tim and lisa cocking

Here, finally, is my itinerary minus the flight from Bucharest to Moscow. I would have posted details sooner this week but everything has been up in the air. We finally have the details all nailed down and we’re ready to go record. Since I’ll be in Bucharest and Moscow the whole time I should be able to keep this blog updated as we record, so keep checking in. Now that I know when we’re going, where we’re going and what we’ll be recording I’ll post a bit about it before we leave.
25JUL ORLANDO TO BUCHAREST
07AUG MOSCOW TO ORLANDO

I’m still going to Russia. I’m not going to Altai, however! Seems a bit strange affter prepping so much for that recording. But, this is Russia so I was warned that anything could happen and it did. The dialog director ended up being unavailable until September. We already have our visas so we’re making changes on the fly and going to get other things done.

We’ll be recording a couple of changes to the “new film” (sorry I have to code things a bit so that this post doesn’t tie into other posts if someone is searching some specific terms) in Russian, and then traveling instead to Bucharest Romania to record that same film in Romanian.

I’ll post more on Monday after I can sit down with everyone and get more details.

We do have a flat to stay in in Moscow and we will be working in pro recording studios in both countries and using professional actors which will be good from a work flow standpoint. The only thing is that I can only do field editing and not field mixing of this film since it’s in surround sound.

More on the countries and languages, and some pictures too on Monday

I had a two hour conference call yesterday (longest call of my life!) going over details for the recording and the state of the logistics. Apparently it’s going to be really hard to get out of Moscow during the first week of August, so we have pushed back the start of the trip by one day and pushed back the end by three. So now we’re shooting for leaving two weeks from today on Wednesday the 16th and coming back on Friday, August 8. So it will be two days longer which will give a bit of breathing room for everyone.

Here is another shot of Gorno-Altai

By the way, I also found out that it is impolite to sneeze loudly or call out loudly to get someone’s attention. It is, however, perfectly acceptable to leave your mouth uncovered while coughing and to pick your nose in public.

The main reason for me to travel to Siberia is to mix the film right there to take the logistical challenges of mixing back in the U.S. out of the equation. This has, however, created other technical challenges. The laptops that we record on are set up specifically to do just that task. They are actually really beefy desktop CPUs with separate video cards and three physical hard drive for redundancy and to keep the video reference material separate from data. All wrapped up in a laptop case.

Anyway, I have different reference files (music cues, foley, and FXs) and different mix templates and I needed to get those as well as a couple of other tools than I use onto the laptop I’m taking and then create the session that I’ll be working in and get it to use all of the files that I just transferred. So I did all of that and opened up the blank session and told it where all the reference files were on the computer and it’s all working! So now I have the project ready to go. All we need now are the recordings from the actors. I’ll take those recordings when we have finished (actually at the end of each day I’ll get that day’s recordings) and edit for lip synch as we go.

So the plan then is that once all of the voices have been recorded it should only take me one additional day to edit, since I will be editing as we go. Then a couple days to mix. A couple days to review and rerecord anything they want to change and edit and mix those parts again.

So this is a big deal for me having my laptop ready to go. We also did a system check on everything else (the recording laptop, mics, interfaces, etc.) and so from an equipment standpoint it’s ready.

Now I just have to get through the non tech portion of the to do list!

I intend to write every couple of days as I get ready to go to the Altai region of Siberia. You can see the post below to look at a map and get caught up with the particulars.

I have my flight itinerary now. I will leave here on Tuesday July 15 and fly through Memphis and Amsterdam on my way to Moscow. We will spend two days there doing entry paperwork and resetting our body clocks! From there it’s another 2000 miles to our destination. We will fly part of the way and then get a 4×4 to go the final days drive up into the mountains.

We will leave the area on Aug 3 to make our way back to Moscow to catch our flight through Amsterdam and Detroit and then on home.

Here are a couple of videos you can watch. The area is similar culturally to Mongolia and the music reflects this. In fact this is where ‘throat singing’ originated, though most people associate it with either Mongolia or Tuva which it the province in Siberia directly East of where I’ll be.

This is an ancient culture and language and the people remain very Shamanistic. This following video is very informative! Click the link below then click on ‘Play Video’ on the right side of the screen

http://russiatoday.ru/russia_close_up/release/1337/video

More info to follow!