Earlier this year, I sat down with GirltalkHQ, the digital publication which describes itself as “an inclusive digital feminist magazine amplifying diverse voices + stories,” for an interview. But, I wanted to be sure that the article they released wasn’t just going to appeal to women or feminists. Instead, I hoped to give an interesting look inside a post-production sound studio that happens to be co-owned by a woman and which maintains a 50% female and gender-expansive staff (something unique in a world where Women’s Audio Mission is still citing that only 5% of those employed in audio are women) without giving gender any weight during hiring decisions.
Season’s greetings to all of you editors, mixers, engineers, recordists, professionals, prosumers, students, freelancers, and everyone in between. Whether you’re aiming to dazzle a certain individual in your life who is passionate about sound/post production, or if you’re a professional in the sound industry finding it difficult to put together your holiday wish list, worry not, we’ve got you sorted!
As many of you know, in 2017, we branched out from our post-production sound business, Boom Box Post, to start Boom Box Library. BBL (as we call it around here) is a sound effect library company which allows us to share our sound design work with other professionals, and also contribute to the creativity of our community members with custom-recorded libraries that we feel fill a void in basic materials. In short, our award-winning sound designers are creating sound libraries that we ourselves want to use.
For many of you who freelance or have unpredictable schedules, adding library creation to your business ventures could be just the thing you need. But, while recording or designing the sounds may be totally in your wheelhouse, there are a lot of other things that go into being able to sell your libraries. And that’s the end goal, right?
Happy Holidays to all of you editors, mixers, engineers, recordists, professionals, prosumers, students, freelancers, and everyone in between. Whether you want to impress a special sound/post production person in your life or you work in the sound world and are having trouble filling out your holiday wish list we have you covered!
I went back and forth about whether to write this post. I hope that I’m a good boss, but I’ll leave that to those who work with me here at Boom Box post. But, I can say with certainty that I’m always trying to become a better boss.
Job interviews are a challenge. As much as you know you deserve the job, those interviewing you do not (yet). A job interview is a sales pitch; the product you are selling is yourself. No worries, you know yourself really well! You just need to bring your story forward in the best way possible.
We have dozens of blog posts on how you can level up your sound editorial game. This post is intended to go beyond the basics - making sure you color code you work, cut for perspective, etc. This isn't about missing deadlines or forgetting to clean up markers in your session before turning in your work. These are mistakes that even seasoned sound editors make all the time. Avoiding these seemingly small mistakes could make a big difference in how you are perceived by your supervisors and those mixing your work.
As co-owner of Boom Box Post, I wear a lot of hats. I’m scheduled down to the 15 minute increment and often need to hyper concentrate on the task at hand. Still, I can’t control when a scheduling request or Slack message from my team will come through. Often times when I'm deep into a creative groove, I get hit with one of these important items that may not need to be handled at that exact moment, but I don’t want to forget. Distracted by the creative task at hand, I am actually quite prone to forget. I have employed various strategies to deal with it. Leaving messages unread, creating a reminder in Apple’s Reminder app or Slack, even Post-It notes. But I never had a perfect solutions. Until now.
In this blog series we will be surveying our Boom Box Post team on different audio tools and equipment in hopes to help you decide if the chosen products are worth it or not! Up first, Pro Tools Ultimate!
Before audio post-production was even a possibility, composers would incorporate the emotion and the action of what they saw on the screen into their musical scores. They played the role of sound FX editor and composer, with a technique referred to as “Mickey-Mousing” where the composer would exaggerate a character’s movements with specific orchestration and musical motives. Now that sound FX editors have taken this role in post-production, Mickey-Mousing is less common, so it’s key for sound FX editors to make cuts that work with the music in the overall mix for a film or tv-show. Here are some considerations and tips that our team shared on their approach to editing with music in mind.
One of our most popular blog series is Glossary of Sound Effects, of which we have done 3 parts. On the original post, we get a ton of questions asking what keywords should be used when trying to find very specific sounds. I decided to relay a few of these questions to our editorial team. I’m very curious what buzzwords they will recommend.
We have done a couple of blog posts in the past spotlighting our favorite audio tools. So for this installment of “BBP’s Favorites”, I asked our team which plugins they couldn’t live without. Whether it’s a stock plugins or third party, if you don’t already utilize these picks hopefully our love for them can convince you to!
Boom Box Post turned 6 at the end of August and over these 6 years we have written a handful of blog posts. For both our new and OG readers, we thought it would be helpful to round up a list of posts that feature free resources. During this turbulent time of COVID-19, we definitely recommend taking advantage of these awesome tools!
A little over a month ago colleges across the country held virtual commencement ceremonies for the graduating class of 2020. If you were one of the many to graduate during this turbulent time you may be asking yourself, “What do I do now?” Here are some steps you can take right now to prepare yourself and help with your future job search!
It’s easy to get caught up in the hustle of the daily grind. Emails, texts, Slack messages, reminders and more are constantly competing for my attention during the workday (and often in the evening or or weekends). Are we truly meant to be on call this much? That’s a topic for another day! But what I do know is that in the race to pivot from one task to another, often times mistakes can be made, which leads to time wasted, not gained.
With the changing of the seasons comes a whole new world of sound. So, let’s discuss some key summertime sounds to keep an ear out for and record to bulk up your SFX library this time of year!
For aspiring editors and audio students, I always come across one tip in—to start building up a personal SFX library. So I complied a list of 10 spring inspired sounds, that if you have access to, you should go out and record this refreshing time of year!
There are many different ways to be a great leader and a lot of different philosophies that can get you there. But this post isn’t to cover the theoretical side of leadership. This is a nuts and bolts how-to with specific tips regarding software, meetings, organization, and communication specifically pertaining to being a supervising sound editor. Obviously, there are many approaches on this front as well, but here’s what we do here at Boom Box Post with much success.
I spent about five years working from home as a sound editor. In terms of life/work balance, they were some of the best years of my career. But thriving as a work from home freelancer isn’t easy. I’d like to share with you some of the best strategies and tips that helped me make the best of it.
We’ve all heard the old adage: be the change you want to see in the world. Jeff and I take this responsibility extremely seriously. We may only be one small studio in Burbank, CA, but we are doing our best to aid in the visibility of women as smart, capable, and creative audio professionals. We sleep well at night knowing that we are giving opportunities to deserving individuals and we’re doing it in an environment of respect and appreciation.
So you can see that taking part of WAMCon was a natural extension of our company ethos. We could not be more proud that they asked us to be part of it.
