Foley Artist

0 – 00/day (Average ,000 – 0,000 year)

1986

23 years

United States

Through a chance series of meetings in a post-production studio, I was introduced to the craft of Foley just as an opening for an assistant became available. After apprenticing for several years as a Foley Assistant writing down Foley Track Sheets, I was given an opportunity to do a T.V. show project solo and over the years I became responsible for more Television, Mini-series and Feature Films works.

An understanding of post-production audio procedures and film making is a major requirement. A background in dance or music certainly has helped some artists become better at performing footsteps and having a “good ear” is always essential. Stamina is also required as Foley is a job that often entails throwing heavy objects around the studio followed by long sessions of tedious exacting hard work.

A Foley session lasts about 10 hours and consists of performing footsteps, clothing moves or “specific” sound tracks. Each element is performed for the entire day (a whole day of footsteps) or elements are mixed up as the show requires; this depends on the nature of the project and the schedule involved.

One day I was given a whole session of time to create a 3 minute chase scene between a car and a transport trailer which was carrying logs down a mountain road. The transport driver, the bad guy, was trying to kill the good guy in the car by running him off the road as the car swerved beneath the transport and in front and behind. I even got to buy and smash a Camaro windshield. The scene took 8 hours and when played back sounded stunningly real. It was like being in the drivers seat.

I was given a fledgling engineer to record my work. During a kick boxing scene, the main character karate chops a fire pole as part of his routine; unfortunately he repeatedly kicks the pole about 20 times, completely randomly and all in about 10 seconds!I asked the the engineer to play the scene over and over about 4 times and then press record – I was memorizing the rhythm and on the last time when he went into record I nailed every single hit on the first take EXCEPT for the last hit. I wanted the young new engineer to simply “punch into record” on the last hit but instead he pressed record about half way through the scene. Each time he erased more and more of the perfect track until finally I had to call in another engineer to record it all from the beginning which we did in one take! I took two hours to do 10 seconds. I wanted to scream…

The variety of every new project.

Long hours and strenuous activity and the total perfection expected.

You get to work with the immensely dedicated people, you get to meet the occasional movie star, you get the honor of participating in creating a feature.