Interview – Emma Butt
Emma Butt is an english re-recording mixer, sound editor and ADR recordist. Her ADR credits include Game of Thrones, Vikings, Rebellion and Ripper Street. Emma has been nominated for an IFTA for best Sound several times and received a certificate from The Emmys for her ADR work on Game of Thrones season 5. Emma is a mentor helping to support the next generation of film makers and creative talent and a contributor to online website “Pro Tools Expert”. She is an advocate for diversity in Film and TV.
Emma Butt (UK)
Re-recording mixer, sound editor, ADR recordist at Emma Butt Sound
Diversity in Post-Production sound roles in UK Television production
Emma’s ADR session template on Protools Expert
How did you get started in the film industry?
I actually wanted to work in music when I first started out but the university in Ireland I attended focused on all disciplines, music, post production and radio. Although I loved music, I was also interested in post production sound. When I was coming towards the end of my course I panicked knowing I needed to get a job and applied to all the music and post production studios in Dublin looking for a runner position. The company I ultimately ended up working for for 9 years was hiring. I went for an interview and got told I’d hear by Thursday of that week. When I hadn’t heard anything by Friday I decided to follow it up and contact them. It turned out they had hired someone else as they felt I might be too “timid” for the job but the other girl they had hired instead, had gone on her lunch break that day and never came back. She hated the job that much. They asked if I could start straight away. By Monday I was working there full time and finishing my Uni course part time. I started as a runner there then progressed to working on the audio bookings for the commercials department, then audio assistant, and finally a sound engineer in my own right.
You’re an ADR recordist, re-recording mixer and sound editor. What’s your favourite discipline?
It would be an equal split between re-recording mixing and ADR. Sound editorial is my least favorite as it’s usually done alone. I love the social aspect and the collaborative process involved in ADR and Re-Recording mixing. Mixing especially is such an incredible time as it’s usually one of the last steps in the filmmaking process where the client finally gets to see all their hard work come to life. They get to sit back and enjoy the piece they made in a new light and it’s such a special moment to be a part of.
What’s your favourite kind of film or genre to work on?
I’ll always be a fan of stories or documentaries where the sound is realistic, no abstract sound design involved. Instead you have to use the natural sounds in a clever way to convey the emotions of a scene. Like using heightened foley or breaths to make a scene feel more intimate or using atmospheres panned tight or eq’d in a way that they make the listener feel the environment is closed in and slightly claustrophobic to create tension.
“ADR is 75% psychology and 25% technical”
What do you find most challenging in ADR (from recording to mixing)?
A few things make ADR tricky.
The first thing is the environment. Having a room that’s the right size ( not too many reflections but not completely dead sound wise and with high ceilings)
The second is mic placement. Making sure the mic isn’t too close so it sounds like voiceover but not too far away that it sounds too roomy and difficult to mix. Position the lav or clip mic in a way that you don’t pick up too much cloth rustle.
The third and probably most important is helping the actor get into the right headspace to recreate a scene.
ADR is probably 70-80% about psychology and 20-30% about the technical side. You’re asking actors to get back into a character, into a mind set, that they may not have been in for a few months. The room needs to feel a calm and supportive environment with all tensions left outside the door. That can be really difficult when the room can be filled with the actor, director, producer, ADR mixer, ADR supervisor and sometimes the post production supervisor.
Can you tell something about the cooperation with directors during ADR sessions?
One of the biggest mistakes I see less experienced ADR mixers make is speaking out about performances during a session. That is not our job. Our job is to make sure that technically the line of dialogue works. The director and actor have a long relationship. They have worked together since the set. They know the characters and they know the mindset the character should be in. With any lines that focus on performance as a reason for being re-recorded, let the director do their job. They usually have ways and have a dialogue shorthand with the actors to get the best performance out of them.
Can you give some pointers how to make and exterior ADR line sound credible?
With exterior scenes mic choices are really important. Generally the lav or clip mic is more commonly used at the final mix stage so it’s important to focus on how thats sounding and matching in. Exterior scenes tend to be more projected but once actors get into the controlled environment of an ADR stage, they automatically drop their projections. It’s important to make sure that doesn’t happen. Also if the characters are walking or doing any form of movement in the scene, get the actor to recreate this by moving their shoulders or bending at their knees. This will affect their voice and delivery of the line and hopefully give you a closer match.
Do you use any tricks to subconsciously enhance an actors performance?
Regarding ADR, in which order of importance would you place synchronicity, projection, soundquality & performance (first is most important)?
Performance first always, then sound quality, projection and last is synchronicity. We have tricks and ways of getting a line to sync up later on. Performance and projection and a badly recorded take aren’t things we can fix later one. They are usually the reasons we are re-recording the lines to begin with.
Are you at the point in your career where you feel confident in your artistic decisions?
Nope, and I’m not sure I ever will. Because every job is so different and sound is so subjective, I feel, you can never feel confident that the work you show to a client will be 100% their vision of what they wanted. Presenting technically correct work is not always the same as artistically correct.
Did your work Game of Thrones raise the bar for the following projects you worked on?
Did you get more exciting projects to work on?
It definitely helped raise my profile and show people I knew what I was doing when it came to ADR recording. I think it helped people have trust in my skills as a recordist but it didn’t really influence the projects I got. When I first went freelance, I was employed mainly by post production facilities and would just work on whatever projects they needed an extra set of hands (and ears) on. Now, 3 years after I first went freelance, I do get more of a say on what projects I choose to do and the more my profile has grown, the more exciting jobs I get offered.
“The sound industry is severely lacking in any diversity”
What are your thoughts on diversity and inclusion within the sound industry?
That is a big question.
The simple answer is that sound, especially here in the UK, is severely lacking in any diversity whether that be women or people from black and ethnic minority backgrounds. It’s something I’ve been saying for years. So to finally prove my point, I wrote a report with the Lenny Henry Centre here in the UK on it. I examined the highest rated TV shows across terrestrial channels during a 3 month period. Read more about it here.
Out of 60 available job roles, only 6 were taken by women and 1 was taken by a person from a mixed race background. I also interviewed 4 people from different backgrounds and found some of their stories harrowing. One person from a black background feels they have to bring a white male colleague to meetings in order to make the clients feel more relaxed. Another woman was told the sound supervisor on a freelance team was reluctant to hire her in case she tried to have a relationship with one of her male colleagues. It didn’t work out.
These aren’t isolated incidents. We also get people saying “Maybe women just don’t want to work in sound”. Having spoken at universities over the past few years and working in sound for 14 years, I can say with confidence that yes they do. The reason we don’t see more is we have a system of hiring that prevents them, and people from black or ethnic minority backgrounds, from progressing. The ones, at least here in the UK, who are lucky enough to go to university have the option of trying to get a runner position in a post house (few and far between right now) or go freelance. But where assistant picture editors still exist, sound assistants don’t unless you work on big budget features (again few and far between) so where do they go? Some retrain and leave the industry altogether, some progress so far but fail to reach the higher end work as they don’t tick a box on an imaginary form (and not through lack of their talent) and some eventually make it through but not until they have suffered behaviour and treatment their white male counterparts would never have experienced. Why you don’t see more women or more people from black and ethnic minority backgrounds in sound is not as simple as “they just don’t want to do it” it’s multilayered and mainly due to a system that’s broken and needs fixing.
It ultimately comes down to hiring practises. Targeted quotas need to be put in place from people commissioning shows to help us get more diversity. Schemes need to be created to help bridge two gaps. One for students leaving university to help them get entry level positions and start their careers, and for people at mid career level who are struggling to progress to the next level.
What are your own experiences?
As a woman working in sound, being spoken down to, having clients think I’m in a production role instead of a technical or creative one is all too common still. I’ve had both men and women tell me that in order for me to succeed that I would need to stop wearing makeup, cut my hair short and dress like a man. Something I ignored every time and instead wear dresses and heels to work every day as my way of giving those people the middle finger.
There’s too many stories I have about mistreatment to share here, but one of the worse when when I worked at a facility. We were working on a very high profile show at the time and recording the voice over for the series. The female presenter and myself got on so well she requested to only work with me for the series if possible. A few weeks after recording the first episode the producers and directors decided they no longer liked the presenters performance and instead wanted her to redo the full first episode. This would mean they would have to pay her an additional fee which they didn’t want to do. Instead they decided to tell her i had recorded the takes so badly that they weren’t usable and they needed to be redone. A complete lie.
They called up the company I worked for at the time and told them they needed to go along with this lie, which the company agreed to do. My male colleague who had to cover the session, found out and went around the building shouting at people, complaining and cursing. Everyone just brushed off his behaviour as him being “grumpy”. I instead remained calm and emailed my heads of department asking that I never work with this client again unless there was no other option. What I’m typing here was exactly what I typed to them.
I was called into a meeting with the MD of the company the next morning. I was told I was making things difficult for my work colleagues, “cutting off my nose to spite myself”. That I had to do the sessions. I was spoken down to and reprimanded for an hour for asking not to work with someone who’s lies could damage my career. My male colleague faced no such meetings or actions.
It was a perfect example of sexism and double standards.
Do you have any tips for students how to deal with these kind of situations?
Here in the UK we have BECTU which is the union for anyone working in TV and film. I would suggest that anyone starting their careers find out more about their local unions and join if you can. I wasn’t a member of a union when that job happened but had I been, they could have offered me support and guidance on what I could do. Never be afraid to speak up about bullying, sexist or racist behaviour. It is never ok. After the #MeToo movement, speaking up doesn’t mean you will burn bridges or not be able to progress in your career. Instead it means you are making sure that person’s behaviour is documented and if the pattern continues, they will have to face repercussions for their actions.
What could film educations do to get more divers applications than they do now?
Make sure film educators go into schools and show kids that this is a job they can do. Part of the problem is that when we do our jobs well and people sit and watch a TV show, they don’t notice good sound because it feels natural. Most people don’t know this job exists. Ask a lot of people who work in sound and you’ll find they found this job through music. If we start teaching and showing kids from a young age that this job is an option, and a fun one, it will help get more diversity into our industry.
What does your work for Media Trust mean to you?
Mentoring is such an important part for anyone’s career development no matter what stage you are at. I wouldn’t be where I am now without my mentors so it’s incredibly important for me to give back and help others who need it. The Media Trust does incredible work in helping kids and young adults from disadvantaged backgrounds get into the creative industries. There are not enough schemes and training available here in the UK to help people who cannot afford to attend University start their careers so I feel it’s important to help the ones who do, in any way possible.
What are your long term careergoals?
What inspires you in your work?
Every different project that I get to work on, it’s usually the people I get to collaborate with across the different departments that inspire me. How everyone pushes themselves and finds ways to overcome issues that might pop up last minute and how they find creative approaches to finishing a project. This is never a job that you do for money but one you do for passion and a love of the craft so seeing different peoples approaches always inspires me to do better.
What three films should every sound designer watch for sound design inspiration?
One scene for me that always sticks out and I think everyone should watch is in “The Dark Knight Rises” a lorry flips over and the use of sound is incredible because of its use of silence and sound. Silence can sometimes convey more than a sound effect can.
“Lion” is definitely another for it’s use of natural sound. It’s one of the very few movies I’ve seen where a sound designer has actually been credited in the opening titles. When you listen to it, you can see why. It’s utterly stunning.
One that might surprise people is “Bohemian Rhapsody” Firstly because of the scene for Live Aid but mostly because of the detailed dialogue editing work that went into that movie. On first watch I never knew that Rami was miming and that they are Freddie Mercurys original vocals. If you watch interviews with Nina Hartstone you will see how detailed her work was and why it won the Oscar.
Knowing what you know now, what two pieces of advice would you give yourself when you started out in Sound Design?
Don’t be arrogant and think you know everything is my first one. I thought leaving University that my course had taught me everything and I was ready to take on full projects myself. I wasn’t. University gives you such an incredible start and a knowledge of the basics but the working world is very different.
Goals are great but if you don’t get to them as quick as you’d like, that’s absolutely fine.
I started working in sound when I was 19 and I spent all of my 20’s putting myself under a lot of pressure and stress to be better, get nominated for awards and work as hard as possible. It resulted in me getting sick. If i could go back, I wouldn’t do that again. I’d enjoy my time more and have a better work life balance. This job is incredible and we are all very lucky to do it but we only get one life so we should enjoy it as much as possible while we can.
