Rising Sun Pictures is teaming with the University of South Australia and We Made a Thing Studios to provide film and television students with practical, hands-on experience in entertainment media production—and an opportunity to see their work on the big screen at next month’s Adelaide Film Festival.
Like many of his colleagues in the sound production industry, Scott Harber began his audio career as a musician, more specifically as a member of a San Diego punk rock band. Over the course of his nearly 30-year career, Harber has worked on leading TV and film productions, including Borat, Noctunal Animals, Get Smart, Hell’s Kitchen, Gangster Squad, Wilfred and Castle, to name a few. He also owns Dang Me Sound, a production sound company based in Los Angeles. I recently spoke with Harber about some of the highlights his long career and the challenges of production sound.
Set from 1913 to the early 1990s, HBO’s six-episode limited series I Know This Much is True required director Derek Cianfrance and cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes to make a choice: What would the show look like? They agreed that a cohesive, period look for the project would be the correct choice — as opposed to a contemporary look.
Simon Hill, senior dubbing mixer at Halo Post in London, has worked on some of the biggest dramas for television and streaming outlets. Included among these is Bulletproof, which airs on Sky One in the UK and CW in the U.S., as well as the British film, Ghost Stories. With audiences craving more and more content, post houses must turn out projects at increasing speeds.
Industrial Light & Magic has announced the next phase of its global expansion plan for the company’s virtual production and StageCraft LED volume services. This expansion of services is tied to a proactive initiative for increasing diversity in the industry by combining ILM’s growth in this innovative methodology with a global trainee program geared for underrepresented VFX talent.
Christie is celebrating its 20th year as the Official Digital Projection Partner of the Toronto International Film Festival, which runs through September 19. The 45th annual festival will screen 50 new films across venues adapted to the global pandemic, including a drive-in theater, an open-air cinema, and indoor venues tailored for public safety.
Rising Sun Pictures served as a principal visual effects provider for The Eight Hundred, the epic war film from director Guan Hu and Huayi Brothers Media and Haining Seventh Image Movie & Media Company. To date, the film has already earned more than $200 million in Chinese theatres alone. The film centers on the true story of the 1937 Battle of Shanghai where a Chinese battalion mounted a determined defense of the Sihang Warehouse from the invasion of the Japanese army. Working in collaboration with BangBang Pictures, Beijing, and overall VFX supervisor RSP’s Tim Crosbie, RSP contributed scores of richly detailed, seamless visual effects to support the film’s riveting combat scenes, all set around a massive warehouse complex near the city center.
For more than three decades, Warner Bros. re-recording mixer Jonathan Wales has created audio magic for numerous feature films, documentaries and television shows. Two recent projects were the Warner Bros. movie Doctor Sleep and the Netflix series 13 Reasons Why. As content creation and technical specifications change, Wales finds himself having to adapt to newer audio compliance standards across a variety of platforms.
DejaSoft has released version 3.2 of DejaEdit to further expand its Avid remote file sharing software and to support Microsoft Azure secure storage. Another major highlight includes the safeguarding of project files with robust prior encryption before they are directed to an assigned media server chosen by the customer.
When New York City began Phase 4 reopening of its economy, it paved the way for the resumption of film and television production under restrictions designed to forestall the spread of coronavirus. Productions must implement testing, apply rigorous cleaning measures and practice social distancing. But the good news is, the city is back in the business of making films and television shows.
