S1: The sound design of solar is almost like a character
S1: in and of itself. And today we're talking about it
S1: with more excerpts from our behind the scenes. I'm Jenny Curtis,
S1: director and producer, and we're getting into a conversation here
S1: where creator Chris Porter, executive producer Bill KURTIS and I
S1: are chatting with Solar's sound designer, mixer and Master C.J.
S1: Drumheller about some of our favorite world building moments in
S1: the sound design of this show.
S2: Speaking of episode eight, I would like to talk about
S2: one moment in particular in episode eight that actually ties
S2: back to episode one ends the communication that we had
S2: with C.J. during this project. I had a nine throwaway
S2: line in the first episode where Jamal says, I miss
S2: the sound of the ocean.
S1: I have 52 unique recordings of the Ocean Alley, Please.
S2: And I always knew that later on in Episode eight,
S2: when Jamal was at a dark point, he was going
S2: to retreat into that sound as a way of comforting himself.
S2: And that was that particular moment, which shows how important
S2: and how much thought was put into the sound even
S2: before we were able to give it to C.J. to
S2: do his magic. But when C.J. was reading the script,
S2: he was like, I wonder if Ali could just play
S2: a whole bunch of different ocean sounds on top of
S2: each other when she says she has 52 unique recordings.
S2: And I was like, I actually love that. That's actually
S2: a really cool moment. I appreciate you mentioning it, but
S2: every wave is different. There aren't 52 different sounds.
S1: I have 52 unique recordings.
S2: I get it. Ali, thank you. Please just let me
S2: get through this and trying to figure out how I
S2: want to say it.
S1: Okay, Jamal.
S2: And I just thought that was a really cool moment
S2: of the sound design being a part of the script
S2: and storytelling.
S3: When we first talked and we first agreed that we
S3: were going to do this thing, I just went on
S3: to see what was going on with space sound or
S3: like sound for astronauts and different things and what they'll use.
S3: And a lot of people don't know that actually audio
S3: is used a lot in space for not only just
S3: communication and stuff like that, but also for comfort and
S3: to add soundscapes that are familiar so that you're not
S3: like if you're on the space station or whatever, you
S3: can hear the sound of a park or so like
S3: the idea of having those ocean sounds was actually something
S3: that came up in some of the talks with actual
S3: astronauts and different people that we were talking to. But
S3: it was also, I know with episode one we were like,
S3: Let's define the rules of the game. What can we
S3: do here to make sure that the sound design things
S3: are going to happen? And we know that from the
S3: sound design level of episode one. We want it to
S3: be something that grabbed the attention to where like, Hey,
S3: we're not going to go full out here, but we
S3: want you to know that things are going to happen.
S3: And so where headphones and and get into this space.
S2: But it's a good point.
S3: I don't know. It's probably the most used pun ever
S3: on our project, but but we wanted to get into
S3: that space early and even talks with Will. And we
S3: were talking about the mapping of the spaceship itself, everything
S3: having its own sound and the idea that each capsule
S3: has its own identifiable thing. And so we literally went
S3: to the drawing board, even in 3D mapping on where's
S3: the door, where's Rin's door, and where's the ants nest habitat. Yeah, yeah.
S3: And so we knew that from the beginning and kind
S3: of since we're kind of jumping around in time and stuff,
S3: I think it's another layer of like just keeping the
S3: listener engaged in identifying different without having to say, Hey,
S3: you're in this capsule like on the nose. We could
S3: just play the sound and they would kind of know
S3: that it was there. So we knew that this coming
S3: from the other side of that idea. I knew it
S3: was going to be more discourse or more dialogue than
S3: than I think I've done before. And just knowing that, like,
S3: even the subtleties and and the details of what we
S3: could do with a more dialogue heavy show was something
S3: that we're going to be bringing a personality to the
S3: show that people will know, you know, whether they're flipping
S3: through shows like when they get to solar, like, Oh,
S3: I'm listening to solar. Now. Part of the reason that
S3: we really encourage listeners to use headphones is because of
S3: that perspective. If you picture yourself watching a movie at
S3: home and you're sitting on the sofa, the TVs all
S3: the way across the room, so that no matter how
S3: much the sound designer wants to be close to you,
S3: they are still going to be across the room. So
S3: when you wear headphones, it opens up a whole new
S3: world to where now I can bring that perspective super
S3: close and I can also control what position you are
S3: in relation to everything else that's happening. And so the
S3: mindset from the beginning on solar was almost like a
S3: VR mindset to where we're in virtual reality. We're going
S3: to have all these different things that are happening that
S3: can actually be placed spatially around you because we're taking
S3: it from mono dialogue to this interactive immersive experience for
S3: Inside the Home. I just got out all my junk
S3: that I have. I have this big I think it
S3: used to be like a cheeseball container. We could go
S3: for sponsorship on the cheese balls probably without even having
S3: to eat them. And I have this smaller size binaural
S3: microphone and also just this little tiny little speaker that
S3: has a little line input. And so I would put
S3: some of the sounds in through and I would place
S3: that little tiny speaker and the binaural microphone and then
S3: cover it up with this plastic jug and play some
S3: of those sounds through there. And you can hear like
S3: literally you can hear some of these sounds coming through
S3: that speaker and then the different voices.
S4: Specialist Dizzy you may begin payload bay arm extension for
S4: orbital placement.
S1: All right payload bay arm extending for orbital place over
S1: around time.
UU: You guys, you are right there Margaret I was caught
UU: off guard.
S1: The arm extension began moving us faster than I anticipated.
S1: Please continue.
S3: I'll tell you, the other secret was I use my
S3: dryer a ton, so I have a big circular dryer
S3: that I would just put the mic in there and
S3: I'd close the door, and a lot of the sounds
S3: was like I would do the actual Foley like on
S3: some of the spacewalks, like to where they're attaching their
S3: tethers or whatever.
S4: I'm confirming visual and physical lock and tether, failsafe safe.
S4: Chief Scientist Cohen can you confirm the same?
S1: I confirm. Oh, my God. I can hear it. Yeah.
S3: That's my dryer.
S2: Yeah. Yeah. Well, what I love is that C.J. is
S2: actually fairly active on his social media, in particular on Instagram.
S2: And he when he wasn't allowed to talk about the show,
S2: but he was working on it, I would sometimes see
S2: these photos that you would post of like the microphones
S2: in these weird places. And I was like, I know
S2: what you mean. Where you creating.
S5: Ali Obviously incredible talent on the. Part of the actor. Yes.
S5: But you also did a lot of work and I'm
S5: not sure how many different renditions of how Ali would
S5: finally sound you went through, but I know it was
S5: more than two or three.
S3: The ones that actually got submitted to Chris and Ginny
S3: was around 60 different options probably. It came down to like,
S3: what is Ali and where is Ali and how does
S3: Ali interact? And I think from the get go, I
S3: know that we had this idea of Ali was going
S3: to continually become more and more relatable and almost more
S3: human as the show progressed, which was, you know, obviously
S3: a challenge in itself. And looking at the different, you know,
S3: ideas of like what a I might sound like, I mean,
S3: this is my tie into also like was the idea
S3: of we had this printer that was like super or
S3: this came into also creating the personality of the ship
S3: itself because Ali is is a super caring and understanding AI,
S3: but she's not something she's not a robot that walks around.
S3: She's part of the ship. She's a part of these
S3: locations to where like she would be coming from either
S3: the alley speaker's from above you or beside you and
S3: through these playback speakers. And I think the identity of
S3: what Ali is as we get to the end of
S3: the series really comes in and hits a home run
S3: at the end. And I'm not going to give any spoilers.
S3: It's really great. I think it's the acting the with Jenny,
S3: what you did with it was amazing and knowing that
S3: we were going to try and find something subtle enough
S3: that they would know that it's in the ship, but
S3: it had room to grow and it had room to
S3: go places to where we had a good par for
S3: the course. We're going to have other things that happen
S3: with Ali that are going to bring this out. And
S3: I loved placing Ali in the room, especially, I think
S3: in episode one to where you'll if you listen to
S3: the distance of where Ali is, like some of the times,
S3: Ali's really close and sometimes she's far away, almost too far,
S3: like now listening to them. Like I should turn to
S3: Ali that moment.
S1: There are so many more sonic moments to discuss. Make
S1: sure you check out the full conversation with C.J. on
S1: the solar panel, available exclusively on our Apple Podcasts Premium Channel.