[78-L] records in films, was: request for a silent 78 side

[buster]

years ago a guy was sent to my house by Walter Murch, to record some  
music for The English Patient.  he acoustically coupled a DAT player  
to the tonearm of a victrola x, then mic'd the horn and recorded what  
came out.  the audio was dubbed into a scene in the film, which won  
the oscar that year for sound, where the characters play a record in  
the background.

On Oct 13, 2008, at 9:06 AM, David Lennick wrote:

> They looked correct in "The Harmonists" but sounded awfully scratchy  
> for what
> were supposed to be brand new Electrola pressings.
>
> I may have been incorrect about the machine in "Out of  
> Africa" (can't remember
> whether it was external or internal) but not about the 70s LP on the  
> turntable.
>
> dl
>
> joe at salerno.com wrote:
>> 99.99%? Really?
>>
>> I think that is optimiistic. (no pun intended, optical having been
>> discussed in regards to MOS)
>>
>> Has there EVER been a scene in a movie, excluding documentaries about
>> playing grammo records, that DOES accurately depict a record CU on
>> screen being played?
>>
>> Can anyone name even one?
>>
>> joe salerno
>>
>>
>> David Lennick wrote:
>>> If they were doing live television, that would make sense, but  
>>> films are shot
>>> from various angles and takes are intercut, so the source music  
>>> can't possibly
>>> be live from "the source".
>>>
>>> Even so, it's great (and unheard of) to find someone actually  
>>> trying to get the
>>> right materials for a scene involving phonograph records, which are
>>> misrepresented 99.99 percent of the time. An external horn  
>>> gramophone was seen
>>> in "Out of Africa", with a close-up of a record with an HMV label.  
>>> A 70s LP.
>>>
>>> dl
>>>
>>> Chris Zwarg wrote:
>>>> At 21:14 12.10.2008, you wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Joe wrote,
>>>>>
>>>>>>> I don't get it - just use any record
>>>>> Hmmm, Joe, nobody, seems to have understood what the film  
>>>>> producer wants
>>>>> to do....
>>>>>
>>>>> The way I understand it, as she says there's a problem for the  
>>>>> sound
>>>>> dept., she wants to film a needle being placed on a rotating 78,  
>>>>> then
>>>>> the camera pans back to film the actors/dialogue, all in one take.
>>>>>
>>>>> So, they don't want music bellowing out from the gramophone  
>>>>> while the
>>>>> actors speak (they will dub some quiet music in later).
>>>>>
>>>>> Now do you see why they want a 'silent' 78 ?
>>>>>
>>>>> So, can anyone help the producer?
>>>>>
>>>>> John
>>>> IMHO, they should find a "suitably quiet" 78 with music fitting  
>>>> the mood of the scene, maybe put a "soft" or "pianissimo" needle  
>>>> on, and record dialogue AND music in the same take. This way, the  
>>>> music will actually sound like music coming out of a gramophone,  
>>>> which I presume is what they want to achieve - if that gramophone  
>>>> is not supposed to play music in the volume and tone quality such  
>>>> a machine will typically produce, the scene setup is somehow  
>>>> silly, isn't it? The "natural" volume of the gramophone music  
>>>> should be low enough that the actors can easily hear each other,  
>>>> so the sound recordist should have no problem to pick the  
>>>> dialogue up clearly; if OTOH the music is so loud as to mask the  
>>>> dialogue, that merely shows that the characters *could just not  
>>>> have been talking the way they do standing next to the machine,  
>>>> as they wouldn't have understood each other*, and they shouldn't  
>>>> try and film it that way, pretending the gramophone sounds more  
>>>> softly than it does.
>>>>
>>>> Chris Zwarg
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