nested sound?

[manis]

the uni rang and asked if i could do the sound for one of the honours student films. the sound designer dropped out and there is little time. maybe a week?? at the most. anyway this movie is particular good, eight minutes without titles. the problem is the sound is completely nested into a stereo track, despite the OMF.., when i say stereo i mean there would be, no more than 6 effects, thats being generous. effects i mean, bees, ..?? cant think of anything else actually :) (atm). the music is completely separate luckily. some of the dialogue was pretty bad so i created files and cleaned them up, add some room tone here and there, did some things, but the actual mix in places is not too bad but i dont have any control over, well, any of it except to create effects and use better sounds. i guess the question is do i chop up the whole movie and create regions and tracks as i have been but for the whole move (thats what i did at uni when i was at uni last year, but as i say the mix is not too bad in places) so i have some control over the separate elements. is this the normal way to deal with films that are 90% nested.

sorry for the long post, but this is a particularly good movie and i really need help or opinion. it would be really appreciated,

M:)

[Sonsey]

Hey Manis,

Are they cutting in FCP with nested sequences? If so nested sequences in FCP only export as a stereo mix down file... They need to open up each of the sequences and export each one... If you're lucky there's only one. Lot's of FCP editors will edit a show, then put THAT sequence into another sequence to add titles, colour grading, etc... If it only shows up as ONE stereo file then that's probably the case.

[manis]

LOL, guess what, there are no titles, and a slug at the end.., sooo.., yea further nesting WILL occur after i hand this back. (yes FCP).

thats a piont though, the location sound in places is not too bad except in cases such as; some of the footsteps in the hall sound boomy and not attractive.., small things like that. in a situation like this film i guess the only options i have is to leave well alone what already sounds good.., add what i can to make it better.., or actually completely rebuild the sound from nothing.

is this the correct approach.

oh yea, this was not a stereo mix to disc, it was an OMF.

thanks for the reply :)

M:)

[Sonsey]

Hey Manis,

Your approach seems sound (no pun intended)...

And yes I realized it was an OMF... I should have specified in my reply that the stereo mixdown of nested sequences occurs WHEN you export an OMF from FCP...Each nested sequence needs to be opened and the OMF of THAT exported... this will break out any tracks in the proper way...Assuming they were broken out to begin with...

[manis]

hi there, didn't see yu. :)

yea unfortunately it is all i have. it my as well been a stereo mix.

cant get any other files and am using my ZOOM to do foley :) ?

when i say effects i mean there was some bees and a toilet flush, couple of other things so its mainly the location (99 percent) sound. it was recorded low for about 80 percent and the file looks as if its been heavily compressed for the most part (it hasn't) if you know what i mean. soooo, the 'effects' and even some of the atmos is as loud as the DIA. for the most part if offers some exciting opportunities for some great dynamics, in the sense of very loud unsettling to dead calm. this seems to be a theme running through it, or at least its one that obvious to me. It really pushes he story which is emotionally dynamic.

anyway, thats my situation. a movie offering some great opportunities for creative sound, a great story, the sound is OK but very low so the signal is fighting heavily with back ground noise. (been looking at a lot of tuts and doing a lot of reading to get up to speed efficiently with protools.)

plus little time, verging on dare i say, no.., pressure :) im battling phase issues due to trying to 'boost' the signal with cleaned DIA files over the location (original) file, thats not much of a winner, seems best to create new files, new atmos, effects with the DIA files cleaned and stripped. not sure if i have time to do that and screen test it?? two days left till screen test.., been at home alone doing it for three days, four maybe.

wow, that was long. > <

M:)