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I get a lot of questions on if I can "do" sound sweetening, usually by frantic filmmakers, calling in the middle of the night. They are frantic because the sound in their movie or video is bad.

They've used a cheap mic, plugged into the camera, or worse,have used the on-camera mic.

They had a friend aimlessly point the mic at the floor, or thesky, anywhere but at the actor muttering his lines, and moved themic randomly during shooting.

Some, from the sound of it, have pointed the mic directly at thewhirring camera, or rumbling electric generator, or humming airconditioner, or buzzing fluorescent lamp. They've bumped the micagainst the wall, or the ceiling, or trees or bushes.

They're far away from what they're recording, not even in thesame vicinity. There's so much "room sound," you can barely hearthe actor mumbling along.

So, the Sound Guy (whoever they can get for a few minutes -usually a well-meaning person with no experience) turns up thelevel too far, which just makes the sound distort horribly, ortoo low, which buries the good sound in the mud.

Sound Editing adds more mistakes, and compounds the problem.The filmmaker has the equipment, and wants the film to be good.You'd think he'd read a book on the subject. You would be wrong.

He chops the sound when he chops the picture, and that's it. Hedoesn't split it into tracks, or replace bad sound, or finessethe tracks, or otherwise spend time exerting care and craft onhis precious film's soundtrack.

Essentially, when he's done shooting and cutting and layingmusic, he thinks he is done, without spending the minimum oftime and care and money it takes, to have a good sound track.

So the filmmaker shows his movie, with its bad sound, tolukewarm audience reaction. Ouch!

People don't know why the movie is bad, actually. Not one in tencan recognize "bad sound," they just think the movie stinks.

If the filmmaker is very, very lucky, somebody will tell him thesound is bad. Otherwise, he has no clue.

He's disappointed, but he still wants to maybe fix it. Somebodysays "sweetening" the sound will help. So he comes to me.

He wants to know if bad sound can be fixed. I have to tell himthe bad news - no.

At this stage, unless he has a great deal of time and money, andis willing to start completely over and take the proper care,nothing can be done.

Bad sound is the product of negligence. If you spend the timeand care, from the beginning, there is no reason for your film orvideo sound to be bad.

You've probably seen many commercial movies with good sound,so why doesn't your movie sound like them? You probably don'treally know how a good movie sounds, and what effort went intomaking them sound good.

Take some time, and actively listen. After a while,you'll notice what a good movie sounds like.

I was very lucky when I was starting out.I read a book by Ivan Watson from England, whospelled out precisely what it takes to record and editand mix good movie sound.

You can still find "Uncle Ivan's" books, either online,http://snurl.com/brbuor at your library. If you haven't read any filmmaking books,you need to. Get going!

What can you do to make your movie track sound less like a video,and more like a real movie?

Maybe a better question is, "Why does video sound so bad?"

I think that's a fair question, because frankly, most videosound, (all elements music-dialog-effects), sucks. I've heardexceptions, so I know it's not just the video itself.

Film does sound very different than video, I am certain of that.

Real movies are rich-sounding, with only the sounds and musicthat move the story along. Video, even shot by filmmakers whoshould know better, often is tinny and muffled, with thumps andnoise on the tracks.

How is film sound different from video? Making a movie soundlike a movie starts with the production sound.

Film sound is recorded on analog machines (yes, they stillexist), or on cool new 96Khz/24bit sampling recorders.

Mini-DV camera sound is uncompressed 48Khz/16bit sampling.That's better-than-CD audio quality, but camera makers save moneyby using cheap audio circuits in most under-$5k video cameras.

Cheap-and-dirty analog-to-digital circuits add noise anddistortion to your high-quality mic's crisp analog sound.

The best video camera sound I've found is on the PanasonicDVX-100A. Its audio section is good as most DAT or solid-stateflash memory recorders. Shooting with one is like recording on aseparate digital recorder.

Film sound is recorded with a midrange bump, and anEQ raise above 6KHz.

6KHz is the high end of the human voice. 'Midrange' is around2.5KHz. The film sound "EQ raise" at 6KHz increases dialogueintelligibility and perceived crispness.

In video, sound is recorded without pre or post EQ. Video soundalso usually uses inferior mics to those used in film sound.

Film sound mics have a cleaner sound, and flatter response,sounding better than the mics used to record video sound.They are highly directional (rejecting extraneous noise).

Give your video sound's midrange an EQ bump, and a raise at 6Khz,and it will be more like how film sound is recorded.

Get some decent mics, not the cheapies. A Sennheiser ME66, or anAudio-Technika 835b, is mid-level, not terribly expensive, andreally works well. Those will give you a rich and full sound.

You may not want to record double-system (sound recorderseparate from the camera), but if you can, do it!

If you have a Nagra or other analog tape recorder, use it. Theyjust sound better.

35mm mag film to edit? Sounds great. It should ' it's a 1/4" magnetictrack at 18ips, and if you fill empty spaces with slug stock, it's self-gating.

In film sound, the sound designer matches sound to the look ofthe film. A sad movie has mood lighting, and the sound will bedesigned to match it in emotional tone. Its dialogue is EQ'dless crisply, with a lower-frequency boost.

In a happy comedy, lower frequencies are rolled off, and it'sEQ'd and mixed to be "brighter."

Film sound is "sweetened" by manipulating room tone, premixingaudio levels, and carefully considering dialog, music, and effects fortheir proper audio EQ.

Film sound expects post-production sweetening, which makes filmaudio sound so different from audio for video. Video sound can besweetened, but Indies use it pretty much as it is recorded. Yuck!

What can be done about it? How can you make your movie soundlike a real movie?

First, notice how video procedures are designed for quick-and-easy operation, and not really for quality.

I think most video sound sucks because the camera operator isalso the sound recordist, and the camera op doesn't care aboutsound.

He wants the framing and focus and color and bla bla bla.Sound is not his priority, and he's not really listening to what'scoming through the mic and mixer and headphones. He can't.

For your sound to be good, you must care about it being good.That care will force you to listen to your track, something mostvideo hobbyists, and many filmmakers, simply don't do.

Until they've lost a film festival, and notice the winner hasgood sound. Or they see the one Indy film that comes along ina blue moon, the one with good sound.

If you actively listen to your track, you'll start hearing (ittakes time to train your ears) all the junk you're recording.

You'll take the steps necessary (filtering, mic placement, EQ,editing) to discard everything that is extraneous. Get rid ofanything that doesn't create a mood, or push your story along.

You will put the mic just as close to your subject as you can,and roll off the wind noise, and use a fur piece on the mic, andonly mix in enough room or ambient noise, and only when it'snecessary.

If there's a single "most important part," I would say it is"gain staging." Set your levels carefully - at every stage!

When we recorded in analog, there was a certain forgiving qualityto the recording process. Overmodulation would "saturate" thetape, limiting levels before actually distorting.

Now everything's digital, and if you're recording digitally (toDAT, CD, Mini-disc, or Flash Memory), there is very little"headroom," and much less tolerance for clipping, than in analog.

If your meter goes "into the red," the sound becomes a chatterydigital nightmare. It is ruined forever. So make sure you use"-6Db" for your "0Db," to keep it clean.

Always "expect the unexpected" when setting your levels. I'venoticed actors always "perform" 6Db louder than they "rehearse,"and musicians do too.

I always feed one mono signal to both stereo tracks, with L atthe "proper" level, and R backed off 6Db or so.

If the sound gets too loud, L will distort, but I'll still have achance to salvage that section of R, when I'm editing.

How much is enough? Experience will teach you. Listen!

The major difference between how film dialog sounds and videodialog sounds is the EQ and compression that is used to make itintelligible and "fatter." With practice, you will learn how toget that sound. There is no shortcut - you must practice!

You will learn what distortion sounds like, and you will learn toset the gain properly, and boost the midrange or add compressionin recording or mixing, when it's necessary, to push theimportant signal up out of the mud, and into your audienceawareness.

How much boost? Again, experience.

That's why you need a Sound Mixer with sound as his only job,one who cares, with enough faith in his ears, and experience atsetting the gain and EQ, and also a trained and experienced BoomOperator, with necessary skills to point and move the boom.

Make it clear to your sound crew that you consider sound just asimportant as the picture, and you expect good work from them.

Insist they yell "Cut!" if it distorts, and tell you when theyneed another take.

Don't make the mistake of letting "just anybody" volunteer torecord sound. Make sure they've done it before.

Just hanging a mic on a boom stand is better than nothing,but not very much better. Care must be taken at every stage.

Get the best sound you can, when you shoot, so your editingwill go smoothly.

Few things are worse than an edit session that becomes an audiosalvage operation. It detracts from the creativity, replacing it withan air of desperation. You want to edit, when you edit.

After your picture is locked, start the sound edit. Split yourtracks, so you can vary the gain on any element. If twocharacters are talking, you should have each on his own track.

Cut your dialogue, and then effects. Use your audio editingprogram to "normalize" your levels, and clean up the sound.

See what needs to be fixed, and fix it. Some stuff can, like Boommic crashes, and ambient noise, but if something is bad and can'tbe fixed, replace it with ADR, looping, and foley.

Foley is extremely subjective, that is, it's not realistic. You don'tnotice footsteps at all in real life, but in the movies, if you needto know somebody's purposefully walking along, the footstepsare loud and pure and pristine.Tik, tik, tik.

Papers or clothes rustling, same thing. There are persons whomake their living making clothing rustling noises, and walkingand all those noises. They're called "Walkers," or "FoleyArtists."

I don't mind having to record every footstep and line ofdialogue. I've done it enough, I know how to make it seemreal. How? From doing it and doing it, so if you want tolearn how, get started, record something.

In fact, I much prefer replacing location dialogue. Thisfrees me to shoot with literally any camera, noisy or not.Eyemo? Arri or Cameraflex? Mitchell, Eclair, Konvas?

All quite delightful results, if you record a track just touse as a guide track.

Or shoot two takes, one with the camera running, one without, butrecording sound both times, and cheat the camera-less sound overthe camera take, and cut it into sync.

Looney, but it works, and that's what I do, and I get good sound.

The harder and longer you work on your sound edit, the betterchance your mix has to be good.

In my experience, looping or ADR are not all that expensive,when you have a vocal room in your house, and some good mics.

In a pinch, a closet full of coats works fine, or a tentmade of carpet, hanging from the ceiling. Just put the micsaway from your computer fan or open windows.

My friend Jimmy O'Brien, Editor and Dialogue Director atUniversal for many years, told me he'd flown to NY and far-offplaces to record a few lines on occasion, if it would fix orchange a line reading, or even change the whole plot line!

I know much of what I know about film sound from a long-agointerview with Walter Murch, in an issue of "FilmmakersNewsletter," where he advised to replace all the lines, ratherthan just one, so they'll all match. Die-hard attitude, but histracks are lovely.

One of those that comes to mind is "Apocalypse Now," which hadvirtually no usable sound when they entered post-production.Think about that - everything was ADR and Foley!

Which brings me to the point in "making your movie soundlike a real movie."

Real movies have real good sound tracks to start with, and arewilling to replace most, and sometimes ALL the sound, to makeit really good.

Use your imagination, to determine what process might make yoursound "sound right." Create a sound space for each scene thatserves the story. Use EQ and reverb and sound effects to createthat space.

Compression is still a useful tool, even in these days of digitalaudio. It makes the "louds" quieter, and the "quiets" louder,raising the overall perceived level. That makes the track easierto mix, because it is "pre-mixed." The mix flies itself.

Use compression sparingly, so it doesn't make overall changes youdon't want. Rather than compressing everything, use your audioediting software to draw in your gain changes.

This is actually a manual type of compression, with intelligence,(yours). Drawing in your level changes makes the track fatterand more intelligible.

Take all the time and care your movie requires, with only oneoutcome in mind, to make your movie tracks sound better.

Have the picture scored by a composer who knows what he's doing,and get the very best mix you can.

Good audio takes as much planning as good picture, from start tofinish. Good audio doesn't "just happen," it is the result ofcareful listening, and time, and care.

Most video hobbyists don't give sound the attention it deserves,and that's why there's such an astonishing difference in qualitybetween video and film sound. Be different.

Start listening! Take care!