Working With The Sound Designer

Originally when I spoke with Steve the sound designer I explained that with this film I wanted something less formalist and more free form in terms of the sound design, in particular the opening dream sequence, I spoke about how I'd like to take influence from David Lynch and the surrealist sound that he evokes in his films. I wanted to give Steve more control over the sound, we spoke about building a complex soundscape for the opening scene, I mentioned that I'd like to incorporate the sounds from what the main protagonist will have heard during his time fighting in Iraq, though audibly not so straight forward and easy to decipher. I pointed out some examples of sound design that I admired that Steve could potentially take ideas from, I mentioned the short piece of sound design from the film 'Saving Private Ryan', this particular piece of sound design blends the sound of rain drops that fall on leaves and the ground into that of gun fire in the forthcoming scene, the drops start at an intermittent gradually building to a more intense rate as they slowly blend into a machine gun. I explained to Steve that I didn't plan on replicating this motif though the idea of combining sound is something I would urge him to look into.


I did point out that I would be again using a song at some point within the film, though I wouldn't be asking a composer to make an original piece like the previous project due to time constraints and the difficultly of the task i was faced with last time. I mentioned that I would show Steve the track as early as I could in order for myself and him to find a place for the track within the film so that it didn't overlap work that he had already planned for sequences for the film.


To give Steve a clear idea as to how I'd like the opening scene to transition into the next I explained how I'd like the sound to come to a climax which would then cut out before the actor shoots his rifle. I showed Steve the opening scene of 'A single Man' where Colin Firth's dream sequence is illustrated which ends with climactic sound cut short by Colin waking up in his bed in panicked. With this Steve could clearly see what I wanted to achieve from this scene and what he had to do with the sound to make that possible.