DEFINITION February 2018

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GRAND TOUR 2 AUDIO

THE GRAND SOUND DESIGN Season Two of The Grand Tour needed extra audio to build more of a sound design for the post-production

WORDS JULIAN MITCHELL PICTURES AMAZON VIDEO

efore The Grand Tour ’s first season aired, Definition wanted to max our coverage of the programme. We saw it as the ultimate technical televisual undertaking; our coverage concentrated on the major move to 4K with the team who transferred from Top Gear to this new world of higher resolution production. Our coverage spanned seven pages in the end with another three in a later issue when we talked about the Minicams. Now Season Two is here and we wanted to revisit the series perhaps in a smaller, more specific way. For Season One we only touched on the all-important audio side so we decided to find out how location sound supervisor Russell

was looking to increase the gear in certain areas for the second season. “The sound basics for Season Two are all exactly the same. I was especially happy with the Sound Devices system; we bought a few MixPres as well and included a few of those in the show because they are just easy to slot in, in case effects are required – they’re the new Sound Devices MixPre-3 and 6.”

Edwards was going to change things. Season One, however, went very well. “We had a meeting after Season One principally about how we could improve the technical system and make it a lot easier for everyone,” says Russell. “But the overall thought was that Season One went really well, mainly because we’ve all got so much experience in this kind of genre that any problem was quickly remedied. “However, we did have to adapt to the 4K and the new equipment that keeps coming out including the sound department transferring to Wisycom’s radio mics. But I think the meeting didn’t last that long as we were all happy with how it all went.” Wrapping up the Season One analysis Russell

THE SOUND BASICS FOR SEASON TWO ARE ALL EXACTLY THE SAME

ABOVE Audio for Season 2 of The Grand Tour was more of a sound design than Season 1.

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FEBRUARY 2018 DEFINITION

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