My Squirrel Recording is in a MOVIE! 📽 DUNE- Mark Mangini, Oscar Winning Sound Designer

2:56PM Oct 24, 2021

Speakers:

Dani Connor

Mark Mangini

Keywords:

sound

film

recorded

squirrel

dune

hear

recording

baby

mark

movie

animal

wild elephants

fantastical

amazing

exist

high pitch sound

pair

edit

visual effects

purring

That's the sound of a baby squirrel eating. Last year I was in Sweden, and I found for orphaned baby squirrels. After weeks of filming them, there was something I was missing. And that was the adorable high pitch sound they make when they eat. So I put a microphone in front of baby pair. I posted it on Twitter. And by the end of the day, the video had 15 million views, and it caught the unexpected attention of Mark Mancini. Mark is an Oscar award winning sound designer. And he's worked on films such as Blade Runner, 2049 and Mad Max Fury Road. When Mark first sent me a message. I wasn't sure if it was real. He said to me, I'd like to use the sound in a movie, Mark and I then spoke on the phone. And he couldn't tell me what film he was working on. But he said go on my IMDb and you can work it out. So I went on to IMDb, and the film was Dune. I'd already heard of Dune, because it's known as the best sci fi film that's never been made until now. And somewhere in that film is a baby squirrel recording. I'm seeing the film tomorrow at seven o'clock in the morning. But I'm about to speak to mark about doing his work as a sound editor and designer and the baby squirrel recording. Hello. Hi, Mark. How are you?

Well, I must say a really good thanks for asking. I'm happy to say that the film Dune is is doing quite well. We hear it opens here in the US in North America. I think on Friday. I hear that Europe it's done quite well. I think it opens for you in the UK in on Friday as well. No,

actually tomorrow. So I'm seeing it tomorrow morning in IMAX and I'm very excited. So you work in the world of sound. Can you explain what you do? And why sound is so important?

Wow. Well, do we have two hours. of important? Well, once you stick your fingers in your ears first and see what it's like, we don't have any of my job. I am what's known as a sound designer, our role in a film is to be responsible for everything the audience hears except for the music. So that means in in a film, our job is to make sure the dialogue is properly recorded and edited and adjusted in such a way that you don't miss what the atoms say. Our job is to record design create, edit the sounds that don't exist in the real world and say a science fiction or fantasy film, somebody has to make those sounds for the bands that don't exist. And as well as going out and recording raw elements as the fodder for these fantastical sound designs that we put in a film that include elements like your beautiful red squirrels that we so perfectly adapted into Dune.

Yeah, well, I was very surprised when you messaged me last year. And I have to admit, when I first received your message, I didn't think it was real. Because you just said in one line. I'd like to use the sound in a movie. And I was like what the amazing opportunity. But what first attracted you to that sound of the baby squirrel?

It started with Joe Walker, our film editor that's the individual out of movie who takes all the scenes that are shot in the camera and assembles them in to the correct order. So a movie looks like a movie tells a story and then I add the sound to it. And Joe happened to be fooling around on YouTube and came across your viral video. Okay, he he immediately said mark, you've got to listen to this. I think we found our desert mouse.

Ah, no, it's a desert mouse. Yeah, the minute thing

and we had already been playing around with sounds for the desert mouse we had the visual effects created. And we were playing with the sounds of hamsters and guinea pigs and you know small row dental like real things that we would manipulate with speed or equalization to try to make it sound just a little bit different for this creature that doesn't actually exist in real life. So when we heard those sounds, we all felt as though Ibiza thing this is something we've never heard before. There was it First of all, it's real. It's an organic sound. It's not a synthesizer or anything. We fabricated, and it also had the right body size. And it was a certain expressiveness to it that we couldn't find in any other animal recordings that we had. I mean, I have a vast sound library with the sounds of mice and rats and durable hamsters and guinea pigs are not those sounds, had the expressiveness that the red squirrels had and, and so I just took it upon myself to find you. In fact, my wife found you because she's a whiz with the field internet. Yeah. And she pass it along. And yeah, I just emailed you and said, We want these sounds for our movie. And I can only imagine that when you saw that one line of text or email, I thought this is pulling my leg

a little bit. Yeah. How do you usually create sounds? Do you usually make them in a studio? Do you go into the field and actually record them yourself? What's the process?

Well, it's actually both in a sort of a certain order. The first step is to watch the film and identify all the sounds that we need and make a list. And that includes real sounds that we might capture and sounds that don't exist. In Dune, for example. There's these fantastical things called ornithopter and there's worms and their shields. And there's all these things that don't exist in the real world. So we imagine the kinds of sound that we might use to make fantastic sounds, and then we set about to go and record them. Part of our mandate in cinema is to make something that you've never seen before feel believable, it's best to start with a sound that is believable. So we start with acoustic sound, we we go out and record everything we can imagine that might be interesting source material, kind of the raw materials. And then we bring those sounds into the studio and we manipulate them, combine layer massage, filter, those sounds to end up with something that maybe you've never heard before, because of the way we change them. So that we almost always start with a real sound, which was why those red squirrels were so brilliant for us, because already in and of themselves, they were perfect. And in fact, they are some of the few sounds in the film that we didn't do anything to they were so right, I just heard of them. They are in the film exactly as you would recorded them except we had to edit the little chirps and phrases to match the mouth move. Yes. Okay. Did it in visual effects. So we did splicing to make it fit the image, but we didn't alter it in any way. It's exactly as you had recorded it.

So I'm going to recognize it immediately. Okay, well unquestioned amazing. And have you ever recorded animal sounds before yourself?

I've made I have a rich, long 45 year history of recording animals that include being charged by wild elephants. By having my nose almost ripped off by a wild mcac I've put my microphone on every possible animal because that is the fodder that we use to create creature and alien sound you know, if you have a big monster, like a Godzilla or something like that, a monster you've never seen before. We usually start again with an acoustic recording of an animal doing something usually when it's enraged or threatened. But nonetheless, an interestingly in the wild kingdom, and you might know more about this than I because this is more your field. Yeah. And in and of themselves, on their own don't usually make a lot of sound until there's distress or hunger. Yeah, so we try to capture those sounds somehow, and then bring those into the studio and manipulate them into making these sounds of creatures and monsters. So yeah, I've been recording everything from wild elephants to my pet, cat and dog. So for example, one of the first films I did design was the first Gremlins movie. It's a very, very old movie from the 80s. So but all of the gizmo purring sounds are my cat purring. Oh, wow. microphone right in right right in the snout, and you get it close up enough. And it's a perspective the human ear doesn't usually capture. And so that made Gizmo feel warm and cuddly and friendly, which is the attributes we wanted for that character.

That's exactly what I found with the squirrels is that I could hear the sounds when I was very close to them, but from a distance, you can't hear them at all. And that's why I put the microphone right up to the squirrel to be able to get that squeaky Sound, it's such an

unusual sound and bless you for having the presence of mind to get the microphone close. I hear lots of recordings like that I review them on every film that I do. And they're never close miked in a way that kind of eliminates the background sound so that you can focus just on the sound that you want to get to there. We've made those sounds so usable.

Well, thank you so much for speaking to me. And I'm so excited to see the film tomorrow. I'll let you know my thoughts. But I've been told the sound is astonishing. So I'm very excited.

I hope you like it. And please do me a favor and go see it in a cinema that has I Oh, you're going to an IMAX theater?

Yeah, I'm seeing at the bfsi

Oh, that's really good. That will be very good sound. And that's really important. I'm

sitting in the middle. So everything's planned. Me, it's incredible, but I'm sure it will be.

Oh, I'm excited. If you don't like it, don't call me.

No, I'm sure it would be great. I'm a big sci fi fan. I'm sure it's fantastic. Well, thank you so much. My pleasure again. I've just seen June and it was incredible. Mark was right baby pair was very recognizable. They removed the grunts and chewing noises. But the high pitch squeaks are almost exactly how I recorded them. So I recognize your recognized baby pair. And as soon as I saw the desert wraps, I knew I was about to hear baby repair. But it was an amazing film. The costumes are incredible. The sound and the soundtrack is amazing. So go and see June. Tell me if you hear baby pair, and I'm going to Sweden next week. So I'll see you in Sweden. But thank you for watching and I'll see you in the next video.