Audio for spots: with short attention spans and TiVo, post pros are more challenged than ever to keep viewer interest

Post, July, 2004 by David John Farinella

Digital video recorder-based television products, like TiVo, aren't exactly beloved these days by those post pros working in commercials. The advent of such products has given the average television viewer the ability to completely skip ads that pop up during any program. With such technology, it's possible that demand for innovative and entertaining spots will dry up.

At the same time, there are a number of mixers that are waiting patiently for the long-promised surround sound revolution. Not only do equipment purchases continue to remain on the shelf, mixers who trained to perform surround mixes have not yet been able to use these new talents. It seems in this arena the wait will continue until advertisers see the value in taking their spots to the next audio level.

Still, there is promise for facilities that specialize in advertising work. The ongoing addition of new cable networks continues to buoy the market and promises more work for these houses. Not only that, theatrical commercials for any number of products are becoming more commonplace.

"I've found that with the advent of digital video recorders in the home, more people are programming to weed out the commercials," says POP Sound mixer Mitch Dorf. "TiVo is changing how we are viewing television. I don't think it will change how we view today or tomorrow, but I do get the feeling that advertisers are really taking a hard look at this and are looking at the theater as an incredible venue ... to really have a target audience to advertise their products too and even more so to tie in with a broadcast commercial spot."

With that in mind, Post checked in with a half dozen facilities to hear what challenges they're facing these days and how they're being solved.

DYNAMIC SHIFTING FOR ESPN

Nathan Dubin, mixer and sound designer at LA Studios (www.lastudios.com), is a veteran of many commercial spots. One of his most recent projects was a package of promos for ESPN and its Sunday night NFL football game. What's important for Dubin is dynamics, and during the ESPN spots he mixed for action that went from a quiet kitchen to a party atmosphere into the announcer and music portion of the spot. "So, how do we translate that dynamic shift across the entire spot, but at the same time, hear and recognize what's going on in the least loud scene, which is the first shot? That was definitely the challenge in this package," he reports, "and all three of the spots had that same kind of scenario. With use of automation for the most part, and compression as well, I think we came to a happy medium of a spot that's still interesting but cuts on the air."

While LA Studios and Dubin have been using hardware and software from the now-defunct DSP for the past number of years, the company is upgrading to Fairlight Constellation systems throughout the facility. "About a year ago we realized we needed to pick a new system and were picking between Fairlight or Pro Tools," he explains. "Those seem like the only two appropriate options for what we do, and in the end we chose to go with Fairlight. We have a lot of confidence in the R & D staff at that company, we like that their product is really focused and tailor made for what we do, and we're excited about the new platform."

For the ESPN spots, Dubin also used an Eventide Harmonizer, and processing within the DSP was done via Steinberg WaveLab. "I used some convolution reverb, which is a new technology of sampling spaces, and then using that space to put sounds in, as compared to algorithms that create delays to create a reverb effect," Dubin explains. Time compression and expansion plug-ins were also used in these spots.

From Dubin's experience, one of the most important ingredients in any successful spot is perceived loudness going from a show to a commercial break. "That's what the client is most interested in," he reports. "For a long time, I think right-fully, advertisers have believed this is the way to gain the attention of the viewers. So, that is almost an inherent part of my job; it's what's most important for my client. At the same time, an interesting spot dynamically could definitely be as effective as just a sheer loud spot. What if you draw somebody's attention by forcing them to listen harder? If you achieve that I think you've done a benefit for your product."

CREATIVITY BREEDS CREATIVITY

From broadcast to theatrical spots, the team at Santa Monica's POP Sound (www.popsound.com), an Ascent Media Company, has been busy. Sound mixer Mitch Dorf recently mixed a T-Mobile spot for TV broadcast and a theatrical commercial for the Pittsburgh Zoo that doubles as a regional broadcast ad. The T-Mobile spots are challenging, Dorf says, because there's always a different environment where the action is taking place. A recent spot, titled ER, took viewers from the point of view of a patient on a gurney getting pushed through a hospital into an operating room and finally into a T-Mobile store. "The neat thing is that I had three different environments that we tried to create--the hallways, the operating room and then the T Mobile store. That's been the set up for all the spots," he explains.