Introduction
Blade Runner directed by Ridley Scott in 1982 was remade as Blade Runner 2049 by Denis Villeneuve, one of the next generations of Canadian directors, in 2017, and now he is remaking Dune directed by David Lynch in 1984. He assembled and produced the key team involved Blade Runner 2049, a 2-hour 35-minute film that was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won six that year. I have watched David Lynch's 1984 film since the LD era and was very impressed with its unique images and sound, so I was very interested in analyzing how the sound for this film was produced. This film is also introduced with a focus on the use of height channels in the Dolby Atmos mix.
１ sound team
Director: Denis Villeneuve
Sound Design: Theo Green . Mark Mangini
Final Mix: Ron Bartlett . Doug Hemphill
Music: Hans Zimmer . Matt Bowdler
Foley Artist: Sandra Fox. Goro Koyama. Andy Malcolm
Production Sound: Mar Purcell
Sound Recordist: Eric Basta
2 Story and Main Characters
In the year 10191, Duke Leto Atreides took over the management of the desert planet Arrakis, the sole source of the “melange” of perfumes essential to space life, from its previous administrator, Halkonen, by order of the emperor, but there was a hidden plot to seize power for the emperor. He descends on Arrakis with his mistress Lady Jessica, his son and successor Paul, and some of Arrakis' most trusted subordinates.
His son Paul dreams each time of a mysterious woman and tries to solve the mystery of what it is. Paul's mother, Jessica, a student of the prophet Benekeserit, who for thousands of years has found a man of true power and protected his lineage, has a hunch that Paul will be his successor and is training him to control it with the voice of his mind.
The planet Arrakis is home to giant sandworms that react to vibrations and swallow them, and blue-eyed flehmen that live in underground caves. The Fremen have been hoping for centuries that a savior - Mahdi - will appear and help us, and they see these talents in Paul.
The emperor's plot is finally put into effect, attacking Arrakis and killing his father Atreides, but it is the woman of their dreams and the Fremen people who rescue Jessica and Paul, who are left behind.
3 Distinctive sound design of each sequence
3-1 introduction 00'00“- 33'00”
●5'10 “Paul and his mother Jessica Heart words at breakfast ”Give me a water"
Jessica is convinced that her son Paul has potential and teaches him the art of her teacher, the teaching mother Benet Keselit. Here is the scene where Paul uses that jutsu to converse with his mother Jessica, ‘Take me a water’. This Bene Keserit dialogue design, which appears several times later, is almost universally composed of a base channel plus a height channel.
⚫️This is the scene where Duncan, a faithful subordinate on the planet Arrakis as an advance party, returns to the base hangar by airship and is reunited with Paul. Here, the ambience of the hangar and the echoes of dialogue are placed in the height channel as a realistic spatial reproduction design at a dense level. Many more examples of realistic spatial reproduction design will appear in the future, but the approach is the same for all of them.
⚫️This is an indoor scene where Paul is training for a fight with his talented subordinate Ghani.
The height channel is mainly used for sword and dialogue echoes, and the base channel is used for sound effects and the pulse sound when the opponent is defeated.
● This is the scene where the Teaching Mother visits the planet Caladan to test the content of Paul's dream and his abilities. Here, too, the voice from the mind of the Teaching Mother, “Come here,” is composed in the bass and height channels.
3-2 accession 33'00“- 49'25”
A dragonfly shaped helicopter: the Ornithopter appears several times later in the
piece and is very well designed in the enclosed space. The hard center is the Foley center of the control sound, the base channel is surrounded by the low and high engine, wind noise, sandstorm attack and window cracking sound, which will appear later, and the height channel is the mechanical echo and engine progress air sound.
3-3 main body 49'25“- 1H45'11”
⚫️Sand Warm
Sand Warm does not play an active role in Part-one of this work, but I expect it will probably run rampant in Part-two. The SE that raises dust is spread over the entire surface of the bass channel, and the high frequency component of the dust is placed in the height channel, and the enormity of Warm is represented by LFE.
● This is the departure ceremony for the Emperor's three SS Sadoka battalions to attack the Atreides family on the planet Arrakis. The Hommi-style voice of the prophet on the platform echoes in the pouring rain. This vocal material was created by multiplexing 89 tracks.
3-4 conclusion 1H45'11“- 2H27'26”
Jessica and Paul, having successfully escaped from the dragonfly helicopter, walk to a rocky area to avoid detection by Sand Warm using the Sand Walk. Suddenly, they step into a sandy hollow - a Sand Drum - and the Sand Warm detects them by the vibration. The Sand Warm is right in front of you, but suddenly turns around and leaves. Chani who is the warrior of Fremen activated the earthquake stakes called thumpers and moved the Warm.
4 How the Height Channel is used
The use of height channels in this work can be broadly categorized as follows
4-1 natural ambience for realistic space reproduction
This is not an intentional spatial design, but rather a way to reinforce the atmosphere of a place, so ambience such as casual echoes are the main use of this channel.
4-2 Prophetic voices and giant Warm special processed sounds
This is a space designed with a clear purpose, so it is made by processing various materials.
4-3 Independent voice
In this work, a very elaborate design is used to create a moving collage of the various voices that are in Paul's fantasy, seeking a savior.
4-4 Reproduction of enclosed space
Surround sound is also very effective in representing enclosed narrow spaces. Here, a closed space is represented where Jessica and Paul are escaping from the laboratory and flying in a two-seater dragonfly helicopter through a sandstorm even higher up.
4-5 Reproduction of a vast open space
The representation of a vast open scene is the very essence of the height channel.
Here, the departure ceremony of the SS to launch the attack on Arrakis is represented by rain and the prayer and warrior.
5 Spectral Analysis of Sand Warm
This work has a very large distribution of low-frequency components, including music. Here is an introduction to the vibrations of Sand Warm.
5-1 Sand Warm
The sound team went out to the desert to field record and assemble various sand and vibration row materials. The figure shows the overall spectral distribution of Warm as it progresses.
A vibration generator that calls for Warm will be presented. This also presents the whole and LFE component spectrum.
6 Scoring Music “ME”
The music was composed by Hans Zimmer and Matt Bowdler. The director, Denis, requested that the music be gentle, abstract, and integrated with the sound effects, rather than the traditional scoring music. For a year prior to the production, they experimented with the direction of the film, visiting deserts around the U.S. to experience what it would sound like there, and as a result, instead of an orchestral sound, they designed a sound that is an amalgam of choral music, world music, rock, and synthesizers. Hans have selected musicians with special instruments and voices from all over the world to record the music.
The mix was done by Alan Meyerson and was finalized on 35 stems, with 4 channels on the bass channel and 4 channels on the height channel with a slightly higher rear level, since the mix was mainly for individual instruments.
7 Sound Design Team and Material Recording
The sound team consisted of Theo Green and Mark Mangini for sound design and Ron Barklett for final mixes, making up Denis' A-team. Dug Hemphil was in charge of the final mix, and they say that Dug is a master at cutting out material he deems unnecessary, to the point of calling him "Mr. Reduction.
A: The design concept of this film was to create a sound that is real and as if it existed there. The sound is as natural as if a documentary team went to the planet Arrakis and filmed on location.
B: All organic acoustic material that resonates deep within the psyche was newly recorded for this project, and no existing libraries were used.
C: The dialogue of the ancients was recorded using ADR with a variety of voice material, with intentional low-frequency additions, “world-tizing” speaker playback, and chest resonances emphasized,
D: The Atmos height channel is designed to allow the viewer to focus on the screen without being intentional.
⚫️ Sand Warm material, which does not often appear in Part-one, was recorded by the team using a variety of microphones set up in the desert, primarily for low frequency vibration material.
The microphone used to record the delicate sand movements is a Sanken CO-100K.
The CO-100K microphone was previously used by the e2 studio team for Foley at Godzilla 2014 to great acclaim.
At the end
Director Denis Villeneuve has always involved his main production team from the beginning of the filming, with the emphasis on the results that making from the mutual inspiration of the team. This approach is consistent throughout the film, but it is also very costly. I think it was important for him to put this philosophy into practice when he chose Origo Studio in Budapest, Hungary, as the filming studio for his previous film Blade Runner 2049.
Origo Studio in Budapest,
It is one of the leading studios in Eastern Europe with 8 Sound Stages and 2 VFX studios. Every country in Europe has its own national film academy, which produces outstanding staff, actors, and directors. the government actively supports this as art. Unlike politicians in the Far East, whose only concern is money and votes.
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