Press release from UTS
Being briefed to treat the animated film Rango like a live action film was the start of the fun for sound designer Peter Miller.
Miller, an Australian music composer and sound designer widely acclaimed for his work in film, music and theatre, will explain the process in a discussion session at the 2011 UTS: Sydney International Animation Festival, at 1pm on Saturday 24 September.
“The director, Gore Verbinski, is a big fan of animation, but he wanted to make a film not a cartoon. Crossing those boundaries was what interested him.
“Because of this, everything we approached was as if we were designing for a ‘live’ film, with much less emphasis on the cartoony sound effects,” said Miller.
Miller started with the story boards, with very small amounts of animation, and found himself making sound to sit with that – a bit challenging, given that nothing was moving.
“As they developed Rango further, we would see the basic animation to get an idea of the movement, and then make the sound slightly more accurate. From the storyboards, we would make an assessment of how long a movement would take and then would need to tweak it as the rendering built up,” he said.
However, unlike most animated films, the dialogue was recorded on a sound stage, with all the actors being shot as if in a live film. Rango, then, was not totally silent.
In this respect, some of the sound design was much like the sound design in a ‘live’ film.
“We had total control over everything else, which was great fun. We created everything from special ambient atmospheres for dream sequences, through mechanicals like a spring-driven wheelchair and a snake-tail machine gun, to unique footsteps and clothes rustle for individual characters,” Miller explains.
The end result is an animated film that is gritty and realistic, due to the director’s vision and Miller’s sound design expertise.
Peter Miller will present his sound design approach along with excerpts from Rango, inviting audience members to participate in the discussion.
“The Sound of Rango” with Peter Miller is on at 1pm on Saturday 24 September, at the 2011 UTS: Sydney International Animation Festival For more information and tickets, go to www.siaf.uts.edu.au
Peter Miller is an Australian music composer and sounddesigner widely acclaimed for his work in film, music and theatre. His standalone music recordings such as ‘Love vs Gravity’, ‘Houdini’ and ‘Strangeness + Charm’ have received critical praise in Australia and overseas, as has his sound design for feature films such as Gore Verbinski’s The Ring (Dreamworks), Jane Campion’s In The Cut (Pathé), Ray Lawrence’s Jindabyne (April Films) and recently the Paramount Pictures animated Western epic Rango, also directed by Gore Verbinski.
He spent two years as Sound Designer and co-Supervising Sound Editor on Rango, the tale of a chameleon in search of his true identity. The film, featuring the performances of Johnny Depp, Isla Fisher, Bill Nighy and Ned Beatty, is thefirst feature-length animation offering from Lucasfilms' Industrial Light and Magic. It was directed by Pirates of the Caribbean helmer Gore Verbinski.
For more information about Peter Miller and his work: http://www.scribbletronics.com/