Welcome to Alumni Live: The Podcast.

These are conversations with Grand Valley State University film and video

graduates about the industry, the film/video major and alumni profiles.

Hello, this is Joe McCargar and welcome to another episode

of Alumni Live: The Podcast.

I, used to teach in the School of Visual Media Arts or the

Department of Visual Media Arts, just retired about five years ago.

But I'm glad I'm back and I'm here to introduce one of the students

of that program, Dennis Dembeck.

We would like to talk a little bit about his life and what he can offer you as

far as his experience and his insights.

So, Dennis, are you there?

Hey.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Happy to be talking about some sound here.

Let's start with the near present.

You mentioned in a note that you originally started in New York and then

more or less recently moved out to LA.

Can you talk about that just a little bit?

Yeah.

So, in school when I was in the film program in Grand Valley,

I was concentrated on sound.

I knew I wanted a career in sound.

And at the time there was tax breaks in Detroit, and I was hoping

something would work out near there.

That's where I grew up, outside of Detroit.

But nothing was happening.

So, I decided to move to New York because I had an aunt and uncle in the city and

they offered to let me stay with them until I could get my feet on the ground.

So I went out there, got some internships, and eventually got hired at a studio

and it's a pretty long saga story of my whole time in New York, but I was

there for 10 years I moved to New York right after graduating in 2013.

Recently moved to LA with my wife, who's from California, and kind

of figuring things out here, now.

I've been here for two years.

I've been working, but I'm a freelancer now, in New York.

I was staff at some facilities.

That's the short story, but I'm happy to dig into any details here.

All right.

What would you say about the environment that you were in at Grand Valley?

Is there an event or a series of events or a setting that got you

started on this path in this craft?

Sure, yeah, I started Grand Valley as a undecided major.

I was just doing core classes and a friend of mine was a film

student I was really into music.

I was in a bunch of bands growing up and I started getting into

film score music on my own.

And I was like, well, maybe I'll try out this film program and see if I

can pursue that and that's how I got into the program . Like from the start

I kind of concentrated on, hopefully pursuing a music career in some way.

And what started the transition to more just sound?

Sure.

So, after graduating Grand Valley, I moved to New York City and got an internship

at a studio that had both a music and sound department, and I was getting

placements on TV, but I was making, like, fractions of pennies on royalties.

It was kind of laughable.

And I started to check out what the sound guys were doing.

They had a lot more work and were a lot more busy, and they let me get

involved and my career kind of took a turn into sound mixing, sound editing,

which was much different than the composing path I was on at the time.

So there's work in sound.

Yeah.

From the start, it's always been, I don't wanna say a struggle, but

everyone is constantly concerned about the future of sound.

But we all live to tell the tale.

I'm continuing to find work, which is good.

But that cloud of like, what's happening with the industry, has been there from

the start of my career till today.

I don't know if that'll ever go away.

How long was the transition, when you got there, before you started

seeing results, so to speak?

To New York or-- so to New York, I got an internship before I moved.

So I was cold-calling studios, emailing studios, and seeing

if they had internships, and I found a studio called Flavorlab.

They had a program, I interviewed over Skype.

I don't know if anyone uses Skype anymore or if it still exists, it

was basically Zoom at the time.

And yeah, they offered me an internship and that actually was before I

officially moved, cause there was a program that we did at Grand Valley

where a lot of students were going to LA, I chose to go to New York

'cause I had my aunt and uncle there.

So I interned at Flavorlab for three months, for a summer.

And then I came back, did my senior year of Grand Valley, graduated.

And then I actually called that studio back, seeing if they would

take me back as an intern again.

And then that's when I officially moved to New York.

It was an unpaid internship.

I didn't have rent to pay ' cause I was living with my aunt and uncle.

So that was a very fortunate situation.

That helped me out a lot until I eventually got hired there and

still didn't make much money.

Once that occurred, what was the trajectory of that?

So yeah, I started out as an unpaid intern at the time and to make

that work, I also got a job at a restaurant, but that's another story.

So at the internship they had me basically sitting in

on sessions, observing a lot.

They had me going out and field recording the city, going around New

York City, getting a bunch of recordings that they were using for movies they

were working on, things like that.

That was a lot of fun.

And they would give me like, test projects.

They'd let me mix things that they had already done and give me comments and

notes and how to improve and give me a little insight on what they're doing.

But basically, this was in exchange for client services, so I also was doing the

coffee runs and making sure there was snacks for clients and things like that.

That was the give and take.

I was doing that kind of work in exchange for a learning experience, so to say.

And I thought it was fair at the time I didn't feel like I was getting

taken advantage of by any means, I was learning a lot and I wanted to be there.

And eventually it led to a job getting hired there.

I'm interested too in what would people there working with you say was, " here's

what you're trying to do." How does sound work in combination with the picture?

So I mean, sound is very important, I was thinking a little bit

about this the other day.

I was working on a project, an animation that involved a spaceship

and I did a whole workup on it and sent it to the director.

And the director got back and basically told me that we need to

really portray that this spaceship is junkie and on its last leg.

And what I worked up was just kind of generic, like a good starting point.

But after he talked about how he needs it to be junkie, I started

incorporating sounds like forklifts and like old car engines with

squeaky belts and things like that.

And once those sounds start to go into the project, you start to laugh and it creates

an emotion and a vibe of what's happening.

Rather than just a spaceship flying around it's almost like its own character.

And so sound can go in a lot of different directions.

In this case, we were going for junkie, but even without the picture

changing, sound can sort of push the audience in different ways, different

emotions, which is really fun.

You can also go down the wrong path and create a lot more work for yourself.

So it's really good to communicate with, directors and clients

and what their vision is.

Yeah, why don't you make a list like a thumbnail sketch of the

positions in sound in a typical movie.

Yeah.

So, in a movie, well, so that's the thing.

There's movies, there's commercials, there's corporate, but like in

a movie, you know, you have your editors, there's the dialogue editor,

sound effects editor, music editor.

There's the sound supervisor who's in charge of the sound, and he's usually

hiring his editors to work under him.

And he's managing the politics, the logistics, the people, and

also edits as well sometimes.

And then once the movie comes together through editing, then it goes to the

mix stage where you have the mixers touching the faders, setting the

levels, making it sound like a movie.

And then, yeah, and then there's the commercial world where, there's not

so much a huge sound team, but there might be a couple people like, oh,

there's assistant sound editors who get all the material from the production

and organize it and set it up.

That's an entry level sound position where they're organizing material

for the more senior sound people.

You learn a lot through organizing and workflow and you're setting

yourself up for anything that goes wrong, you will be able to figure

out through just constant experience.

Yeah.

there are lots of organizational frameworks for

the people that you work for.

And I was wondering what kind of differences are there from

corporation to corporation or organization to organization in

in terms of your responsibilities?

Well, so there's small studios, big studios.

Most people in the sound world are freelancers and the sound world works

where there's sound supervisors who are the ones getting hired by the studios,

and then those supervisors need to build their teams or they already have

their teams of people who they hire.

And so like moving out to LA, I had to start introducing myself to these sound

supervisors, because those are the people who will ultimately hire me as an editor.

And another path would be to make friends with producers and

you could become a supervisor.

But you know, that's a long shot, especially on big projects.

So you know, you gotta start small, like you start working with people on short

films and you kind of grow with those directors, those producers, and hope that

everyone's careers start to take off.

So there's a little bit of a difference between what you might call a staff

engineer who works for the company and the engineer who is hired by

that, maybe by that staff person.

Yeah.

And then these facilities also have staff sound people and a lot of them are techs.

And that's how I actually was hired at Harbor as a tech, setting up the

stages, setting up the sessions, doing all the workflow so that way, the

mixers come in, sit down, mix until time's up, then they stand up and leave.

And then you kind of, as a tech have to break everything down.

And what's great, you know, I've worked at small studios and big studios and the

smaller studio I worked at was awesome because you kind of get your hands dirty

in every corner of the business it's not, you're not just working on sound.

I was doing billings and bookings and, client services and I learned

how to like run a, business, through working at the smaller studio.

But then when I got to the bigger studio, it was more of an assembly line

where it's like, you have your role.

And so it's really important to be aware of the operation and what's

happening around you because you're just doing your one little thing

and you can get stuck in that.

you kind of want to, just observe and learn how the

operation ultimately is working.

In general, what do you like about the work?

I mean, it's a very creative field.

I like that part of it, but it's also very technical field.

And, there's a lot of problem solving, with both creative

issues and technical issues, and it can be like a game sometimes.

When you talk about problem solving, can you give a real quick example?

Sure.

I mean, well, there's creative problems that need to be solved for projects,

creating a emotion of of a film through sound, and also, technically, things

go wrong all the time, especially when you're working on, a mix stage with

the whole crew of people and things kind of fall outta place and you gotta

keep the show rolling, in some way.

You kinda have to get creative technically, how to fix

things or work around things.

Speaking of fixing things and working around things, is there a project that you

took on that was , especially gratifying?

And why was it that way?

Well, gratifying in what way?

Like, it was a really fun project that also accomplished

a really significant goal.

The great thing about at least, my career so far is, you know, every

project has its own challenges and, it's like a fresh start with every project.

And I find that refreshing.

Can you remember that one project that just was super proud,

you know, of what you did.

Yeah, I mean, I guess the most difficult project I was on, and probably the

biggest project in general as terms of scale or whatnot, was a Netflix

movie called No Hard Feelings.

Jennifer Lawrence was the star in it.

And it was a big Sony Pictures movie that would normally get mixed in LA and

I was in New York at the time, and so this movie came to New York and we were

working weekends till midnight and I don't think we got a day off for a month.

It was a lot of hard work, but I learned a lot on that job.

A lot of things went wrong.

A lot of things went right.

It was just a, really big, task.

But felt good to get through it.

There was a lot of politics involved on that film where, it would, like I said,

would typically be a big LA production, so the producers were skeptical

of us New York guys working on it.

And I remember the producers were in the room deciding whether or not we continue

working or they were going to take it away from us and, give it to somebody

in LA and that was really stressful.

But we proved ourselves and made everyone happy at the end.

See, I think that's something that, most people trying to get into the business

need to know that, as much skill as you need with the gear and the concepts and

all that stuff, there's this thing called, I guess you would call it, politics.

I think there should be a class on politics at school.

As far as what you're just saying, it's so important in the real world and we

get thrown into the fire, and don't really see it coming after graduation.

Yeah, that's a really important point.

And that's, again, that's beyond the button pushing and the level getting,

and the actual recording is knowing how to be a diplomat and that type of thing.

Yeah.

You mentioned a particularly gratifying project.

I've had experience both in film sound and music and whatever that I

like to call the "Project from Hell."

Does one of those pop up into your mind?

I know the Projects from Hell definitely, still, I remember.

Well, I would say that project I explained was both the most

gratifying and the Project from Hell.

The reason is I think I mentioned this, is like we didn't have any time

off, and I'm in the union and luckily, we get paid overtime and stuff.

And then I ended up getting really sick on that job.

I got the stomach flu and I had to go to the hospital right in

the middle of the project, so yeah, that job was a nightmare.

So that's the thing is like, we were so beat up, but then,

you know, you get taken care of financially, I guess, which is nice.

But I also learned so much.

That movie was an Atmos job.

I don't know if that's something really discussed at school, but Atmos

is a theatrical, sound set up, with a lot of channels and speakers and

working in that format was really cool.

Let me ask, did some of your abilities make that transition from stereo to

surround to atmos a little easier?

It's learning along the way.

I mean, it's really, like I said, getting thrown into the fire with things.

You know, it's about , not saying no, even if you're not confident in yourself.

It's about just going into it and learning along the way.

Every project there's something new that is learned, you know?

And sometimes it's a big step, like going from stereo projects to five

one projects, to then atmos projects.

What was great is, there was always support.

Especially working at facilities.

I was around a lot of smart people and was able to learn from them, and that's

been my struggle being a freelancer.

I'm kind of on my own, solving my own problems, so I don't have that

community like I used to have.

Right.

as a rule, can you expect that type of nurturing environment as

you get into it, do people help?

Most people in the sound career are freelancers.

I think I was in the minority to be staff at a facility.

So I think a lot of people need to learn on their own and, figure things out.

But what's great is there's so many great online communities, like I'm a

part of this, Sound Slack, that, if I have any questions or anything, I

can go to the Slack, ask a question.

So many people respond right away.

And, so yeah, we live in a time where there's community out there

available if you're looking for it.

I think that's an important point that it's out there now.

I used to call it in my class, we live in magic times

where, it's there immediately.

Did you find yourself making use of online resources?

Both early on and clearly currently.

So yeah, early on, no, I was kind of in the bubble of the studio

I was at and around the people.

But I didn't feel like I was deprived of anything, like, I was learning a

lot and it wasn't until I became a freelancer, then that's when I really

started to reach out for any sort of online community to keep me connected.

We're taking a short break to tell you about the Dirk Koning

Memorial Film and Video scholarship.

Here's Gretchen Vinnedge remembering Dirk Koning.

The Koning Scholarship enables students to get that kind of an education, to be

a good filmmaker, to be able to express their voice and to continue Dirk's dream.

For more information, and to donate to the scholarship, visit

the link in the description.

Now, back to the show.

So you've moved to LA.

What kind of signature changes were there from New York?

Yeah.

So in New York I was working at a facility called Harbor.

The move to LA happened because my wife's family is here and

she wanted to be closer to them.

So we decided to go for it.

We moved to LA.

I quit my job at the studio and became a freelancer.

It felt like I started my career over after being, you know, a decade into it.

I had to make new contacts, it's almost like, I'm graduating

again and, figuring things out.

And how do you think that your personality, I guess you'd say, because,

I know that this is a common experience where all of a sudden you're freelancing,

how did you, make that transition?

What about you, I guess you would say, allowed you to go back into the

freelance world, the market, and then be able to transit back into, I guess

you might say corporate recording.

It was just a lot of, soul searching, I guess, and reflecting and then also

figuring out like, what do I do now?

And figuring out a new city, and it was sending out a lot of emails,

setting up a lot of meetings, and it's all about who you know.

Like, I've always heard that saying it's all about who you know, and it's so true.

And I never had to worry about that, being staff at sound facilities.

I'd just show up to work and do the work and yeah, being a

freelancer, you got to know people.

You gotta know your clients, and it's a lot about putting yourself out there.

It's uncomfortable, but, you get better at it with, doing it more and more.

I often mention to people that a lot of it is just tenacity, and just

not letting the barricades stop you.

Yeah, I know.

it's hard to take a break and, it's also hard to be working and then

also looking for the next project and it's kind of hard to juggle that.

But yeah, you just kinda push yourself.

Get through it.

Is there something, about, your skills and your personality as a whole that

makes you well-suited to the work?

And that's, like, all aspects of the work.

What is it about you that, if you had a son or daughter that you wanted to

get into this world, what is it about you that you wanna pass on to them?

Yeah.

The sound world in general is both creative and technical and I

think you really need to have the creative side and the technical side.

' Cause if you just have one, I think you can only go so far.

The top sound guys out there, they are the most creative people, but

they're also the most technical problem solving people that I know.

Cause a lot of stuff can go wrong technically on jobs and doesn't matter

if you have some sort of creative vision, you're not doing anything with the

technology not working for you, you know?

And, I guess I'd say too, what about your experience at Grand Valley

prepped you for this type of, mindset?

Yeah.

Well, so some advice I could give for students at Grand Valley, I don't know

if there are a lot of sound students.

Hopefully there are, but for me what prepped me was going out of the classroom,

talking to fellow students who are working on projects and asking to do the

music or the sound of their projects.

So sure, I had my own projects I had to do, but then really getting that extra,

practice in by doing other people's sound.

If you're just working on your own projects, you're in your own head.

Once you start working on other people's projects, you start, creating a dialogue

between other people and following their visions rather than your own.

And sometimes there's disagreements on how things should be done, but

ultimately it's, it's the director's vision, and you sort of learn how

to create other people's worlds.

Yeah.

And you're basically translating someone's idea or vision into

another medium in a sense.

Yeah.

And so, yeah, at Grand Valley, I think most of my experience came through

just working on other people's films.

So that would be good advice.

As soon as you get some, competence, start going out at that level,

at the education level, and just dropping yourselves into this and,

getting that practical experience.

Yeah.

Yeah, and I'm trying to think if it could apply to other, you

know, not just sound and music.

But yeah, I'd really encourage students to work on as many projects

as they can, even if it's not their own, to just get the experience.

And once you're there, what did you do to help you start the

staircase, move your way up from, smaller projects to larger projects?

Yeah.

Well, a lot of that is luck.

I mean, to answer your question would be to not say no to any projects.

Cause you never know, even if it's a small project that you think, " this

is gonna be a waste of my time, I don't need to do this." You never know.

The people you're working with could end up being big time directors

or producers in five years.

You never know where your path is gonna take you.

I try to not say no to projects unless I'm really super busy, but even when

I am busy, I try to fit stuff in at night and just constantly try to meet

new people and work on new things.

If you could make a list here, what advice would you give to people who

wanna pursue this work, and what kind of a person do you have to be

to make it, enjoyable and worthwhile?

I actually wrote a lot of this down, 'cause I think this is

important to mention a few things here, for students graduating.

For one, I think your mindset of starting out and, just being

curious and wanting to learn.

Not being a know-it-all, I guess because when I was working at

Flavorlab, one of the facilities in New York, I was in charge of hiring

interns and the best interns were the students that wanted to learn and

said, I don't know how this works.

Because everyone there wanted to help and show and teach.

Surprisingly, there were a lot of students that were kind of like,

know-it-alls and wanted to prove that they knew more than you.

And in some cases, hey, maybe they, did know more than me at some things.

But that attitude doesn't take you far.

It's kind of a turnoff.

And then people don't really wanna help you grow.

We had a similar situation where we invited one of our former students when

I was at the studio, just to talk a little bit, just as you're doing, and

I said if there's one thing that you want people to know about getting into

this business, it was really simple.

He said, " Be nice."

Yeah, you know, being nice helps you make friends, and everyone's

kind of hiring their friends.

That's how you get work.

Speaking of which, you know Grand Valley folks out there.

Can you name a couple of them and look back a ways?

Sure.

Yeah.

So, my closest friend out here is probably Casey Burr, who graduated with

me, and he's a really successful props guy and he's on a lot of movie sets, and

working on a lot bigger projects than me.

But yeah, in the props department, and I know he has

a lot of fun with what he does.

I know.

Michael Johnson's out here.

I haven't, reached out to any of these people.

I know Michael Johnson's out here.

Angelica Lobo, is out here.

Gustavo Rosa.

Yes, I remember these names.

I'm just kind of going off the top of my head of who graduated with me.

That's all I can really think that's out here right now.

But I, I owe them a text or something.

I don't even think they know that I'm out here.

It's a big place.

Yeah.

Any other advice?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I got more.

I think a big one is moving away from home.

I grew up outside Detroit and I don't think my career in sound

would've went far staying in Detroit.

I went to New York City and, yeah, you just have to go where the action is.

So like, New York, LA, other places that have tax breaks, so I guess

Georgia and New Mexico now, and I don't really know what's going on there.

I'm just kinda spitballing here, but really like going

where things are happening.

Have to have a little sense of adventure.

Right, yeah.

the thing is, is like, not everyone has, like, I had an aunt and uncle I could

stay with in New York, and not everyone has family or friends in these places.

So it's important to maybe buddy up with a fellow student who you're close with

at school and maybe move out together, and then you have that support, you know,

split rent, figure things out together.

You don't have to do it on your own.

So yeah, students could figure it out that way.

And, oh, so this reminds me, Joe, you had this, exercise in your

class where you had us email a successful sound person, I guess.

And I remember you saying, like, " these guys aren't famous.

They're just normal people." And it's so true.

even these really successful guys, if you send them an email, you don't always hear

back, but more chances than, you know, you do hear back and, they're happy to give

advice or even get coffee or whatever.

So that's what I've been doing out here is just emailing people, seeing if

someone's free for a coffee or for lunch.

and that's how I've been meeting people and getting some opportunities.

But yeah, I remember in your, class, you had us email somebody and I emailed

a composer who I looked up to and he actually got back to me, which I was

surprised, but he said he was super busy and I wasn't able to talk to him.

but yeah, that's a start.

You know, you just start reaching out.

And I think too, you kind of put it in reverse in the sense of

not asking them, is there work out there, do you know anybody?

But, I often said, have them tell you about what they do and that

gives them a chance to give you information by talking about themselves.

So, Yeah, I think everyone might have their own kind of

like, pickup line, I guess.

For me it was really letting it be known that I'm new in town, I don't

know anybody, and I'm really just trying to meet people and get outta the house

and sure enough, I connected with some people who were between projects and

happy to get lunch and now I know a whole bunch of people out here now.

It doesn't always lead to work, but like I said, you don't know

when something is gonna happen.

Like, you meet somebody two years ago, they might call you tomorrow.

You know, you never know when the phone's gonna ring.

You know, there's a lot of luck and fate involved, I think in my

path and I didn't mention that.

So when I was interning at Flavorlab, I got the internship through just a

cold call, but then I wasn't really able to support myself or pay for rent.

I kind of like, outgrew my welcome with my aunt and uncle.

And I ran into I don't know if remember Neil Brower, who

was a student at Grand Valley.

We ran into each other on the street and we didn't know each other were living

in New York, and he needed a roommate.

And rent was cheap, it was a funeral home actually.

We were living above a funeral home.

And so we got a beer on the spot and I was like, all right, let's move in.

So that kept me afloat for a little longer, and then I ended up graduating,

my master's, and was gonna move back to Michigan and figure things out.

And I was on a flight coming back to New York from Michigan.

And the guy sitting next to me is putting his luggage overhead in the

bin and dropped his luggage on my head and he was super apologetic.

And I would've never said a word to this guy if this never happened, but

he was chatting me up because he was so sorry for dropping his luggage on

me and he ended up asking what I do, I told him I work in sound and one of

his best friends was a higher up at Harbor, which was a facility I worked

at in New York and put me in touch with him, and I got a job through that.

Fate!

I know.

And so there's so much luck and stupid, like, where did this even come from?

You know?

I don't know what to call it.

I had plans to move back to Michigan.

And then that kept me in New York for another six years and I ended

up meeting my wife and all that.

It's just like totally turned my life.

It took it down a different path than I was planning on.

Did you think about grad school and if so, what came out of that?

So, yeah, I did go to grad school after Grand Valley, I went to NYU.

At the time, I was still trying to be a composer, and so I went

into the music technology program, but was trying to focus on music.

At the time, this is when VR headsets were coming out and things like that.

And I thought for sure this was gonna be the future.

So I was focusing on immersive audio.

And yeah, it never really took off the way I thought it was going to.

So in that sense, like, I don't wanna say my time was wasted there

'cause things ended up working out.

But yeah, I spent all my effort focusing on immersive audio, especially

for like VR, AR, things like that.

And I thought it would be so much more integrated in our lives.

Like it's still growing, but I mean, this was 10 years ago,

this was like 2014 2014 you know?

it just never took off the way I thought it was.

And, to be honest, I didn't need to go to grad school to get to where

I'm at now, so it's kind of hard to say if it's necessary or not.

I did meet some really cool people.

I mean, I met my best friend at grad school , so there's things like that.

If you were to ask me if grad school is worth it, I would say yes.

Just for that friendship, it was worth it.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, it's interesting that you talked about VR and to this point,

it hasn't really taken off yet, but there's this other thing that's really

taking off, Artificial Intelligence.

How do you come down on that?

Yeah, I mean so far, at least in the sound world, AI has just been a helpful tool.

It hasn't really replaced us.

It's made things easier, more exciting 'cause you're able to fix

things that you didn't think were fixable and you're like, holy crap.

something that completely sounded awful can now sound halfway decent.

As far as AI generative stuff, I've played around with a few things,

and I'm sure it'll get there to the point where, it's creating really

good sounds and things like that.

I think you're still gonna need an editor to edit these sounds.

'Cause at least in my career, directors can be so picky and they

can have tunnel vision of their.

vision, so like, AI can generate something in a ballpark, but ultimately

it's gonna need to be honed and I think you're always gonna kind

of need someone to guide the AI.

I don't know.

I don't know how good it's gonna get.

That's what's scary about it.

I thought it was interesting that you said it's a great tool,

Yeah.

And in my world, that's the way we're thinking about it too.

Someone just did a pretty extensive, article asking people

who were in the audio business, how is this gonna affect us?

And that was just what you said.

it's a tool.

Now, as of now,

Right.

But,

you know, who knows where it's gonna go.

There's so many different AI things coming out, so I don't even know what

this one's called, but I just watched something with Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise

fighting on top of a building that was created with a prompt, and, and

it looked real, sounded like them.

It would've cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to do that scene, but

they did it for free with a prompt.

So that's, scary for sure.

And the sound sound effects were included in it.

That incident got a lot of press.

Yeah, so you guys probably saw it too.

But yeah, I like to think that people want the human touch, and hopefully

that keeps the industry going.

It's scary.

But, I'm not sure if I mentioned it earlier, but since the start of my career

in sound, it's always been a scary career.

I think you kinda have to accept that going into it.

It's just gonna be a lot of unknowns, you know?

I think that's a good point.

It's certainly been my experience.

Yeah.

But here we are, still at it.

As kind of a wrap up, if you were to go back and talk to your 2014 2014 self,

13. Well, I graduated 13, but clo, yeah.

Close enough.

And you had advice for that young man starting out the next stage

of his life, what might that be?

It was that, you know, things aren't going to work out the way you think

they will, for better and for worse.

And so a lot of life happened from graduation until now.

A lot of good things, a lot of bad things.

My path is constantly going whichever way, and, I still don't

even feel settled in my career.

And I think you have to learn to accept that it's a bumpy ride.

And, I do it because I love what I do.

If I wasn't cool with this lifestyle, I would've found something else

by now, but this is what I love.

And it can be uncomfortable and everything's not gonna work

out the way you might picture it for better or for worse.

Like, things can take off in awesome ways and they have for me.

And then there's also a lot of upsets.

So there's a lot of ups and downs.

Well, it sounds like life to me.

Yeah,

it is.

we really appreciate you sharing this with us, and we hope that the

people who ultimately hear this, get a good understanding because you

have certainly given the information needed for a good understanding

of this business, the art and the craft, and we really appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

I love to talk about this stuff and I'd love to meet some students who

are interested in sound and hopefully answer some questions they might have.

Well, you'd be a fantastic resource.

Thank you for being with us and being in our world.

I wish you the best.

It's so great to see your face and to talk to you and we will be in touch.

Yeah,

Thank you.

Thank you.

See ya.

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