Sound Design Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for sound engineers, producers, editors, and enthusiasts. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
For those of you who have made sound design your career of choice, is there anything you would have done differently along the way? Are there certain choices you're especially glad you made? Would you rather have gone freelance/studio, film/games, east coast/west coast, local/international, analog/digital, etc.?
More than anything, I'm interested in hindsight.
And to make things more interesting, I've included a bounty.
What I wish I had done more of:
What I'm glad I did:
I just answered some questions on the soundesign blog, and one question relates loosely to your question. The questions was:
What would you suggest to young people wishing to become a sound designer? Which one is the never-without tool?
This is a question that I can personally relate to as I recently have reached a point in my career where I am working on projects that I find personally and professionally fulfilling.
Things I have learned: Always have a sound design project to work on; try get it out there and seek feedback; share your knowledge; call yourself a sound designer; charge for your sound design (even just a bit); the web can be your mentor.
- The best way to learn is by doing. By participating in projects, you will learn new techniques and develop skills for future projects. If you work in a team, you also can build working relationships.
- Sharing knowledge forces you to absorb and apply what you have learned and encourages other people to share their knowledge with you.
- If you call yourself a sound designer, people will treat you as a sound designer.
- Don’t be shy to charge for your skills as a sound designer. People will try to get you to work for free, but you are offering a valuable service. Once you start charging for your skills, you are considered a professional sound designer. Initially it’s difficult to get away from the free work. It took me a long time to get over the I have no value and I should work for free attitude.
- Mentors are sadly hard to find, but we are lucky to have the web. There is a huge online community that is eager to help. There is a huge amount of knowledge that is distributed for free, it is up to you to find and make something out of it.
The main tool in your arsenal is your ability to work with others. Becoming the sound designer people want to work with will serve you well. If you’re that person, you will work your way up quickly. As sound designer you will more than likely be dependent on a team. You need to have a production to earn money, or you need a good script to do a good sound design. This should get the ball rolling: When people want to work with you, you will earn money to buy equipment. When you have the equipment, people will hire you for bigger projects and you will get better at sound.
There are also some really good answers on this thread if you haven't seen it and care to read more.
One important thing I have learned during my adventure is to "Focus" on one thing.
Instead of being jack of all trades, and doing the foley, recording, overdubbing, sound cleaning, video games, animations, short movies; just concentrating on one thing made me a better sound designer, instead of being average in each field.
I don't mean that you should not learn or try the other things, but in my opinion knowing your strengths and weaknesses, and sharing them honestly with a client will emphasize your professionalism.
I would have started earlier.
Not sure it becomes clear how involved, abstract, and broad, this subject can get. The technical knowledge can be accumulated fairly quickly but lateral thinking, trained ears, aesthetics, and the necessary cultural background don't come as quick. Not to mention the need for people skills and the attitude required towards a sometimes unrewarding job. There's also the issue of having to experiment for a couple of years just to get the basic stuff out of the way and find one's own niche.. And build a library. So yeah. Encourage experiments.
If I could time travel I would go back & tell myself: apply for the Berlinale Talent Campus (And if you get tuned down, keep improving you application & keep applying every year until you DO get accepted)
Despite any shortcomings, it was the best experience for - appreciating the role sound plays in film making - appreciating all the other key roles - meeting & freely discussing film/art/sound/music with people from all over the planet - appreciating you are limited by your own experiences - appreciating what travel means ie if you have not travelled & engaged with other cultures, then you are VERY limited!
I wish that I had concentrated on the one thing.
If I were to do it again I would buy a perfect little boom op rig and work on as many paid and unpaid jobs as I could get hold of. I would not do anything else until I was perfect at that role. Only then would I look for sound mixer work, as everything is about the dialogue, you're either cleaning it or supporting it, through the music or sound effects, and once you understand that, everything else is so much easier.
