Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures, 2nd Edition

Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures, 2nd Edition

by John Purcell
Released July 2013
Publisher(s): Routledge
ISBN: 9781135040598

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Book description

Produce professional level dialogue tracks with industry-proven techniques and insights from an Emmy Award winning sound editor. Gain innovative solutions to common dialogue editing challenges such as room tone balancing, noise removal, perspective control, finding and using alternative takes, and even time management and postproduction politics.

In Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures, Second Edition veteran film sound editor John Purcell arms you with classic as well as cutting-edge practices to effectively edit dialogue for film, TV, and video. This new edition offers:

  • A fresh look at production workflows, from celluloid to Digital Cinema, to help you streamline your editing

  • Expanded sections on new software tools, workstations, and dialogue mixing, including mixing "in the box"

  • Fresh approaches to working with digital video and to moving projects from one workstation to another

  • An insider’s analysis of what happens on the set, and how that affects the dialogue editor

  • Discussions about the interweaving histories of film sound technology and film storytelling

  • Eye-opening tips, tricks, and insights from film professionals around the globe

  • A companion website (www.focalpress.com/cw/purcell) with project files and video examples demonstrating editing techniques discussed in the book

Don’t allow your dialogue to become messy, distracting, and uncinematic! Do dialogue right with John Purcell’s all-inclusive guide to this essential yet invisible art.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half Title
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright Page
  5. Bound to Create
  6. Dedication
  7. Table of Contents
  8. Preface to the Second Edition
  9. Preface
  10. Acknowledgments
  11. 1 What Is Dialogue Editing?
  12. 2 The Story of Production Sound
    1. • Introduction
    2. • Success Has Many Fathers
    3. • Early Attempts at Sound in Movies
    4. • Feature-length Talkies
    5. • The Modern Era
  13. 3 Film Sound Workflows: Then and Now
    1. • Classic Film Workflows
    2. • Single System Workflows
    3. • Film/Video Hybrid Workflows
    4. • Working in an NTSC Environment
    5. • Working in a PAL Environment
    6. • Digital Cinema
  14. 4 On the Set
    1. • The Picture Team
    2. • The Sound Team
    3. • Other Departments at the Shoot
    4. • Sound Equipment
    5. • Syncing Picture and Sound on the Set
    6. • Sound Reports
    7. • Getting What You Need
    8. • Give the Post-Production Team What They Need
  15. 5 The Sound Department
  16. 6 A Quick Look at Picture Editing
  17. 7 Moving the Film from Picture to Sound
    1. • The Picture Cutting Room
    2. • What You Need in Order to Get Started
    3. • A Brief Detour to Understand How Film Became Digital
    4. • Exporting and Importing Sessions Using OMF/AAF
    5. • The Edit Decision List
    6. • Metadata
    7. • Performing the Assembly
    8. • Filenames
    9. • Back Up Your Files
  18. 8 Working with Picture
    1. • A Brief History of Editing Sound Locked to Picture
    2. • The Trouble with Digital Picture
    3. • Timecode Burn-Ins
  19. 9 The First Screening
  20. 10 Setting Up Your Editing Universe
    1. • The Monitor Chain
    2. • Sync Now!
    3. • Preparing Your Editing Workspace
    4. • Eliminating Redundant Regions
    5. • Scenes
    6. • Beeps, Tones, and Leaders
    7. • Wild Sound
  21. 11 Editing Dialogue Tracks
    1. • Organizing Tracks
    2. • Scene-to-Scene Splits
    3. • Where to Edit
    4. • Shot Balancing
    5. • Room Tone
    6. • Shot Transitions: Basic Rules of Thumb
    7. • Working With Many Channels of Dialogue
    8. • Making Sense of a Scene
    9. • Production Sound Effects
    10. • Making Guide Tracks
    11. • Editing Dialogue for Television
  22. 12 Image, Depth, and Perspective
    1. • Dialogue in the Soundscape
    2. • Depth
    3. • Focusing on One Character in a Group
    4. • Perspective
    5. • Choosing the Crossfade
  23. 13 Dialogue Editing Tips and Tricks
  24. 14 Dealing with Noise
    1. • What is Noise?
    2. • Transient Noises
    3. • Fixing Transient Noises
    4. • Alternate Takes
    5. • Reducing Ambient Noises
    6. • To Process or Not to Process
  25. 15 ADR
    1. • Replacing What Cannot be Fixed
    2. • Looping, ADR, and Postsync
    3. • Preparing for ADR
    4. • Organizing the ADR Process
    5. • The ADR Recording Session
    6. • Preparing Dialogue Tracks for ADR Editing
    7. • ADR Editing
    8. • Group Loop
    9. • Matching ADR to Production Sound
  26. 16 Managing Your Time
    1. • Ask the Right Questions
    2. • Set Daily Goals
    3. • Estimate How Long the Editing Will Take
  27. 17 Editing Production Sound for Documentaries
    1. • Documentary Sound Challenges
    2. • The Documentary Workspace
    3. • Typical Documentary Problems
    4. • Production Sound Effects
  28. 18 When the Picture Changes
    1. • The Reconform Defined
    2. • Automated Reconforms
    3. • Manual Reconforms
  29. 19 Preparing for the Mix
    1. • Talk to the Mixer
    2. • Check the Final Picture
    3. • Moving from One Platform to Another
    4. • Dealing With the Details
    5. • Packaging Dialogue Elements
    6. • Close the Cutting Room and Back Up the Project
  30. 20 The Dialogue Premix
    1. • Premix Goals
    2. • Planning the Premix
    3. • Mixing Models (A Bit of History)
    4. • The Mechanics of Mixing
    5. • The Final Mix
    6. • Back to the Box
  31. Afterword
  32. Appendix A: Dialogue Editing in a Nutshell
  33. Appendix B: Track Template for a Typical Small Film's Dialogue
  34. Glossary
  35. Bibliography
  36. Index

Product information

  • Title: Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures, 2nd Edition
  • Author(s): John Purcell
  • Release date: July 2013
  • Publisher(s): Routledge
  • ISBN: 9781135040598