Wayne Kozak, a former Ko in Vancouver’s KoKo Productions, has launched his own, new-style audio entity, Wayne Kozak Audio Productions.

During his 22 years with KoKo, Kozak worked on many high-profile productions, including the theme song for Vancouver’s Expo ’86 and numerous commercials, including 10 years of spots for Mattel.

‘For years I was Mr. Barbie,’ Kozak explains. Now, from the comfort of his own ‘dream house,’ Kozak discusses the separation from his longtime partner, Michael Koren. ‘It was just time for me to make a change on the corporate level. Initially, I was trying to buy out my partner. But it ended up where I sold my shares and went off on my own – which has been a really good thing.’

Kozak has set up his new shop at Broadway and Granville, five minutes from Vancouver’s downtown.

The penthouse studio, complete with south-facing, view-of-the-tree-tops windows, was designed by Kozak and respected Vancouver studio designer John Vrtacic.

Says Kozak: ‘Basically, it’s a post-production room. It’s all digital. I have a booth for doing voice work, but it’s not set up to do full sound track in terms of full orchestration type recordings. There are some really good studios in town that I can go to and do that. I can record sound track and bring it back here for post.’

Before officially opening, Kozak took a couple of months off to go whale-watching and ‘ponder how best to set up [the] new business and put a different twist on it.’

Kozak explains the differences between the old and new business styles. ‘[At KoKo], we started not only doing creative, but hiring out the studios as one service we offered the advertising community. Now, with my new facility, I’ve sort of gone back in the other direction. I call it my studio workspace. I’m not really renting it out as a studio, I’m just having it here for my own projects. Now, instead of being so stacked to the roof with projects it’s like ‘take a ticket,’ I can take on one project at a time. It allows me to be a lot closer to the creative people and the agencies.’

Doing one project at a time has also allowed Kozak to add more personal attention to each project. In fact, on many of the nearly 20 spots Kozak has worked on since going solo in October, he has gone down to the set as an audio director – something Kozak explains is ‘fairly unique in the commercial business.’

Not only does Kozak direct the voice talent on set, he also approaches the sound tracks as he would a feature film. For example, on a spot for Canada Direct Insurance, Kozak was not only directing voice talent but was in the audio trenches with his sound recordist.

‘[We] picked up all kinds of audio outtakes. [Then], when I end up in the studio doing the post, it gives me that flexibility of getting all kinds of things that might not have shown up from a film director doing the shoot and some sound recordist being there. It’s not so integrated,’ says Kozak.

Kozak works to build sound effects libraries for each individual production: ‘It’s really different what you get if you go out there, watch all the action and put your ear to it, instead of the camera. It’s fabulous. It really works well for post.’

In terms of directing the talent, Kozak explains why directors and creatives are so pleased with his hands-on approach. ‘[The director] is trying to create some kind of look and feel to what he’s shooting, and not to have to worry about the performance of the singer is a really good thing.’

Kozak, who feels productions would be wise to bring him in sooner rather than later (to add an audio perspective to the production planning process), has only one employee. The rest, three engineers who work freelance, are brought in on a per-project basis.

The audio industry veteran has noticed some problems in the commercial sound business. And he thinks he knows what has caused them.

‘At the Lotus Awards last year in Vancouver, I noticed that all the audio started sounding somewhat the same. I think it’s partly because everyone is working with the same palette these days. Everybody’s got their Mac computer and they’ve got Pro Tools or some audio digital system that they’re working with. Also, a lot of the synthesizer sounds are the same. That’s one thing I’m trying to up the ante on. My audio chain here is all 24-bit, which is better than what it had been at 16-[bit], says Kozak, adding:

‘Analog has a certain warmth and size to it that I think is missing. However, I have to say that the production tools, which are all digital, are fabulous for doing production. So I think the secret is to try and get some sound that has that kind of depth and then put it into the digital domain.’

With his new one-to-one business style, Kozak expects to be able to implement all the improvements that he preaches.

‘I can do these kinds of things now, pretty much every time I step into a project, because I am approaching it one at a time and giving it personal attention.’