For the past 5 years I have been freelancing as a sound mixer and now exclusively as a sound editor & designer. If you had at least one client as a freelance artist I am sure you know already at least a couple of pitfalls to avoid. The freelancing life can be great if you […]
Author: melissa pons
Thinking Natural Soundscapes in Films
Being a natural environment enthusiast, a field recordist and a sound designer it has been great to research for this article. There I mention Chris Watson approach to build a soundscape and talk a little about subjective experiences. Check it out here.
3 Film Directors That Place Importance on Sound
What follows is an article I wrote for the SFX website SoundSnap. I discuss some examples of films of Terrence Malick, Gus Van Sant and Hayao Miyazaki (whose sound design’s film The Wind Rises has been dissected on previous articles) and mention very interesting interviews with their sound designers. These director have gotten my attention […]
Working Across Aesthetic Boundaries
Recently my name was short listed amongst incredible field recordings on SoundFly, an audio educational website with great content that is definitely worth following (I’m still stunned by this!!) What Patrick McGuire writes is spot on: Pons considers her work as a way to relate to and understand elements of the world around her. After some years […]
Using Sound Design to reveal the under layers
Two films I am involved in inspired me mostly to write this article. I have been giving this matter a lot of thought, which bursted particularly while working for 8 months on history and social related TV programs with a regular interview / stock footage format (which unfortunately felt kind of flat). One is an […]
Nocturnal Sounds of the Atlantic Forest
*purchase the album at any price you’d like – half of the profit will be donated to Iracambi* This album combines my interest for field recording and nature. A post made months ago around my stay in Brazil mentions Iracambi, the NGO where I stayed three weeks listening and recording how much I wanted in […]
The Wind Rises – Sound Design Analysis III – challenging and supporting the notions of vococentrism
For the purpose of this review, principles and notions from Chion are going to be referenced and hopefully challenged at times. Chion’s notion of the central role of voice in cinema as a means of the conveyance of psychological and emotional information that is expressed trough its spacial, material and sensory inputs – vococentrism. In his book […]
Being a sound guy as a girl…
As I write I question myself if this is necessary, who are the ones who are going to raise eyebrows, what jobs will I be missing in the future. This might upset some people and I’m sure to be hearing anytime soon that maybe I could have been more discrete. Oh screw that, alright? The trend […]
The Wind Rises sound design analysis II – elements of nature / the earthquake
The earthquake In September 1923, Tokyo became a hell on earth. In less than three days, a magnitude approximate 7.9 earthquake and subsequent conflagrations reduced nearly half of Japan’s capital to a blackened, rubble-filled, corpse-strewn wasteland of desolation. The human tragedy of over 120,000 killed and 2 million left homeless was matched in severity by […]
The Wind Rises – sound design analysis I – the oneiric realm of Jiro (part 2)
Part 1 of this analysis can be read here. 6/ [00:54:54] / A world with pyramids After his stay in Germany, Jiro proceeded west, sent by his company “to see the world”. He is travelling in the train by himself when a man sits next to him. Jiro looks happy and surprised when he understands the […]