For those who don't know, foley is the process of recording sound effects for video and film. An important part of making a movie that doesn't completely suck beyond redemption is have good sound-including good sound effects. Sure, that badass about to breach the door of the bad guy's hideout has an entry shotgun that looks like it could take down a bear, an elephant, or your overbearing mother-in law-but does it sound like a toy? Or worse still: does it sound like you recorded a real gun with a toy microphone?

I hadn't planned on doing sound design myself, but when our audio engineer, Brian Hoff, got himself lost on a small island infested with cannibals, someone had to pick up the slack! Fortunately, three years of assisting with foley and some careful research prepared me to deal with sound-eating cannibals. If you have any interest in how foley works, keep reading!

We just completed ADR this past weekend! I flew out to L.A. to record Shannon Kummer and stayed with her lovely family. Texas and California are two completely different worlds. Texas is kind of like the Wild West that grew up. California, on the other hand, is more like George Orwell's 1984 or Half Life's City 17-a world where computers predict when and where people are going to commit crime (a la Minority Report), traffic is monitored by surveillance aircraft, and buildings emerge from a dense haze in a frightening fashion similar to Silent Hill.

Full Metal Panic -Come Make My Day joined the twitterwebs yesterday. Follow us here:

Follow @fmpthemovie

Come Make My Day Production Status:

80%

Version 2.0 of web site has been launched today in preparation of completion and promotion of the movie. I've been on a web design binge today and fixed some of the inefficient elements of the previous design. Readability, functionality, and load time has been improved in the new design.

In other news, we're in the home stretch, near the end of post production. Since engineer Brian Hoff withheld audio from one of the scenes, all but one actor/actress has recorded ADR. The last remaining actress will be recording her lines this coming weekend. All ADR/Sound Effects work will be completed by the end of the month. There's a little bit left do on the visuals that should be completed next month.

Coming in the near future: details of my ADR adventure in L.A. and info an promotional Full Metal Panic! dubstep remix!

-Kenneth

First, a little bit of bad news:

For unknown reasons our audio engineer, Brian Hoff, stalled for months before announcing he was suddenly booked for an entire year. He eventually decided to hand over most of the audio, but failed to release any audio for an entire scene and stopped returning phone calls and texts. This created a huge mess; resorting to on-board camera audio instead of clean off-camera audio would create a movie of sub-par quality.

If I didn't have some experience with audio, we would probably be stuck using the horrible on-camera audio which would ruin the film and make it not worth having in anyone's portfolio (which was the entire purpose of the project). ....after all the hours, hard work, and expense everyone one of us put into this project.

Now the good news:

I worked closely with another audio engineer for about three years, have a little experience with film audio, and recently acquired my own gear for location and post sound. I also have a new assistant who I have worked with before on two different projects. I will be overdubbing the missing audio for scene 4. Most of the people who I need to overdub have already responded to me, I just have to get back with them and schedule the sessions. Shannon, our lead actress, now lives near L.A. (best of luck to you!) and I will have to buy a plane ticket to go out there and record her. Hopefully, no else is leaving quite yet... lol I'm also doing the sound design; Jennifer and I have already begun recording the sound effects.

There was some delay in getting the downloads up yesterday, but they are available now. Check it out on the Art Contest page. Next on the agenda is a mobile version of the web site.

The first Full Metal Panic! -Come Make My Day trailer is online and posted on the web site. It's a featurette with scenes from the movie and behind the scenes interviews with director Kenneth Lindbloom and actresses Shannon Kummer (Teletha Testarossa) and Juny Suh (Melissa Mao).

Are you an artist? Also added to the site is a promotional movie poster and wallpaper contest. Design your own Come Make My Day poster or wallpaper for a chance to win signed movie stills, a costume used in the movie, or a 1 year subscription to Deviant Art. Check it out now on the "Art Contest" page.