Deepak Chopra in Studio C

Renowned doctor and author Deepak Chopra has been in the studio with us a number of times over the past month working on both a meditation CD project and an upcoming video game title to be released by Curious Pictures in conjunction with video game giant THQ.  It looks to be a wonderful way to link kids and technology with positive messaging from one of today's more prolific writers on self awareness, kindness and emotional well-being. 

Audio for the game was recorded using a Sennheiser 416 located about 6" from Mr. Chopra. Additional audio for the project was slated to be recorded in New York City at SkinnyMan Studios a couple of weeks later, so we needed a configuration that could be matched on both coasts. Studio West co-owner and engineer Mark Kirchner commented, "Mr. Chopra has an interesting voice to record; there's a bit of pronounced "s" that the de-esser doesn't catch - almost like a click.  In working with Mr. Chopra, specific mic placement has been the best solution. He is very nice, and easy to work with, however he likes to get to work right away, so you don't have much time to test setups. It's part of what makes the job exciting and nerve-racking at the same time." We're all excited to see how the game turns out!

Read more from gamespot.com.

Around The Studios...

Kellogg has been busy in Studio A recording Erick Macek, Anoushka Shankar's 6th full-length album, Traveller, the traditional Irish sounds of Kick Up the Dust, and Johnny Clegg for NPR.

Over in Studio B, Gary has been working on the video game trailers for Thor: God of Thunder and Captain America.

Meanwhile, in Studio C, Mark has been recording Deepak Chopra, Joshua Dinnerman, Richard Dreyfuss' narration of a National Geographic program about parallel universes, spots for Lucas Arts and 5 Gum, and the 100th episode of A Way With Words for NPR.

Open Hearts Foundation Inaugural Event

Four hundred people attended the event that was held at the private residence of award-winning actress, artist and philanthropist Jane Seymour and her husband, director, producer and writer, James Keach.  The Open Hearts Foundation, founded by Jane Seymour, is a nonprofit charity established to raise funds to enrich the lives of children in the areas of health, arts, sports and education. The Foundation’s goal is to bring the Open Heart movement into communities worldwide by providing funds to children’s charitable organizations.  The evening was hosted by CNN Anchor Christi Paul and included musical performances by William Joseph, Katharine McPhee and Jakob Dylan.

The 48 channel record was a last minute request to Studio West. We received the call for help two days before the event. Making things a little more interesting was the severe weather that was pounding the West Coast that weekend. Record low temperatures and thunderstorms didn't dampen the event turnout, but did knock out the main generator in the middle of the auction which was after dinner and held prior to the night's musical performances.


Fortunately, the power that went down temporarily was feeding lighting, so the sound-side of things was not affected. There were a few moments during Jakob Dylan's performance when we could hear the rain on the tent roof - it sounded like white noise and it threw us for a loop...momentarily. In the end, the event was a huge success raising money and awareness for children's charities. Our thanks and support go out to Jane, James and their foundation!


View a sample of the night's performances here:

Fallbrook Film Festival

Two film projects recorded at Studio West will be featured at the upcoming Fallbrook Film Festival, Well Done, a narrative short "modern fairytale involving a chef, a cake, a waitress and a steak"  and We Must Remember, a short documentary about sixteen American high school filmmakers and their life-altering experiences discovering the Holocaust.  Here's a little more info on each project:


Well Done trailer
Well Done blog (including pictures of the cast and crew at Studio West)
We Must Remember trailer


Even if you missed out on the Groupon, you can still get tickets to see these two great films and more here. Mark and Gary will be there, so make sure you say "hi" and let us know what you think!

Social Networking and ISDN

I did an ISDN link yesterday connecting with WBUR in Boston for NPR's radio show On Point. In Studio C at Studio West was James Fowler, professor of Political Science at USCD. One of the cool perks of this job is that we do lots of ISDN connections with various NPR stations, so we get to hear lots of different interviews on all kinds of topics. It's like being back in college and having to go to sociology lectures, but getting paid for it too! Yesterday's session had an interesting twist. I'm using social media right now (this blog), to comment on a show that was discussing the underlying twists of social media. 

Do your friends' friends' friends actions and opinions have an effect on everything you do? Is it possible that what you do today via your social media network may influence what your friends' friends' friends do tomorrow? For example, if you loose weight and blog about it, are your friends likely to loose weight, too? You'd be surprised at the findings; I was!  It was a very interesting show; If you've got a free few minutes, check out the podcast. 

A little about the studio setup. James was seated on a stool in the Studio C booth at a Neuman U87. I ran the 87 through a Focusrite Red 7 mic preamp with slight compression, 3:1, with a light threshold of a light threshold of straight up on the Red 7. We use Telos Zephyr ISDN interfaces in Studio B and Studio C. Our connection codecs were XMIT L2 128 and RCV L2 - a very standard configuration. I recorded the ISDN send to WBUR (James' voice) and the ISDN feed to us as a backup. It was a standard ISDN session configuration. Session setup was 44.1, 24 bit, WAV. The session consisted of a single audio track for James, a stereo aux track for the ISDN feed received from Boston, and a mono aux that we patch the DCommand's talk-back into - so we can easily send console talk-back both to the mix going to Boston and the cue mix going to the booth. It's a standard configuration we use in Studio B and Studio C for ISDN and phone patch sessions.  

In case you're wondering, "What is ISDN?", think of it as a special, very high quality phone line. It uses compression technology to encode on the sending side and decode on the receiving side. Two phone lines are required. Both studios involved in the session need to have similar ISDN Interfaces installed and correctly configured. This way, we can have a voice talent in San Diego connected to an agency in New York and it sounds like they're right in the agency's booth. Very cool technology - kind of expensive, but still much cheaper than flying to New York for a three hour session! 

Remember to support your local NPR station! 

Mark Kirchner

POST Magazine Interview

Gary Miranda and myself got a chance to chat with the folks at POST Magazine on Friday about what it's like to work on video game audio.

One of the questions asked was: "What are some of the hurtles you face in doing sound design and scoring for games?" In our case, one of the biggest challenges is the ever-changing duration. A few seconds added here, a few frames removed there, this phrase added here, and so on. These changes can happen right up to the moment the project is due - so you learn to expect that they're going to happen and you roll with it. It's actually part of what makes audio for games such a challenge.

Stay tuned for a link once the article has been published.  

Mark Kirchner

Voiceover and Dialog Recording for Discovery's Kidnap + Rescue

Congratulations to Brad Barker, The Halo Corporation and the folks at Go Go Luckey for a successful launch of Kidnap + Rescue on January 29th. Over 1 million viewers for the pilot episode - way to go!  Brad has been a frequent visitor recording all of the show's voiceover dialog at Studio West. The new series uses actual footage, first-hand accounts and dramatic re-creations to tell the stories of kidnap victims and their heroic rescuers (10 pm, Discovery ).

Kidnap + Rescue is a provocative new series about kidnapping and the rescuers with the courage to go where no one else can - risking violent reprisal to reclaim innocent victims, inside our borders and beyond. The first episode of Kidnap + Rescue features The Halo Corporation, a San Diego-based security firm founded by Brad Barker and his team of former Special Ops, National Security and Intelligence personnel. Together they work to provide security and humanitarian aid along the U.S./Mexico border. This episode tells the story of two kidnappings to which Halo responds.