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Spanish, Castilian & Catalan-Valencian-Balear Recording Trip
"The Story of Jesus for Children" December 8 to 16, 2000 by Kary Hagen
THE TEAM:
Spain, a country rich in history & culture, provided a rich
cultural & recording experience for producer, Brian Mytas,
myself and my daughter, Amanda. Our time in Barcelona lasted about
a week. We were in the province of Catalonia where both languages
are spoken. When Brian isn’t recording, he is training recording
techs. When I’m not traveling, I oversee the audio editors
& mixers in our JESUS Film studios. Amanda is in the 6th grade.
This was Amanda’s first "missions" trip, and she
raised the funds needed to cover her expenses. All things considered
it was a good trip & we secured good quality voice recordings
which will be blended with JESUS film recordings to produce 2
seamless language products for "The Story of Jesus for Children".
These were the 8th & 9th languages recorded for this product.
Trip photos are available on the web at www.gloryofgod.com/hagen/spainpix.
THE HISTORY1:
Spain was settled by the Iberians, Celts & Basques.
Later influences were Carthaginians, Romans, Visigoths and the
Moors from North Africa. In 1492 not only did Columbus arrive
to the New World, but Spain drove out the Moors & united under
a Christian king. Unfortunately, this same year Jews were driven
out of the country. Over the next centuries Spain colonized many
lands, and then gradually lost them in struggles for independence.
These lands include Mexico, parts of Central & South America,
The Netherlands, parts of Germany & Italy, Cuba, the Philippines
and Puerto Rico. The Spanish-American War of 1898 ended Spain’s
global ambition. A few African colonies remained until recent
times. In 1939, Francisco Franco became dictator. In 1975 Prince
Juan Carlos became king. Presently Spain is a constitutional monarchy.
TODAY1:
There are 39 million people in Spain, and 97 percent
practice Roman Catholicism. Barcelona is home to about 2 million.
THE LANGUAGES:
Our Campus Crusade, Spain staff who helped us with
script & logistics mentioned that dictator Franco would not
allow Catalan to be spoken in schools, so she learned it at home
where Castilian was not allowed! Presently Catalan is spoken in
parochial schools, and the goal is to put a Catalan "Story
of Jesus for Children" video in the hands of every parochial
school child. Please pray toward these ends. Catalan is an older
language than Castilian, whereas Castilian is the national language.
With France just over the mountains it’s easy to see why
there are close similarities between Catalan & French just
as there are between Catalan and Spanish. Catalan is the language
of the church in the northeast of Spain. One challenge with the
Catalan script translation is the balance between pure Catalan,
and the phrases that children would more naturally use. Pray that
the leadership of the schools & churches will approve our
Edit/Mix Approval Copy (EMAC), and approve the distribution for
the product as is.
THE RECORDING:
We arrived Saturday morning after not getting much sleep
on the plane. Amanda did get sick on the last leg of the flight
from Madrid, but there were no other health problems during the
entire trip thankfully! The actors demand double wages on Saturday,
so we did some shopping that afternoon. Sunday, the actors
do not work, so we took time for sightseeing around the city and
particularly at a nearby castle-fortress on a hill. Sunday night
we discussed our strategy and schedule for the recording &
review.
Monday we were allowed to set up in the professional studio "The Rock" which was only 2 blocks from our "Hotel Rekord" (how appropriate). This proved to be a very helpful convenience. After setting up the equipment and doing some test recordings, we were prepared for the first actor who was scheduled for after lunch. We powered down, and when we returned, our video card was not working—the card that feeds video from our computer to other TV monitors for the actors to see. Upon further testing it appeared that there was AC voltage on what should have been ground on the studio cable we hooked up to. I suppose that a voltage spike occurred during power down or power up that toasted the card.
Now we had an interesting challenge: the voice actor & dialog director would need to watch our laptop screen to synchronize the actor’s delivery to match the original picture. This meant that the recordist’s position instead of being in a separate control room (looking through a window) would be located 4 short feet away from our microphone.
Now add to this that we were testing a new microphone that was much more sensitive than our standard. Not only could we hear every wet mouth lip smack, but the "audio control processor" (ACP) fan and laptop fan were coming through loud & clear. So after recording about 10 or 15 loops we decided to bag the mic & go with our standard. This worked much better, but we still needed to do something about the fan noise. Moving the ACP further away was not an option, so we found a 3-foot square sheet of foam to cover it & that seemed to work. Now ¾ of our work day was gone by the time we got started with actual recording. To complicate things further, our dialog director and the studio had broken our script into what they call "takes" which are groupings of voices based on scene. Our system numbers every "loop" or phrase that an actor says. This loop data structure is in our computer & makes it very easy to call up any character or loop number & record. The two systems were not very compatible. Along with that, our method of recording, though very efficient, is not what many foreign studios are used to in that we typically record one voice at a time, except for crowd scenes. This helps us get just the right sound from each voice in the final mix. Other studios are used to having 2 or 3 actors being recorded at the same time, playing off each other.
All of these problems compiled & resulted in our meager result of 50 loops recorded by the end of our Monday. That night I called back to the states & asked for prayer support. Then we went to an internet café downtown & emailed over 100 people to ask for prayer.
Tuesday the prayers were evident. We hit our stride. Despite the differences in approaches to recording, the dialog director began to get used to our system, and we accommodated her by doing many loops at a time for each character. Brian & I would take turns recording over the long hours, and Amanda helped by checking off a list of what loops were recorded, and jotting any special note we should include in the software later for the editor & mixer to read before they worked on the project. My prayer for Tuesday was that we would make up for lost time. Tuesday, to God’s credit, we recorded nearly 300 loops!
Wednesday the studio was not able to schedule any actors, so our hopes of coming home early faded. We decided to make the most of the day. I spent a couple hours cleaning up the audio for what we had already recorded (editing), and applying a rough volume level mix to the material to assist our review to go smoothly. There are places in the kid’s version where Sarah will be narrating over John the Baptist, or other characters from the JESUS film, and for better evaluation it is best for those voices to fade down quieter. Our typical review has all loops at full volume. Wednesday afternoon we visited the "Temple of the Holy Family" a cathedral created by renowned Barcelona architect, Gaudi (http://www.op.net/~jmeltzer/Gaudi/eltemple.html). It is an unusual creation indeed. Gaudi never finished it & died in 1926. It does have an interesting portrayal of the birth, life, death & resurrection of Christ. Today Spain is working on finishing the temple, which may take another 50 years.
Thursday was another powerhouse recording day in which we nearly finished the job.
Friday we had our recording review with a 2 person review committee: the CCC National Director for Spain, and our Catalan speaking CCC, Spain staff member. The Castilian review went very smoothly since it was roughly edited & mixed. Catalan went fairly well also. Only two needed corrections were identified. There was also some discussion at length about the close of the story & what is appropriate for Spanish culture (and I would add European culture at large). For now, we will use the program as is. Friday evening we recorded the 2 corrections & the remaining loops of "Benjamin" in Castilian that the actor was unavailable for any other time.
Saturday we got up prepared to go home. 22 hours later
we were home in Florida & ready for bed. Amanda did very well
for her first international trip. I was very proud of her. It
was fun working with Brian, who happens to be a friend of our
family. Despite the difficulties, God moved in a big way &
reminded us to put our entire dependence on Him, and trust Him
in all things at all times. And all God’s people said, "Amen!"
1. Excerpts taken from "Kiss,
Bow, or Shake Hands" by Terri Morrison, Wayne A Conaway,
and George A. Borden, Ph.D.