[MIKEROPHONICS]

ooh - good question.

You open up the difference between what is a doc DME and a drama DME. The lines get blurred with dramatised docs sometimes.

Also consider which country it is going to be sold to. Germany has a very different style of mixing to other euro countries. Holland is fine with subtitles, France is NOT!

For docs, cheapest and most common is a full DME, with all but the VO. Undipped relative to VO. And that is it. Foreign territories will translate over the top of your M&E mix for the sync sections.

Next scale up is to make stems for the DME. Stems should make up the DME. and dig a foreign mixer out of any probs and allow a better mix.

AETN tend to deliver for foreign territories:
version 1)

A1 mono dialogue mix
A2 Mono USA full mix for reference
A3 Stereo M&E L (undipped relative to sync)
A4 Stereo M&E R (undipped relative to sync)


or sometimes where international sales have been an afterthought
version 2)

A1 Stereo USA mix L
A2 Stereo USA mix R
A3 Stereo DM&E L (dipped relative to sync)
A4 Stereo DM&E R (dipped relative to sync)

The problems occur in four ways:

1) American TV as a style has much less space in it than UK TV i.e dialogue is often butt edited together or has in and out points on large music crescendos

2) INcomplete splits - i.e sync dialogue being on USA mix only and not on dial stem just down to bad bussing and template design.

3) A miscomprehension of a mono dialogue stem - where the VO has been included as well - often very tightly edited to the sync - or even overlapping (tsk tsk)

4) The concept of M&E vs DME gets mixed up. If you have no clean dial stem, then you need a DME, if you have a dial stem then an M&E is great. M&E and american mix is not much help to man nor beast.

5) The DME or M&E is dipped relative to the US VO - european languages are considerably longer on average (have you ever seen the german for lawnmower?)

With scenario 1, when the "foreign" mix (i.e a new UK mix) is made, a new DM&E gets made simultaneously (often needing a reverse two way dip), which can get passed on to other european territories.

I need to crack on with work, more later hopefully..)