Part 4 - Dialogue Transfer and Editing

Up to this point in our series on how audio can help your digital video production we've been focused on preproduction and production. The overview in part 1 laid out the case for taking audio seriously in the first place, the preproduction checklist in part 2 set us up for success, and the location sound primer in part 3 spelled out what to listen for on the set. From here we move on to the postproduction process, and specifically dialogue editing.

As with location sound, entire careers have been built solely on the art and science of dialogue editing, and it is an aspect of filmmaking and digital production that can take a lifetime to truly master. If you are doing the dialogue edit yourself and have even a moderately complex project I would highly recommend the book Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures: A Guide To The Invisible Art by John Purcell. It offers excellent insight into the practical aspect of making production dialogue work and spells out the dialogue post workflow in a straightforward and understandable manner.

Even if you are not doing the dialogue edit yourself, you'll want to be familiar with the specific technical aspects to watch for and the potential trouble spots that can crop up in modern postproduction workflows. Successful digital filmmakers understand the weight that the dialogue carries in their productions, and spend time preparing and testing those workflows well in advance. Your ability to navigate the following parts of the postproduction workflow will often be the difference between something that is watchable and something that is spectacular.

In the days of analog the transfer process was one of the most frequently fouled up steps that the production audio had to pass through. It was common for stereo sources to get summed to mono, for well-recorded sounds to be distorted, and for excess noise to be added unintentionally and unnecessarily. Fortunately since the digital revolution everything has become file based and your precious dialogue won't have to pass through a mis-routed 4 channel mixer on its way into the editing workstation.

The digital workflow has its own quirks however, and the transfer process can often be the source of a new batch of audio gremlins that didn't exist before. Sample and bit-rates should be matched up between the acquisition and the editing workstation. Some workstations will import audio with multiple sample rates and not convert them, instead just playing them at the wrong speed - so it is very important to know what the sample rate setting is for your edit session as well as for your source audio. If the two don't match you'll want to convert them all to the same sample rate before or during the import.

Remember that once you import the audio, sync it and link it together with your pictures you will be listening to the primary source audio that your final audience will hear. Take a few minutes to be sure that all of the front end work and effort put into your sound during the shoot are being retained during this critical step. If something doesn't sound right, raise the red flags right away and treat any new problems that crop up seriously.