News
Quantum of Solace looks to UK’s finest for Quality of Sound
30 October 2008
From premixing, through film scoring to the final edit, AMS Neve was the console brand of choice for the Quantum of Solace sound team
Convincing… powerful… compelling… richly nuanced… The critical acclaim for Casino Royale, Daniel Craig’s first outing as James Bond, made the follow up – Quantum of Solace – the most eagerly anticipated movie of 2008. With the screen action relying on gritty realism rather than gadgetry, Quantum of Solace
called for a soundtrack that was equally powerful and compelling. Cue a
cast of award-winning soundmen, the UK’s top facilities – De Lane Lea,
Air Studios and Real World Post – and, naturally, AMS Neve consoles and
outboard.
Mike Prestwood Smith and Mark Taylor, BAFTA-winners for their work on Casino Royale, were a shoo-in as re-recording mixers, as was Real World Post for the premixing. Co-founded by Prestwood Smith and with a 24-fader AMS Neve DFC Gemini at its heart, Real World Post is the film sound mixing and post-production alter ego of the renowned Big Room at Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studios in the Wiltshire village of Box, near Bath, England. Along with premixing for Quantum of Solace, the facility was also used for delivery requirements such as Music & Effects mixes for foreign language versions.
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“Once again the DFC proves to be the best gadget in Bond's arsenal,” Prestwood Smith comments. “Top summing, endless headroom and the best dynamics on any large format board.” | |
While Prestwood Smith and Taylor were in Real World, Geoff Foster was busy at Air Studios’s 96-fader 88 RS console, recording and mixing David Arnold’s soundtrack. As with the re-recording team, Arnold, Foster, Air – and AMS Neve – are also first choice for Bond movies, their 007 collaboration dating back to 1997’s Tomorrow Never Dies.
Foster also used two Neve multi-channel compressors – supplementing Air’s own unit with a second AMS Neve 8051 hired in specially for Quantum of Solace. “I was using a split desk format to create two stems for the music soundtrack,” explains Foster. “Having a second 8051 therefore halved the number of passes and made life much easier.”
And so to De Lane Lea – voted Best UK Film Sound Facility at the 2008 Conch Awards – for the final mixing and editing. Quantum of Solace reunited the award-winning Casino Royale team of Prestwood and Taylor, with Soundelux’s Eddy Joseph as supervising sound editor and Doug Cooper as sound mix tech – plus, of course, De Lane Lea’s 80-fader AMS Neve DFC console.
And with the film clocking up the UK's biggest ever three-day opening of £15.4m, the rest, as they say, is box office history.
