Sound Lounge to Mix Entire Third Season of Hit FX Series Damages

Sound Lounge Rerecording Mixer/Sound Effects Editor Cory Melious will mix the entire third season of the Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning FX series Damages (Produced by Lori Jo Nemhauser), alongside lead Rerecording Mixer/Sound Effects editor Sean Garnhart. Sound Lounge's well-established Film and TV division will embrace the challenge of mixing a full season (13 episodes) of 44:00 television shows. An innovative mix stage and an off-sight playback system will allow show producers to view and approve Sound Lounge's work in real time from remote locations, setting the studio up for similar future projects.

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 90:00 season two finale. This season, Sound Lounge will anchor the show's routine production process and become 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, the section of their 12th floor that was built four years ago for their Film and TV division, to this project. Melious will mix 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 will mix music and dialogue. Select outside sound editors - some of the nation's top talent - will also 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 used their extensive commercial, film and TV experience to inform their work for Damages. "I would say the biggest difference between this project and our previous work is scale," stated 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. We're looking forward to this close collaboration with FX to really shape the show."

This project will showcase Sound Lounge's ability to work effectively under tight time constraints, as they will have just three days to mix each episode. As Sound Lounge mixes each show, the next installment will already be under production at Steiner Studios in Brooklyn, where the majority of production occurs. The episodes will typically air one week after Sound Lounge finishes their work, though three episodes will be fully mixed by the season premiere on Jan. 25.

The key to meeting this tight turnaround will be a custom-built ProTools/Digidesign 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." stated Melious. "And, the ability to work with the show producers remotely with this offsite playback system really sets us apart from other facilities."

The offsite playback system - designed in large part by Sound Lounge engineer Steve Giammaria - at Steiner Studios, 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," noted Sound Lounge EP 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. This is another example of Sound Lounge's solution-oriented approach and ability to adapt to a project of any scope, whether film, commercial or TV."

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 are detailed below.

The third season of Damages will premiere Monday, Jan. 25.

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 ProTools v8
• Linked with ProTools Satellite Link Via Ethernet
• Each Position can be used as a control surface for up to four separate ProTools systems for a total eight systems controlled completely from two seats.

• Waves v6 Diamond Bundle
• TL-Space
• ReVIbe

• Cedar DNS-2000
• Grace m906 Monitoring

• 2x ProTools HD3
• 5x ProTools LE
• All Computers Linked through a facility-wide internal network for fast file transfers.

The Credits:

Damages Producer: Lori Jo Nemhauser
Audio Post: Sound Lounge
Lead Rerecording Mixer/Sound FX Editor: Sean Garnhart
Rerecording Mixer/Sound FX Editor: Cory Melious
Sound Recordist: Steve 'Major' Giammaria
Executive Producer of Sound Lounge: Travis Call
Sound Lounge Chief Technical Engineer: John DeMaio
Supervising Sound Editor: Fred Rosenberg
Dialogue Editor: Dave Ellinwood
Foley Artist: Steve Visscher
Assistant Sound Editor: Billy Orrico

About Sound Lounge:

New York-based Sound Lounge is the undisputed industry leader in audio production and post services. Now celebrating its 10th anniversary, the artist-owned and operated company features a staff of talented individuals who set the standard for creative excellence and technical mastery, including Partners/Engineers Tom Jucarone, Peter Holcomb, Philip Loeb and Partner/Sound Designer Marshall Grupp. This team is backed up by two Manhattan studios featuring 13+ production and mix suites fully equipped with the latest in digital audio technology, including 5.1 surround capabilities, sound mixes for cinema and HD, and ADR/VO sessions perfectly suited for large or smaller projects. The Lounge is also outfitted with an immense sound effects library on a lightning fast internal network, and supports a variety of video formats including DVCam, Digibeta, and HD.

Over the years, the studio has grown to include Marshall Grupp Sound Design as well as Entertainment and Radio divisions that produce innovative work in specialized areas. Sound Lounge's dedication to quality has earned a loyal patronage from top advertising agencies, television, and film studios nationwide. Recent projects include Oscar-nominated Rachel Getting Married (dir: Jonathan Demme), Oscar-nominated Frozen River (dir: Courtney Hunt); Oscar-winning Taxi to the Dark Side (dir: Alex Gibney), and Super Bowl campaigns for E*TRADE, Castrol, and H&R Block.