Fuzzy in LA, cinema mixing part 5

Hey all, so here’s my final entry in what I can only describe as one hell of a ride!
Last Friday I spent the day at Sony Pictures and Saturday was spent picking up the last few bits for the studio, with a spot of theatre and wine tasting in between for good measure.

Sony is a city. I didn’t actually realize just how expansive their film operation is but it’s basically the composite parts of Columbia Pictures, the old MGM and a whole bunch of other subsidiaries clustered under the Sony banner. Unfortunately they are very security conscious so wasn’t able to get many photo’s, but in true Hollywood fashion I crossed paths with 1 (one) celebrity (I ain’t saying!) and then had the pleasure of watching him getting mobbed by 3 tour groups, haha! He was very good natured about it.
But I digress. An interesting thing about the lot is that much of it can be accessed by the public but it’s a running studio…in fact probably my favourite part was seeing the production end in action. As you know I’m mostly a post-production kinda guy, but I got a real kick and learned a great deal from checking out their soundstages, TV production stages (including the old Married with Children spot, haha!) and even though not my field, their set design. Ok, Carel would probably have got a lot more out of it than I did, but still….

Of special interest to me was the Foley stage, which is very different to the one I visited at Todd-AO (post 1). Of course everyone has a different way of doing things but looking at the commonalities was very important. Coming from a smaller industry it’s nice to know what “industry standard” means!

To round off my trip there was that trip to Vampire Vineyards I promised myself when I first got there for some tasting under the guidance of their Russian barkeep (thanks Igor!), a cool evening at the Odyssey Theatre and a lucky visit to a music shop to pick up double bass strings for the coming Lark tour, hussar!

I’ve met so many lovely and fascinating people over the last fortnight, and am thrilled that most of them gave me their details so I can continue the relationship and have welcomed any questions I may have…that alone is worth the trip! So, thank you to Gary Hecker, Nerses Gezalyan, Peter Brown and his crew on the Hollywood stage, Gary Summers, Maysie Hoy, Mark Stoeckinger and most importantly, Kim Jimenez for looking after me and Michael Broomberg for making it possible! And now back home to my Lady ☺