an easy place for location sound- many arterial roads, planes overhead on their way to/from Heathrow . The location sound was well recorded with many wildtracks and once again Izootope’s RX4 advanced came to the fore. Always satisfying to be able to shrink the ADR, keep the onset performances as much as possible and have time to really hone the sound design.

It opens in UK cinemas 17th APril 2015. Click here for more Info via the film Site