Outdoor Sound Effect ADR.

Question

I had this thought while I was dreaming last night:

If I were to do a huge chase scene with a police car chase etc.,

I'd take the video along with me and record the same car on the same surface doing the same stunts (that can be safely done with a stunt driver [not all the car flips for example]) but you can at least get the screeches in the right places...

Has this been thought of before?

Is this what is done in the industry?

Or does the sound team usually just get told "You have a 15 minute car chase-scene with 3 cars through an Italian village" and the sound team HAS to start recording it and not wait for the picture to be edited because by then it would be too late?

Have you ever gotten an edit of an action scene early enough to be able to do this sort of "sound effect ADR"? Like you see the car squeeling out and swerving certain ways and you try to recreate that for sound in the desert with a stuntman and show him the video? Or do you just go out before-hand and record the screeches blind without any reference and rely on editing it together in Pro Tools to match the screen?

And for that matter, would it be worth it to go to great lengths and do foley work outdoors in the same environment (say a forest meadow or some other place with somewhat controllable ambience) to get the correct echo on the recording? How often (if ever) is this sort of thing done? I know it was done on the submarine movie that Walter Murch did with great success.

Just wondering... Sorry if it's a lame question but it's been on my mind.

UPDATE: The movie "127 Hours" did this apparently.

Answer 1

It depends on the project of course, but the conventional method is to either:

1. Watch the scene in the editing room and make notes on what moves will be required, or:
2. Take a QuickTime on location with you and watch the scene with the driver & recordists.

If you have to record before you receive picture (which is unlikely) then the next best thing to do is have a screening of the scene with the picture editor and make notes at that point.