Field Trip: Warner Brothers Studios

A Hollywood landmark!

Once you hear it, there’s no mistaking what you’re supposed to see – the oafish Patsy clomping together two coconut halves, always two steps behind Arthur as popularized in the 1975 cult classic Monty Python and the Holy Grail. But where did that idea come from? Where did this style of sound design emerge?

Sound effects first became incorporated into the “talkies” in the late 1920s with the work of audio pioneer Jack Foley. The field he developed – the art of creating and recording live sound effects (often with unconventional materials) in sync with a finished reel during the post-production process – revolutionized motion pictures in the early years of cinema and continues to permeate the industry today. This type of work is rarely required within the scope of traditional theatre (unless it is a specific choice for the production), so it was a real treat for the MFA sound design students when we had to opportunity to explore the sound stages at Warner Brothers Studios, taking an in depth look at one of their Foley facilities.

This field trip (coordinated by Professor Vincent Olivieri as part of DRAMA 255: Trends in Modern Sound Design) began on the cool morning of December 6, 2019. After we carpooled up to Burbank, we left our vehicles with the valets and made our way past the multiple ongoing studio tours to the commissary where we grabbed a quick bite to eat and some hot joe (side note: they have a killer breakfast spread). After a few minutes to take in the enticing aromas of scrambled eggs and bacon, we headed back outside to meet our host Alyson Lee Moore, an accomplished Foley artist with over thirty years of experience in the industry, half of which she has spent with Warner Brothers. She is also a two-time Emmy award-winning Foley artist (a recent win shared with the department for their work on HBO’s Barry) with numerous Golden Reel nominations from Motion Picture Sound Editors.

One "street" of the studio

Alyson first took us around the various sets situated about the lot – a small township built out of scenic skeletons and optical illusions meant to be filmed from specific angles. Each unit is highly configurable – some even had false walls (they were quite convincing, even up close) creating striking visual partitions within the spaces. Everywhere we looked, there were full crews of carpenters, electricians, and stagehands hard at work preparing for the next set. At times, I felt a bit like a pedestrian on a construction site, but no one seemed to mind us: they are likely used to random people walking about. We also spotted some unique staged statements scattered about meant for quick selfies from tourists. We obviously had to take a few for ourselves…

MFA Sound Design Students, 2019-2020

Next, we headed into the museum on the lot where technical aspects from titles in the Warner Brothers catalog were on display – from the beautiful gowns worn by Lady Gaga in A Star is Born (2018) to a scenic reproduction of Central Perk from Friends (1994-2004) or the forced perspective table used in The Hobbit (2012). Towards the end of our stroll through the museum we exited off into a small enclosed room. Here, the audio from the film Gravity (2013) was played in a stemmed format so that we could listen to the sound effects, recorded dialogue, and soundtrack independently. Afterwards, we listened to all three together to hear how the tracks were crafted to complement each other – the spatialized mixing in ProTools really brought everything to life. We concluded in, where else? The gift shop!

Costume pieces and props from A Star Is Born (2018)

One of the many stages located on the lot

Next, Alyson took us around for a peek at some of the various sound stages while we waited for the working Foley artists to go to lunch (we didn’t want to disturb them while they were working). There were dozens of various sizes (some akin to aircraft hangars), and most of them had full crews within loading in the next production or striking the previous one. Each stage has a unique placard located next to the entrance with a comprehensive list every title that had been worked on in that space. Then, we meandered through the main properties storage facility on-site which, to me, looked more like the best stocked antique store that you could ask for. Alyson said that this was a frequent haunt for her, as many of the items required for Foley could normally be considered props. We finally came full circle, ending up back at the commissary where we departed for the recently vacated Foley studio.

The Foley studio, which was underground in the post-production facility, was comprised of a main room where all of the actual Foley would take place, a kitchenette-style area with large tubs for water work, a smaller side room dedicated for storage, and a control room complete with studio-grade recording equipment. From Alyson’s description, three artists would be working in the facility for a given project – two Foley artists and a mix engineer. She also let us in on some of the more… unique sounds that she has had to come up with over her career, like the use of semi-frozen gelatin to capture the likeness of footsteps on an alien planet. The main space was full of odds and ends (all noisemakers), a pit full of sand, gravel and debris, and some great shotgun microphones. After she fielded our questions for a bit, we had a chance to make some noise of our own. Then, we headed upstairs towards the daylight and contemplated lunch. 

As the day ended, we headed out with Alyson to one of our favorite cafes right as an afternoon downpour swept over the city. We spoke more with her about some of the specifics of her work, but also what she enjoyed doing in her free time, ongoing hobbies, and the ever-present question of work/life balance. Something that I found insightful is that although longer hours are sometimes inevitable, her daily schedule was fairly regular with hours from around 8 am to 5 pm. After the rain let up a bit, we said our goodbyes and made our way back to Irvine.

All in all, it was a fantastic day full of spectacle and even more insight into a boundlessly creative line of work. Throughout the tour, one descriptor kept coming to my mind that perfectly encapsulated the career and underlined its inherent connection to live theatre - resourcefulness.

I’m incredibly grateful that we had a fantastic quarter in our Trends class last fall and that so much of it was able to be spent out in the field or exploring other industries within sound design; this final excursion was the perfect cherry on top.

Biggest of thank yous to Vincent Olivieri, Alyson Dee Moore, and all the wonderful folks at Warner Brothers.

Photos by Garrett Gagnon, Vincent Olivieri, and Meghan Roche.

Meet our new Sound Supervisor… Jeff Polunas!

After an extensive search, we are thrilled to announce that Jeff Polunas will be joining UCI mid-May as our new Production Sound Supervisor!



Jeff is thrilled to be retuning to UCI, where he received his MFA in Sound Design in 2012. Since graduating, Jeff previously served as Production Sound Supervisor at CSU-Fullerton for 5 years. Jeff is also a member of USA829 as a Sound Designer and has recently designed Shakespeare in Love and Sisters Rosensweig at South Coast Repertory. With over 125 designs to his credit, he has designed for the following theaters: South Coast Repertory, Antaeus, International City Theater, PCPA Theaterfest, Summer Repertory Theater, Atwater Village and many universities in Southern California. Jeff is also a member of the USITT MainStage Committee which he helps organize, install and run the Sound element of the MainStage events each year. Jeff is looking forward to working with the Graduate Students at UCI and helping mold future sound designers.


It's been a very long year since we lost our dear friend and longtime Sound Supervisor, BC Keller.  I would like to personally thank the following people for doing double-duty getting our shows up and keeping the shop from exploding:  our "unofficial" interim supervisors -- Kate Fechtig, Matt Glenn and Mark Caspary; our incredible grads -- Jordan Tani, Andrew Tarr, Ningru Guo, Hunter Moody, Jack Bueermann, Ben Scheff and Andrea Allmond; our Production Manager -- Keith Bangs; and the over-hire professionals from Diablo Sound.  You are all the very best, but thank goodness Jeff is on the way… and not a minute too soon!

-Mike Hooker

Wave Field Synthesis

In our Trends in Modern Sound Design class, we often begin the quarter by gathering a list of topics we are interested in learning and proceed to study them over the course of the term. One of our topics delved into how Dolby Atmos and realistic sound imaging function and thus we were tasked with the project of conceptualizing and building a system that could test the capabilities of Wave Field Synthesis. Wave Field Synthesis deals with the production of artificial wave fronts synthesized by a large number of loudspeakers. The process of creating these artificial wavefronts is to create a virtual starting point for these sources, recreating the source in the space (whether in or outside of the space itself) and being able to localize to that point regardless of the listener’s position within the room.

Andrew, Hunter, and Ning prepping the system

In determining how to properly navigate this project, we began by designing a robust surround system that could allow us to accurately create a wave field. As a team we ended up with a 20-channel surround system, designed in our classroom/lab space comprising of a mix of Meyer cabinets: UP-J, UP-Junior, MM4, and UP-4s. One of the most important factors we had to consider with a variety of cabinets was not only placing the speakers in the correct position on the rigging supports, but to ensure that each speaker was in line at the driver level.

We decided to use the Focusrite Liquid Saffire 56 for our routing needs. Once we ensured that every speaker had proper power and signal, we took SPL measurements via Smaart of each cabinet and recorded that data within a spreadsheet. Taking into account the different models of speakers, we needed to standardize the SPL from each cabinet to prevent sourcing to any one particular cabinet once signal is sent to every one.

From this point forward, there were two tasks that needed to happen in order to proceed: Generate data points corresponding to both attenuation levels and delay times for each speaker based off of an imaginary sound source, and an interface that could interpolate these data points and send sound to each speaker.

We decided to use Max/MSP to create a patch that could allow us to route audio and control all of these data points. This particular approach to the programming involved creating a 1x20 (in/out) monophonic mixer that could allow for setting initial Gain/Trim levels for each speaker and then have points to add our attenuation and delay times in. Visually, the patch began to take the shape reminiscent of a standard mixing console or related interface control software with movable faders and mutes for each individual channel.

Attenuation and Delay calculations - 4 locations 

In our first run, we began with a single file, Suzanne Vega’s vocal-only recording of “Tom’s Diner” and listened to how it behaved in our system. It was a very interesting experience, being able to hear and localize the sound but be unable to point to any one specific speaker as its source. Walking around the room, our placed sound retains its spot as if Suzanne Vega were singing in the room… floating above our heads (I’ll talk more about that in a few paragraphs).

Our next step tasked us with adding in multiple other sources to place within the room. New calculations were taken and stored in the data sheet, and a new version of the patch was programmed. In both learning how to navigate this particular system and understanding more of Max’s programming, I would continue to find oversights and weaknesses in the programming that would be fixed with updated versions. Though the patch worked completely fine, developing methods for increasing time efficiency and finding a way to create recallable presets became a priority.

In the next round of testing, we upgraded the programming to take four channels of audio and apply the calculations of four distinct points within the room. In Max, despite the seemingly chaotic visuals on screen, it was a simple duplication of the original 1x20 mixer, each taking a different channel of the audio and then being routed back out to the ~dac object. Playing the four channels, the imaging was once again very successful. Sounds were placed in the room, and the sense of distance and location was achieved very successfully.

WFS - Max Patch (4 source mixer)

Getting back to Suzanne Vega singing above our heads… in doing this process, we uncovered some of the holes in our initial methodologies for attaining calculations. The rig in our lab is built to be about 10’ above the ground, and thus any speakers hung would be anywhere from 8-10’ above our heads. Our calculations were taken via a 2D ground plan drawing, giving us the information for the X and Y axes. But because our speakers are in the air above our heads, we would also have needed to factor in Z axis information to properly achieve the exact measurement. As it stood, our measurements were taken in the same plane of the speakers, hence the floating Suzanne Vega. With that being said though, by standing on a ladder and becoming more level with the speaker plane, the imaging becomes even more realistic and stronger.


Things we took away from this project: Wave Field Synthesis is pretty amazing and very powerful. Creating the sense that someone could be singing or playing music from the room next door, and giving that same experience to anyone within that Wave Field is enthralling. The greatest challenge of this is resources. If we wanted to get an even better sense of realism, we would need an even larger amount of speakers in multiple planes: ideally one at head height, in the air, and overheads. Doing something like that is just not practical. If we had more time to play with the system, we would take recalculate and use a 3D model of the space to achieve the most accurate information  (and this is what would be needed for multiple planes of speakers too).

This project also brings up interesting ideas into how this can be incorporated into theatre or other productions of live performance. We would need to find a way to build the patch that allows for easy creations, saving, and recalling of multiple presets. In a theatrical environment, the biggest challenge is the programming is to be able to make quick changes immediately in the rehearsal room and more importantly the tech process. Developing an interface that can function like QLab could allow realistic spatialization to become easier.

Overall, while not perfect and with having no experience of the project prior to this, our experiments became an incredibly successful endeavor that yielded a lot of valuable knowledge that we hope to apply once again in the future, in both theatrical mediums as well as any other immersive sound system. 

- J

Welcome to our MFA, class of 2020!

UCI Drama is excited to present our two incoming students for next year: Hunter Moody and Jack Bueermann!  

Hunter is native Arkansan, and he first discovered the fascinating world of sound design in his undergraduate years. After graduation, he set out for eastern Kentucky to join the 2013 summer season of Jenny Wiley Theatre as the A2. With the advent of potential full-time work in 2015, he was promoted to resident sound and graphic media designer. He has since designed the sound for and engineered over thirty productions between JWT and the budding University of Pikeville Theatre program. Hunter has developed extensive experience in educational theatre, working with the Jenny Wiley Footlights Theatre, a pre-professional TFYA program, and guest lecturing at the University of Pikeville. Outside of theatre, he has designed sound for dance, voice-over, and competition, with experience in audio engineering for concert venues, church events, and live comedy. His research interests include the historical contexts of music, the psychoanalytic effects of sound upon memory and mood, and innovations in audio production technology. In his free time, Hunter is an avid video gamer and loves (trying) to bake. He has a BFA in Theatrical Design/Technology from Arkansas State University.

Jack recently graduated from the University of Redlands, where he designed multiple major productions. Since graduating, he has worked professionally as an assistant sound designer in the Los Angeles area. More recently, he has been working as the A1 at the San Diego Repertory Theatre where he mixed the world premier of Hershey Felder's Our Great Tchaikovsky. Jack is passionate about theater and story-telling through sound, and is excited to collaborate with the talented faculty and students at UCI.

We had a number of excellent applicants this year, and Mike and I are both thrilled and Jack and Hunter will be joining us in the fall.  Be on the lookout for great things from them both!