Freelance sound supervisor Louise Willcox on mixing live sport and winning a BAFTA for the BBC's Watches By Heather McLean, Editor Monday, May 23, 2022 - 14:03
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Louise Willcox is a highly experienced freelance sound supervisor at DWR Associates
We caught up with UK-based Louise Willcox, freelance sound supervisor at DWR Associates, a business aimed at solving audio and communications problems for the broadcast and business world run by Willcox and her husband. We spoke about the ins and outs of her career, which has taken her from mixing live sports coverage to the BBC's Autumnwatch, part of the annual BBC series known as The Watches.
What are some key projects you've done with outside broadcast firms companies?
It's true that I've been fortunate enough to work with some great companies, many of which are OB companies who've employed me for sporting fixtures such as football, hockey, rugby, motor racing and horse racing.
For NEP in 2021 I was one of three sound supervisors for Wimbledon, where all of the consoles I used were Calrec consoles and were all connected to a private network. The network administrators set up protocols giving consoles access to their areas only. I used Calrec Summa consoles for the outside courts and Apollos and an Alpha for the show courts.
When I'm responsible for planning the whole job, I research the most efficient mode of delivery for audio signals. I take advice, I offer up alternatives to the planning engineering manager - who manages budget and then agree with the them what kit I will use
The outside court mixes managed similar facilities including court FX mics, commentary and EVS. Most consoles were managing audio for two courts at the same time; the outside courts, which were traditionally directed with camera operators, and the trace courts, which used the trace tracking system camera automation.
Trace courts were spot monitored' during the day. The Show' Courts are Centre, Court 1 and Court 2. I scheduled the same relief sound supervisor to a show court for the duration of the competition, where, for outside courts, all three worked in all areas.
Centre and Court 1 consoles were Apollos, and Court 2 employed an Alpha console. The basic coverage was the same as it was for the outside courts with the addition of a larger court mic and crowd FX rig; more track sends to EVS record area, on-court interviews after each match (more auxiliaries for IFBs, and feeds between the broadcast console and PA), and many more EVS replay channels. Two of Calrec's Artemis consoles came in very handy for the Wimbledon Channel and World feeds.
The Summa console is excellent; the delay resources were powerful enough to match the considerable latency of Trace court pictures. Things like cloning and VCA functions allowed users to create bespoke layers, leaving pro-forma layers untouched. The touchscreen on the Summa is easy to understand and quick to learn to operate. Fader and upstand labelling, as well as upstand metering, made interpreting the different desks easy; some court facilities varied a little.
Dock10 also hired me to be part of the team that covered (what I call) the virtual Tokyo Olympic Games' for BBC Sport. All of the commentary was done in Salford; only post-event in-vision interviews at venues were live from Tokyo. I was relief mixer available to cover HQ3's (Harbour Quay) live coverage and presentation from their virtual green screen studio. I was actually based in HQ 4, submixing commentary, and voice-over recordings, as well as available to trouble-shoot anything for the team.
HQ2 and HQ3 had 56-fader Apollo consoles, each with split working Grams extension of another 16 faders. Above all, the Apollo's auto-mixer function was invaluable; with COVID social distancing in place, it managed the increased delayed spill' faster than I could!
The industry is moving towards IP-based solutions for audio control, networking and distribution. What is your experience with these changes and how are you experimenting and working with IP?
I have mixed live coverage of various football matches for Gravity Media, sitting in a little office in Manchester with feeds routed to a desk remotely by a team in London. The commentators were in a room next door; their signals were sent to London then routed back to me, next door. (I had a feed straight off their commentator units just in case.) The signals coming from the Olympic Games in Tokyo to Media City were via IP.
There are a lot more women working in professional audio now, many working in the northwest, Media City in particular, I've noticed. More of them have children, with child rearing more equally shared with their partners, and/or with a lot of help from parents. There is hope!
I helped the Institute of Production Sound set up an audio over IP (AoIP) training weekend, and have copious notes in my Idiots Guide folder on my PC! However, and to be frank, when I'm employed as a white gloves' sound supervisor, I plan what sources I want on the desk, and a guarantee engineer (wherever they may be based) route those sources to the desk for me to manipulate. They can be analogue, MADI or AES, and may originate from a myriad of sources.
When I'm responsible for planning the whole job, I research the most efficient mode of delivery for audio signals. I take advice, I offer up alternatives to the planning engineering manager - who manages budget and then agree with the them what kit I will use. I become an expert in a particular type of kit for the duration of a job, make copious notes, then mentally discard the information until the next time I'm a planning' sound supervisor. Technology is moving so fast I cannot be wedded to any particular technology or manufacturer.
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