National Day file, based on real events, the evacuation theme film " Thousand Miles Homecoming " is far ahead in terms of box office and word-of-mouth performance, and it is also a film with artistic discussion value.
"The Journey Home" stills
The story takes place in the fictional country of Numia. Due to a sudden war, several staff of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs have to lead the unarmed expatriates to avoid the attacks of the rebels and go to a relatively safe border. Due to the epidemic, the entire film was filmed in China. Imagine how much pressure it will put on film creators to shoot a purely foreign realistic movie in China.
"The Journey Home" has a lot of details in the production, and it is these details that make this movie full and beautiful. For example, the film crew of "Returning Thousands of Miles" created a city for the movie 1:1. For example, in the sound of fireworks exploding in the film, the crew was full of ideas. This exclusive interview is from Jiang Jianqiang, the voice director of "The Journey Home". It covers everything from film sound style to simultaneous sound recording and post-production. I recommend it to everyone.
Voice Director Jiang Jianqiang
Jiang Jianqiang: This play is the 4th cooperation between me and Director Rao. Because of the previous cooperation foundation, we quickly reached a consensus on the sound style.
"Homecoming" is based on real events, and the final creative direction set by the director is realism, so in terms of style, we focus on reality and need to be restrained without too many exaggerated elements. The so-called "real", first of all, let the audience believe the story through audio-visual, and secondly, if the picture and sound are "real", it will have a strong sense of substitution for the audience, and the audience will be more likely to enter the story. .
"The Journey Home" stills
Filmmaking still needs artistic processing. Although the sound of the entire film is mainly based on reality, it is not stingy where it needs to be highlighted. For example, after a sudden explosion in the street outside the checkpoint, when the four of them woke up and walked out of the checkpoint into the street full of smoke and screams, they still did some special sound treatment in terms of atmosphere, but this treatment was based on From the heart of the character as a starting point. Zong Dawei has been in a state of mission in a war-torn country for a long time. The war is harmful to his psychology and physiology. For example, there will be some post-war traumatic disorders. When he hears the sound of sudden explosions and shootings, his psychological There will be strong changes. Taking this point of view as the core starting point, after the explosion, the voice will be used to express the entry into Zong Dawei's subjective world. This kind of voice will also affect the audience's participation in the cruel deprivation of innocent lives seen in Zong Dawei's perspective.
"The Way Back" stills
In addition, after a lot of discussions with Director Rao, more "suddenness" was adopted in the sound effects of explosions. For example, gunshots and explosions in the streets, and explosions before the border rebels rushed over. The explosion sound effects of these scenes have enhanced the "sudden sense" in order to echo the fireworks explosion behind. This "sudden sense" is to let the audience feel that in a country in a state of war, very cruel events will happen around people at any time, posing a great threat to life.
However, this explosion sound is more of a festive atmosphere in our country. Fireworks, firecrackers, etc., represent a kind of festivity, so the two explosion sounds form a sharp contrast. In this part of the sound design, we made it more prominent, a little more abrupt, and even a little exaggerated. We also approached the sound of fireworks in domestic streets from this angle. During the mixing process, we removed a lot of the process before the fireworks exploded, so that the sound of the explosion appeared more suddenly. When the movie reached this stage, Zong Dawei’s feelings and reactions to the sound of fireworks also on behalf ofexpresses the feelings of a part of the audience.
Film and Television Industry Network: "The Homecoming" was filmed in China. What changes does this bring to sound creation?
Jiang Jianqiang: Due to the epidemic, "The Journey Home" was filmed in China throughout the entire process. How to restore the unique sound elements of Numia in North Africa is a very big challenge.
I have traveled to some Arab countries in 2018. Compared with the domestic ones, the life philosophy and details of life are very different. I have a habit of carrying a portable tape recorder with me when I travel and recording some local sounds wherever I go. That time, I also recorded some Arabic sound materials, such as some atmosphere of the market and sales sounds, and some of those materials were also used in this movie, so that travel experience also has a certain effect on the sound creation of "The Journey Home". help. In addition, by studying and referring to some films about Arabic-speaking countries, I have compiled some knowledgeable materials and improved a part of my sound production demand list.
"The Journey Home" stills
For Zong Dawei Dawn Departure from the embassy, the whole city is filled with the sounds of adhans and prayers that are unique to Islamic countries. My plan was to go to different mosques in China to record these materials. Later, I found that the pronunciation of adhan in domestic mosques is still significantly different from that in Arabic-speaking regions, so I gave up. Another way for me is to ask my foreign counterparts to help me record the adhan in the Muslim National Mosque , but due to various objective reasons, this plan also fell through. Very fortunately, during the filming, among the large number of Arabic actors in the group, some of them had very good voice conditions. By communicating with them, they were happy to help me record some adhan sounds and some unique Arabic sounds. In addition, I obtained a batch of sound materials for the adhan through other channels, and finally formed the sound atmosphere of the adhan one after another when the morning salute departed.
"The Journey Home" stills
Film and Television Industry Network: There was a big scene of riots at the beginning of the movie, and there are many scenes with a large number of people in the movie. Do you use the same sound?
Jiang Jianqiang: Basically the same sound is used here, and some Foley sounds are superimposed at the same time. It is difficult to restore the sound of such a big scene only by the same period or only by post-production, and it is difficult to achieve the desired effect. In order to shoot this kind of scene, I made a live recording plan in advance before starting the shooting. In addition to recording during normal shooting, I will carry a set of portable surround sound recording equipment with me and participate in the recording of the big scene. After finishing work or changing the scene, I will arrange the microphone positions in advance, organize all the actors, replay the performance several times according to the performance method and state of the OK bar, and continue to record. In these ways, we get a lot of valuable sound material.
used these precious live materials to add some local ADR and Foley during the post-production sound editing, and finally presented the opening sound of the movie and other large scenes with a large number of people.
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Film and Television Industry Network: Zhang Yi is the main actor, but there are a lot of scenes in which speaks the Arabic language , is it also the same sound for his language?
Jiang Jianqiang: The Arabic spoken by the translation brother is basically the same sound. During the performance, the on-site Arabic translator praised Mr. Guo's Arabic for being very standard. Of course, for some long lines, some still need to be supplemented later. After all, the language system of Arabic is different from Mandarin Chinese and English. It is very difficult to fully master it in a short period of time. In the later stage, we first asked the translator to listen to it several times, and found some unqualified or easy to cause ambiguity, re-worded and added a few sentences, but the final sound was basically the same.
Film and Television Industry Network: What is the significance of insisting on the same sound for "The Journey Home"? What happens if you use post-production?
Jiang Jianqiang: Because of external environmental factors, such as various noises, various radio interference, and simultaneous multi-camera shooting, it is a big challenge for the simultaneous recording. However, the recording process of the synchronous sound has actually been updated and upgraded all the time. In addition, the post-production is becoming more and more powerful, including the update and use of various audio plug-ins. Most of the problems of the synchronous sound can be solved. I think for a movie with a modern theme, as long as the recording crew is more responsible, and the technology and equipment are excellent, most of the sound of the same period can be preserved.
"The Way Home" stills
is especially like "The Way Home" is relatively large in size and has many special sound elements, and the sound production is extremely difficult. Restore and shape the atmosphere, momentum and realism we want. For example, in the scenes of beating, smashing, burning, looting and demonstrations in large scenes, it is difficult to organize so many foreign extras if it is all dubbed in the later stage. Only the ADR multi-track superposition method can be used to achieve the purpose of increasing the number of people, but The screaming presence and the high emotional output at the scene cannot be completely restored. On the other hand, it is very difficult for a few foreign actors to return to the recording studio, face a cold microphone, and fully restore the live performance to the mouth shape.
So the main purpose is to do everything possible to keep the simultaneous sound and record a lot of live sound during the pre-shooting process. From the perspective of overall film sound creation, the volume of film production has become larger and larger in recent years, and the sound of the same period has been unable to meet all the sound needs of a film, requiring a lot of post-production sound editing, Foley and mixing. The recording and post-dubbing are combined to refine and reprocess to create and restore the movie sound that is more in line with the needs of the audience. Between simultaneous recording and post-production, the sound of a movie is equally important, but their functions are different. The former is more technical and experience, while the latter has more creative space in addition to technology and experience.
"Homecoming" work photo
Jiang Jianqiang: First of all, let's see what the theme of this drama is, whether it is a fantasy, sci-fi, animation or realistic feature film. Secondly, it depends on whether it is live shooting, virtual shooting or shooting in a film and television city. These objective conditions have a certain impact on whether or not the simultaneous sound can be recorded. In addition, it also depends on the director's requirements for the sound of the film, whether the film party has enough shooting budget to support the shooting cycle of the simultaneous recording method and the sound director's requirements for sound. If the sound director is unable to build a good enough simultaneous recording team due to budget pressure, it will also affect whether or not to use simultaneous recording in the end.
Film and Television Industry Network: Visual effects production has been advocating post-production pre-production. For the sound department, is this way of working effective?
Jiang Jianqiang: Sound production and visual effects production are not the same. The reason why visual effects production can be pre-positioned in the post-production stage is that as long as some visual effects shots are set in the early stage, visual effects can start designing and producing shots. . But for sound production, you can't rely on a few specific shots to make the sound, but to do it accurately for each frame of shot. As long as the picture involves modification, the audio needs to spend a lot of time to modify hundreds of thousands of shots. The sound of the track, even sometimes because of the frequent or complex picture modification, may cause the sound to be completely overturned and remade. Therefore, it is very risky to start sound production before the picture is cut. This is the particularity of sound production. Although
said that the sound production cannot be carried out in the early stage, but if the sound guide is in the script reading stage and the shootingIf all the scenes are involved, you can discuss with the director to leave some space for sound design in the process of perfecting the script and shooting. In addition, you can plan the key sounds in the play according to the script and shooting plan in advance, and let the recording team focus on recording. During the filming of "The Return of the Thousand Miles", I was there for the whole process, so I used this post-production method.
"Homecoming" work photos
Jiang Jianqiang: "Homecoming" is completely different from the project process I made in the past. After so many years in the industry, it is the most challenging play for me, both physically and psychologically. Due to the large volume and the particularity of the subject matter, the post-production cycle is very tight, not to mention our sound department, there is very little time left for the director to edit. In order to complete the work on time, the director was still in the process of fine-cutting the picture, and the sound departments started work in advance.
"Homecoming" work photos
During the process of the workload, I occupied more than a dozen sheds upstairs and downstairs in Harmony Studios. At that time, we adopted the collaborative work method of multiple sheds and multiple people dividing their duties and responsibilities at the same time. In a hurry. While completing the known workload every day, we also have to face the unknown workload of the constantly updated new version of the screen modification. As the work progressed, there were more and more sound tracks, and the difficulty of modification became more and more difficult. When the number of tracks was almost over 1,000, we had to give up the modification and directly re-create some sounds. Although this increases a lot of manpower and material costs, this way of working is more effective than modification, and at least it can ensure that the work is completed as planned to the greatest extent possible.
The mixing stage basically works continuously every day, because a lot of work in the mixing stage requires physical time to digest, which cannot be solved by adding a few more studios or more staff. So every minute, every second was very precious to me at that time. The time period of other main creative departments was also very tight. I only got all the finished music of the whole film on the last day of mixing and recording. Some of the sounds that had been mixed and recorded in the demo were used, and some modifications were made on the basis of the new music. This time, all the departments are gnashing their teeth and insisting. The producer is under a lot of pressure, and the director is under even more pressure. In the whole later stage, everyone basically had no time to rest. Fortunately, we all persevered and the film was released as scheduled.
"Homecoming" sound team and director
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