Download - Audio Media

ialSpecialund Game Sound SpecialGame Sound Game SpecialSound Sound Game SpecialSound Game SpecialSound Game SoundSpecia>companies gathering on the site. And there’s a lotto be gained from collaboration; as a companyourselves, we encourage other companies to comein and work with us.”Some from as far afield as New Zealand, even.In August 2007, Mere Mortals founder DavidJeffries took the company to New Zealand in hisnew capacity as Strategic Development Director.Mere Mortals NZ has been established ‘to dealwith title progression’, leaving Mere Mortals UK tohandle new IP.Why New Zealand? “MereMortals is a company competingin a global marketplace,” explainsWalmsley. “We had to payattention to the fact that somecountries – let’s say Malaysia,Thailand, and China – were ableto produce things more costeffectively than we could in theUK, just because of their lowercost economies, so we neededto look for somewhere where wecould outsource and save costs.Interestingly, when we looked atChina, we discovered that whileyou could save money on labourcosts, you often found that yourmanagement overhead in theUK climbed, because you weremanaging such a remote facility. Also, there weresome significant cultural barriers to working inplaces like China and Thailand – language beingtop of the list. When we looked at New Zealandwe had, probably, about a 30 percent saving interms of cost – not enormous, but because wedidn’t have all the cultural barriers we consideredit a nightshift solution rather than outsourcingto a low-cost economy. It works very well for us,and gives us 24-hour operation, which is veryeffective.”United Colours Of AudioThe company actively encourages collabortaion,idea sharing, and social interaction between staffacross the company – it’s a strategy with a goalof increasing creativity. And audio, of course, cancontribute to driving those creative dynamics.Walmsley: “Audio does actually go across all threeareas – very much so; strangely enough, the audioteam have probably been more involved in thatcross-company activity – right from the start,because our games team needed audio, as did ourweb team, so they’d always actually focused onThe team at Mere Mortals.audio, whereas, perhaps, the web team wouldn’tnecessarily need as much contact with the gamesteam in terms of the visuals. Audio was a place thateveryone was familiar with.”Mere Mortals’ Michael Coates – former Final CutFacilities ‘last man standing’ – concurs: “CertainlyI think the guys in the games side of things findit really useful, because in the past they wouldmaybe have had to buy a load of CDs themselves,then search through them to find the soundeffects they want and drop them in, but now theybenefit from having broadcastqualityfacilities in the nextroom, so you get the guys whoare actually coming up withthe ideas and programmingthe games being able to sit inthe studio at no extra cost tothe company, because we’vegot those audio facilities. Evenwithout final renders, we canget source files fired acrossthe network, and, because it’sPyramix, which is obviously veryvideo-based as well, the gamesguys can render a QuickTime,AVI, MPEG, or whatever, andload it into Pyramix, so we’vegot something to work withstraight away – even if it’s justadding or trying out little things.”Perhaps, then, the secret of Mere Mortals’success is that creative cross-company, crosspollinationof ideas, which in itself begs thequestion that Walmsley willingly poses: “DoesMere Mortals specialise in anything in particular?Well, the answer to that is, ‘Yes; we specialise in anawful lot of things.’ But, more than having specialistaudio engineers, editors, 2D and 3D artists, so wecan service clients who just specifically need thoseindividual discrete items, I think it’s the addedability to be able to see the bigger picture – howall these things connect up. So, for instance, wecan take a media artefact – an asset of somedescription, and, provided that we’re aware thatit needs to be used across a variety of differentplatforms, we’ll engineer or create it to be usedin a number of different platforms, so, therefore,there’s a cost saving there. You’ve really got tobe aware of where your audiences are; there’s nopoint in producing something and putting it on aplatform if there’s no audience at the end of it, sothe three main ways of reaching the audiencesthat our customers are trying to reach are throughgames platforms, the web, and TV. Of course, theinteresting thing about TV is that IPTV is becominga stronger contender – same production values, interms of the quality and creativity of the TV asset,but it’s just a different delivery mechanism.”To a certain extent, the same can also be saidabout the games industry, which is where westarted. Walmsley signs off with the following foodfor thought: “For the foreseeable future, there willbe a need of a large body of consumers out thereto have their own platform and to be able to buyboxed games, but it will change – undoubtedly,and, of course, it’s part of our job to keep aheadFINE CUTWhen launched in 1988 by ex-BBC Look North newsreaderJohn Kyle and business partner Colin Bone, Newcastleupon-Tyne’sFine Cut Facilities started life in the spirit of1980s entrepreneurship, providing stable employment for15-plus people during its relatively long lifespan, as well asbeing the first North Eastern UK post-production/editingcompany to embrace several new technologies, includingAvid, AudioFile, Betacam SP, and Digital Betacam, to namebut four.However, come 2005, and Fine Cut Facilities was nolonger the cutting-edge proposition it had once been.Michael Coates, who had joined Fine Cut fresh from BradforUniversity recalls: “The sound guy went to a differentcompany, and they made an offer for the AudioFile, sothey literally bought the sound studio out from under us...When Mere Mortals came in with an offer for Fine Cut, thecompany had shrunk from six members of staff to John andmyself, though John didn’t work much anymore. My bosssaid, ‘Yes, but you have to take Michael with it.’ Basically,I was purchased! Mere Mortals’ Operations Director MickStockton used to ring me just to check I was alright... I wasliterally padding around this big post-production facilityon my own.”Things took a considerable turn for the better whenCoates carried Fine Cut Facilities’ remaining equipmentover to Mere Mortals’ more salubrious surroundings of TheOld Forge: “In the process of that switchover, Dave McPheecame up from London as our new Head of Post Production –he was a sound engineer as well, and basically got the veryenviable position of building a new studio for himself.”Enter the likes of Merging Technologies’ thoroughlymodern Pyramix Virtual Studio and VCube – togetherwith a Yamaha 02R96 automated digital mixing console,5.1 surround monitoring, CEDAR Tools Auto Dehiss, andupmarket outboard from TC Electronic and Solid StateLogic – and more besides. “It’s not Dave’s dream studio,”Coates concedes, before adding: “There were obviouslybudget restrictions, but the audio suite was built to hisspec. Getting the sound booth in was, I think, the mostchallenging aspect, because this was just open office space,and we’ve turned it into a post-production facility.”The varied services since being offered include – butare not limited to – broadcast dubbing, voice recording,dialogue replacement, track-laying, ISDN sessions, radiocommercials, television commercials, sound design,location recording, and podcasts.of that curve and to try and predict where thingsare going.”Onwards and upwards for Mere Mortals, mostlikely. And on the strength of the evidence so far,why not? It’s a creative goal for Newcastle, that’sfor sure – with a little help from those friendly NewZealanders. ∫......................................INFORMATIONMere Mortals Group of Companies0191 224 2333www.mere-mortals.comAUDIO MEDIA JULY 2009 35