Sound Lounge re-recording mixer/sound effects editor Cory Melious is mixing the third season (13 hour-long episodes) of the FX series Damages alongside lead re-recording mixer/sound effects editor Sean Garnhart. Sound Lounge's innovative mix stage and an off-site playback system allow the show's producers to view and approve Sound Lounge's work in real time from remote locations. 



Damages' producers selected Sound Lounge to mix the new season after a competitive bidding process. Sound Lounge had some experience with the show, having stepped in to produce a last-minute mix of the season two finale. This season, Sound Lounge anchors the show's routine production process and is the final stop after all other post has been completed. 



Sound Lounge has dedicated its custom-built 5.1 surround sound mix room and edit rooms to this project. Melious mixes sound design, backgrounds and foley, keeping a line of communication with the show producers to ensure his mix matches their vision. Lead mixer Sean Garnhart mixes music and dialogue. Select outside sound editors contribute from Sound Lounge's facilities. These include supervising sound supervisor Fred Rosenberg, dialogue editor Dave Ellinwood, foley editor Steve Visscher and assistant sound editor Billy Orrico. 



Sound Lounge is using its extensive commercial, film and TV experience to inform its work for Damages. "I would say the biggest difference between this project and our previous work is scale," says Melious. "For the first time, we have an opportunity to stake ownership over a show for an entire season and really influence the texture and feel of the franchise." 



This project showcases Sound Lounge's ability to work effectively under tight time constraints, as they have just three days to mix each episode. As Sound Lounge mixes each show, the next installment is already under production at Steiner Studios in Brooklyn, where the majority of production occurs. The episodes typically air one week after Sound Lounge finishes its work.



The key to meeting this tight turnaround is a custom-built Avid/Digidesign Pro Tools/ICON two-man mix stage. "We are able to bring our sessions in on Pro Tools and have full access to all the tracks at mix time. Other facilities have to pre-dub their sounds and bounce them down, ultimately setting the balance in stone. With our Pro Tools setup, we can access each individual sound at mix time, leaving the producers lots of options," says Melious. "And the ability to work with the show producers remotely with this off-site playback system really sets us apart from other facilities." 



The off-site playback system at Steiner Studios—designed in large part by Sound Lounge engineer Steve Giammaria—allows the show's producers to listen to the mix and edits in real time and "drive" (play, stop, rewind) the footage, all while watching in HD, establishing what is in effect a giant virtual collaborative space that, in many circumstances, will render distance irrelevant and travel unnecessary.



"This process is unheard of in long format. Usually, with a project of this nature, the mixers would have to wait around until the network producers finished shooting the next episode so they could travel to the studio to review the final product," notes Sound Lounge executive producer Travis Call. "This remote room is going to save everyone time and money, as the mixers no longer have to bill for wait time and the creatives can use production breaks that would normally be downtime to approve and tweak the mix for the previously produced episode. Plus, we can modify this to work from anywhere.



Sound Lounge has used a similar setup on previous projects, working from New York with clients in Virginia and Washington, D.C. to great results. 



Mix Stage Specs:

• Dual-position 48-fader Digidesign ICON D-Control Console
• Powered by two dual 3.2GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon Macs
• ProTools HD5 Systems running Pro Tools v8
• Linked with Pro Tools satellite link via Ethernet
• Each position can be used as a control surface for up to four separate Pro Tools systems for a total eight systems controlled completely from two seats.

Select Plug-Ins

• Waves v6 Diamond Bundle
• TL-Space
• ReVIbe

Hardware

• Cedar DNS-2000
• Grace m906 Monitoring

Edit Systems

• 2x Pro Tools HD3
• 5x Pro Tools LE
• All computers linked through a facility-wide internal network for fast file transfers.