While that oxymoronic standby ‘less is more’ has proven sporadically true at best over its long life, in the post-production world the adage is gaining some respect. Born of the evolution of digital technology and the constant search for time and cost-saving means of completing a project, smaller gear and a streamlined process are being applied to more jobs at every level.

And as more is done with less, the universe of audio and video post is also contracting, with not only smaller gear and a ‘contracted equipment set’ but convergence of talent. With digital nonlinear post, the job descriptions of audio and video post people as well as engineering and post become blurred. At the same time, talent is now working on traditional as well as digital equipment and methods, both new talent schooled in both worlds and existing talent who have devoted considerable effort to making the leap.

The combination of that intermingling of talent and the expansion of high-level capabilities over a larger equipment base has been, once again, to distill the importance of the human equation; a more level equipment field emphasizes the importance of raw talent and quality from the beginning to the end of the production process.

In the following report, new stars and established players discuss shrinkage, digital dexterity and the evolution of the production and post process.

* * *

Capable of location and direct-to-multitrack recording, Mike Godfrey’s new multichannelled invention is taking the art of sound reproduction back to basics and revolutionizing how, and what, we hear.

The Global Sound Microphone System is a center-specific, football-shaped device which, after further development, will directly coincide with existing theater playback systems such as Sony, Imax or Dolby, as well as their systems of the future.

Godfrey, a musician, recording engineer and music producer, came up with the concept for the gsm after spending some time experimenting with a binaural, or dummy head, microphone a few years ago.

‘The binaural microphone is a phenomenon,’ explains Godfrey. ‘It’s two omni-directional microphones that pick up sound in a globe when put on a dummy head with realistically designed ears, so that essentially it records exactly what a person’s head hears.’

Up until now this was the only way to hear exact sound precisely as it was recorded. Godfrey was confident he could come up with something better and spent the next two-and-a-half years developing the concept and working on a prototype for his system.

‘Technology has advanced so much that people forgot the roots of what they set out to do in the first place, and that was to capture the sounds of reality for someone else to share,’ says Godfrey.

His system works on the principles of binary localization which enables the brain to perceive where a sound is coming from. Since sound travels through the air in waves, it bends around our heads which causes a slight difference between both ears, taking the brain a split second to figure out where the sound originates.

This audio phenomenon is the reason behind the football-like embodiment as ‘it is the shape that makes it work.’

‘Sounds don’t come from one place,’ says Godfrey, ‘therefore, in order to have real sound, it must come from many directions at once and play back from as many directions as it was recorded from.’

Although presently the only gsm in existence is an industrial-grade prototype with 10 individual microphone cables (which work to split sound and keep it separate), Godfrey holds the patent for infinite channel configurations.

Presently the process used by movie studios to record ambient tracks in order to create that ‘natural’ surround-sound environment is time consuming and labor intensive. With Godfrey’s internationally patented invention, a single person can plug the microphone into a special pre-amplifier mixer, hold the system in their hand, point it at the direction of the sound, and record.

Recently Godfrey traveled to Los Angeles to give some major Hollywood players a demo of his new system using the sounds of airplanes taking off which he recorded at the l.a. airport.

‘I attached a speaker to the ceiling of the boardroom,’ explains Godfrey. ‘Sound goes up, but since existing playback systems are linear; you never get any perception of height. This system focuses on the top so you get phenomenal sound coming at you from everywhere.’

After discussions with the enthusiastic l.a. studio heads, Godfrey returned to Toronto to begin work with the National Research Council on further developing, refining and configuring the gsm so that it may be used with all existing playback equipment.

Currently in the midst of production, the gsm should be available by the end of summer 1997.

Already being used by Godfrey in his Richmond Street recording studio, Noize Sound and Vision, he is confident that the gsm will be indispensable for filmmaking as it will ‘completely enhance that feeling that filmmakers are constantly trying to achieve of transporting you out of the theater to another place.’