Since our last studio session, we have begun looking into the different things and how we are going to record them, to make our sound library. Seeing how this is quite a big task and will mostly like take a few weeks to gather. John and I decided it would be a great idea to get on to the ADR as soon as we can. Because the scene is full of action and horror elements, there actually isn’t that much dialogue, it’s mostly just countless screams. The only dialogue is Ed and Lorraine Warren. I finished Ed during our last session, the only dialogue left is Lorraine Warren. We also needed to find some young singers for our creepy crooked man song.
Here is a sneak peek of our crooked man song.
Finding Lorraine Warren (Bec Wilson)
It took me a while to choose the perfect Lorraine because the role was quite demanding. We needed someone who was going to be strong, confident and could adapt well to different volumes and vocal ranges due to the dialogue being mostly fear based and involved a lot of yelling. I asked a few female friends if they would be interested in taking on the role, surprised I got a big response. But after trying out a few different people I felt my partner Bec Wilson would be the best choose due to how comfortable she is around me and in the studio. I also chose Bec due to her vocal training and previous acting career. After getting the go ahead with Bec as Lorraine I edited the scene down to just her dialogue and handed her the script and left her to it. Once Bec felt ready I and John decided to book out the post production
Finding the creepy kids for The Crooked man nursery rhymes (Kitty & Harvey)
I decided to ask around and see if we could find a few young kids who parents would be ok with us recording their children. I asked my chiropractor David if his children Kitty and Harvey would be interested in a project like this. Harvey and Kitty children quite a big portfolio which features modeling, acting, dance and much more already so I knew they could do this quite easily and comfortability. Plus it would be a great thing to add voice acting/studio experience to their already impressive portfolio and David agreed which was amazing. I couldn’t wait to get them in and create a fun environment, this is something I have never done before too. The only rule David had was that we couldn’t allow the kids to watch the scene which is a fair call due to the film being a horror movie and we needed to send all the information a week before. As Soon as I got home I sent through everything David wanted.
The session
John and I booked out the post production for a 6 hour session so we could get Bec, Harvey, and Kitty done in one day which in the long run could save us time. We had Harvey and Kitty coming in at 1 so we got in early to set things up and make sure everything they would be 100% comfortable. Our mic chose for the session was a Rode NT1A due to the fact that the Neumann u87 and a lot fo the other large condensers were hired out, we had no choice but to use what we had left. I like the NT1 I think it picks up a lot of highs and has quite a bit of clarity. After setting up the mic we got the session ready, we kept to David’s rules of no footage. We just set up the audio I gave to David to help make the kids life a little easier we also set up a vocal guide track which was sung by John to help give the kids more guidance with the songs melody. When the kids came in they were super nervous and didn’t know what to do in the studio which is understandable seeing how they are only 9 and 10. I think the main thing that scared them was being put in a glass room by themselves, I made sure to go in there with them, explained how the mic worked and the process we need them to go through to get a good take. Doing this was fun I got to teach them something which gained their trust. Whenever they got nervous I would just pull a stupid face or pretend to fart so they would laugh and realize it’s nothing to be scared about. Plus I made sure to pull out the number one tool that every kid loves a high five. Both Kitty and Harvey got everything done in three takes, we didn’t want to push them. After they finished up we just let them have fun, Harvey really wanted to do a Rastafarian version for some reason so we let him. Then we showed them pro-tools and the magic it has to make the thing sound silly by using the pitch shifting tool. They loved that its been a while since I have seen kids rolling on the floor from laughing. During the madness Bec rocked up to do her take, we said bye to the kids and reset the room.
Recording Bec was a dream, she really did her homework and got into character. She was jumping around screaming and yelling at the top of her voice. It was amazing to watch. The only guidance I needed to give to Bec was with the pronunciation of her words, I fell into the same trap when doing ADR for Ed. Because you are screaming unnaturally your throat closes up which makes it hard to perform words. You have to try and focus on the use of your mouth. Because when you scream your mouth is set in a certain place. You just have to remind yourself to shout instead of screaming. Once I explain that to Bec she was all over it.
Below are take of Kitt, Bec and Harvey and photos from the session.
Lloyds World of Audio 