If I asked you to describe what a bird sounds like, or even if I asked you for your best R2-D2 impression, you’d be able to fulfill either of those requests on command. But say that you had to come up with a sound for something that didn’t exist yet? It’s a harder order to fill, which is part of why The Creator’s 2024 Oscar nominees for Best Sound are so good at what they do.
The other part is being able to take an oddly specific instruction from writer/director Gareth Edwards, and turn it into the unique and awe-inspiring sci-fi movie soundscape that defines the massive USS NOMAD.
The other part is being able to take an oddly specific instruction from writer/director Gareth Edwards, and turn it into the unique and awe-inspiring sci-fi movie soundscape that defines the massive USS NOMAD.
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Short filmTranscript
00:00Now we need to talk about Nomad.
00:03Could you as a team describe the process of creating that signature scanning noise?
00:08Well it started before we saw any visuals at all on the film.
00:13In fact, Gareth approached us six years ago with this concept and that's when we started
00:18like gestating ideas for the movie before a frame, a picture had been shot.
00:24And I remember in the script, we're talking about this sort of big ship in the stratosphere
00:30that can go around the globe, shoot down blue beams across the terrain and scan and target
00:37to be able to bomb AI bases.
00:41And so when we first started working on the sound, we didn't have any visual effects.
00:48So we were kind of like, which is a wonderful freeing creative thing that just have like
00:53this, you're working in the dark with a blank canvas and what do you do?
00:58And Gareth's direction to us was, well, it should sound dangerous.
01:04And it should sound like if you were to put your hand into the beam and hold it there
01:09for too long, you're going to get cancer.
01:12And I love that kind of direction where it's not like, make it sound like this sound from
01:17another movie.
01:18It's more of like an emotion, it's he's going for something visceral that we then as sound
01:23artists get to interpret and come up with, okay, what is that dangerous sound of something
01:29volatile and corrosive and powerful and dangerous?
01:34And so I did a bunch of experimentation.
01:38One of our sound designers, Malta Beeler, did a bunch of experimentation.
01:42What we wound up with was sort of a hybrid of both of our work, which is the only synthetic,
01:49like purely synthetic sound that we use in the movie.
01:52Even though it's a sci-fi movie, we based most of the sounds on actual organic recordings.
01:58These were pure synth, which is ironic because it's the West who's trying to destroy AI,
02:03but they are using the most synthetic technology of everyone.
02:07So there's an irony in that.
02:11First, we created sort of these dangerous synthetic tones, mostly deep frequencies that
02:17then we would add like a riz to, which to me, reminds me of like something corrosive,
02:25like a Jacob's Ladder-ish, you know, a buzz that kind of resonates.
02:30And what we wound up doing is we started to see the visuals come in and the beams would
02:36kind of shift and switch and do this sort of stuff.
02:41We would do these sort of like, which was perfect because that made it sound even more
02:49volatile and dangerous, like this building energy that would then cut off and shift.
02:54So actually, that was one of the easier sound concepts in the movie, but one of my favorites
03:03because it's just, it's so pure and fun cinematically.
03:09The other interesting thing sonically about Nomad is that in the third act, when we go
03:15aboard Nomad, we get to play with the whole idea of what happens, you know, when the hatch
03:22door on the jet that they travel to Nomad on, when the hatch door, when Joshua blows
03:29it and suddenly we're exposed to space and all the atmosphere gets sucked out of the
03:35jet.
03:38And so we, you know, we suck the sound out as the atmosphere is being sucked out.
03:45And for me, that's like such a beautiful moment because it's really in that moment, sounds
03:50telling the story, telling you what's going on and making it become a poignant moment
03:59because Joshua fortunately was able to get into his space suit and Alfie is standing
04:04there in front of him in no space suit.
04:09And it's suddenly like hits home.
04:11Oh yeah, that's right.
04:13Because by this point in the movie, you've, you've in a way grown to love this, this little
04:19girl so much, you've in a way forgotten that she's actually a robot.
04:23And then you're reminded in this, in this moment, oh yeah, that's right.
04:27She's actually a machine because she's able to survive without a problem in this, in this
04:33environment that suddenly is devoid of oxygen.
04:37And the only reason he's able to survive is he's in this space suit.
04:42And that whole, that whole moment is, is sort of that whole realization is made possible
04:50by what we do with the, with the sound.
04:54And then as we travel through Nomad in that whole third act, it becomes a real sort of
05:01balancing act, you know, for, for Dean and Tom, especially mixing as far as like, okay,
05:08how far can we push it in every given moment to explain the geography of Nomad in terms
05:16of like, how are we in an airlock?
05:21Are we in a space that, that has atmosphere or are we in a part of the ship that's already
05:26lost its atmosphere because the, the ship is, you know, starting to, to break apart.
05:33And so it's, it's a really, I think it's subtle and probably for a lot of audience, people
05:39in the audience, it was, it actually is subliminal.
05:42Maybe they're not even aware that this is being done with the sound because it's, it's
05:48a delicate balance really to make it feel believable moment to moment, but also to always
05:55be reinforcing that idea, you know, that the oxygen is actually running out.
06:03So for me, it's an interesting sort of way that we use sound to help tell the story,
06:12but in, in, in subtle, maybe more subtle ways that, that sometimes become almost subliminal,
06:20but still, you know, impact us as an audience.
06:24From an intellectual point of view, it's like the, where, where the Nomad is in space is
06:31always sort of, it, it, it adjusts from like higher up where obviously, you know, explosions
06:39are going to be more muted and more silent to lower down in more atmosphere where you're
06:44going to hear more.
06:45And that gave us the, the sort of leeway to play them differently in a way moment to moment,
06:51which I think was, was super valuable in terms of being able to create all these gradations
06:59of color within this sort of the sonic tapestry that we're constantly weaving.