Warming Dialogues

[Neil Whippey]

Hey guys,

So i've pretty much finished my sound design for the short that i've been working on and am getting to my mix stage - I'm thinking about the dialogues at the moment, and in terms of filtering out nasty frequencies i'm pretty happy - I usually do a lot of Edutainment TV stuff so it's quick turnaround with a lot of resonant nastiness removal going on - but i don't ever get the time to do any voice warming, which i'm about to start doing. I'm talking about the rich texture you hear when watching a top end Hollywood standard mix.

Does anyone have any good starting tips for this... things to consider etc?

thanks in advance guys, the knowledge on here is great, I've learned so much just by reading and implementing things from this forum!

Cheers

Neil

[ErikG]

Dialog warming?

No such thing as far as I know of.

Great acting and directing. Good location recordists with good gear. Good locations. Well performed and recorded ADR. Huge sound design. Great mixer on a great rerecording stage. Stir gently while mixing and add a little EQ.
Add a well shot picture a zimmer score and there you have it, the hollywood sound?!

[jozzafunk]

Well I just finished a short with a ten minute insipid voice-over that grated the composer like anything - But I went through it syllable by syllable removing the mouth clicks and most of the breaths, eq'd and compressed it to make him sound close ( Waves Rchannel ) and then put it in a nice room wih TL Space. Composer sat back with relief and said he didn't think that VO could ever have sounded any good.. try that

[Big Andy]

Here's some knowledge from my music days. Get a good wordclock and run your dialogue through a Pultec on bypass and that typically gives you a "warmer" sound. But most people don't want to drop the money on an old noisy EQ unless you will use it a lot.

[ruy]

crane song phoenix plugin.

[r-sd]

tubes, tubes, tubes

[Neil Whippey]

thanks for the posts guys. Yeah tubes is a pretty good idea. i don't know why but i think I'd feel like i cheated if i ran the dialogue track through some sort of warmer - I'm definitely going to check out what it sounds like though, especially as all of you have pointed towards it. I almost want to be able to do it with just an EQ inside of Tools - I think i'm probably showing my inexperience here though....

I was watching Flash Forward last night (we only recently got it in the UK) and it just sounds like the frequency content of all the dialogue is perfect. Even if it's all ADR the mix is still great and it cant all be ADR.....can it? I think i'm going to get hold of a copy of one of the EPs and analyse the freq content of dialogue, then replicate on a similar type of character and then hear what the outcome is. I could be chasing something that's just not possible with my material.......

[BIGBANGBUZZ]

To get a phat dia sound try the C4 or the Waves Side chain comp, experiment with the Bass Enhancement setting

[mgoorevich]

It's impossible to do (to warm) the sound with any plugin.
You learn how to make it by editing only. Nothing else.
Of course it must be a good source recorded on the great equipment by the great recordists.
There is no magic.
However I heard many slammed to death movies, which had good original recording.

A multiband compressors (when mix ITB) can give you more control, but it will not warm the sound.
Good transparent EQ will remove unwanted subs from dialogs.

[Etch-A-Sketch]

Originally Posted by r-sd

tubes, tubes, tubes

Yeah, because you know, all the really great re-recording dub stages like Fox, Sony, Warner Bros, Todd AO, Disney, Universal... they all have TONS of tube gear in the racks to warm up all those dialogue tracks.

Just look at all that vintage tube gear and analog warmth!!!!

Warner Bros. Post Production
Sound Mixing | 20th Century Fox Studios
Re-Recording Motion Picture Theatres
Todd-AO | Welcome
The Walt Disney Studios - Post Production Services - Dubbing/ADR Stages
Sound | The Filmmakers Destination

[Etch-A-Sketch]

Originally Posted by Neil Whippey

I'm talking about the rich texture you hear when watching a top end Hollywood standard mix.

Does anyone have any good starting tips for this... things to consider etc?

Hire a top hollywood production sound mixer/recordist with a truck full of high quality mics (lavs and booms) to choose from for each shot.

When I've looked at the original dialogue sessions from Pirates of the Caribbean, Van Helsing, and the new Travolta movie Old Dogs (I have a friend that is a dialogue editor), the dialogue sounds that way from the start. While the mixers do a lot to the dialogue sometimes, it's more to get the timbre to match between takes in a scene, and not to do an overall "warm up" the sound. What you hear on the screen is 80~90% what is recorded on set AND in ADR.

That's another important point. If something sounds thin or like crap in a "big hollywood" film. They replace it with ADR. Period. Seriously. That's it. There's no secret, there's no tricks, there's no magic.

[Henchman]

Basic Eq really.

[Fabi]

Sounds a bit strange but add warmth by rolling off some high end. That only works though if the production sound is done in a very good way.

Since you want to hear your dia though the rest of the Mix some mixers tend to boost frequencies that increase dialogue audibility. This often makes it sound harsh although its done for a good reason. Its nececerry if the production sound is noisy / dialogue not well isolated.
When you have a clean Dialogue track you can bring it up with the fader without also bringing up the "dirt". This allowes for smoother EQing with less need to bring up high end in order to make the dialogue more audible.
When I listen to the big productions I hear way less top end, which IMO contributes a lot to a "warmer" / smoother more natural dialogue integration in the Mix. When you want to do that though the production sound is not too clean, try to isolate the dialogue more with a cedar e.g.

Just my personal experience though

[danijel]

Originally Posted by Neil Whippey

but i don't ever get the time to do any voice warming, which i'm about to start doing. I'm talking about the rich texture you hear when watching a top end Hollywood standard mix.

Can you provide us with an example? Like a youtube link to what you refer to as a 'rich texture' in dialogue? So we all know what we're talking about without everyone interpreting the description in their own ways?

Most people I know tend to capture, edit and mix the dialogue as clean and natural as possible - a logic that closely relates to recording classical music. A perfect (but utopian ) scenario is when no postproduction is needed - everything sounds just like it did on the location, perfect as it is - from a great balanced voice, to a great sounding room where the recording took place, to an absence of noise and other unwanted sound.