When it comes to horror films, production teams work hard to find new approaches to scare audiences. Today, with Dolby Atmos and immersive sound growing in popularity, there are even more ways to give viewers a fright. That's exactly what Re-recording Mixer Jonathan Wales accomplishes for the horror shows and films on which he works, both as a freelancer and for Warner Brothers Studios.
Wales didn't set out to specialize in horror, but a 30-year-long career path brought him there. I tend to work on a lot of horror movies, he says. It wasn't supposed to be that way, but when you start doing something well, people notice, and you end up doing more of it. It was an accidental career path, but it's a fun genre to work in. Right now, there's probably an even amount of time spent between original series content and horror films and shows.
Among Wales' most notable mixing projects are Netflix projects like Haunting of Hill House, Midnight Mass and Fall of the House of Usher. His feature-length film credits include Insidious, The Red Door and The Black Phone. When he's not working on re-recording projects, Wales is also a scoring mixer and is credited with mixing the score for every Mike Flanagan project, from the first episode of Haunting of Hill House in 2018, forward.
Wales says he has also seen a change in the way directors and producers attack horror projects. Over the past five to 10 years, there has been an increasing trend towards mixing in Atmos as the primary format, he explains. That requires us to have solutions that handle a lot of detailed format conversions like upmixing and downmixing, while simultaneously managing level specs. That's how I've come to grow my relationship with NUGEN Audio.
Wales credits the brand's Halo Upmix as being one of his go-to tools. It sounds natural and you can control what it's doing in a very understandable way, he continues. It's one thing to be able to make tweaks in a plug-in, it's quite another to have them be predictable and do what you expect. That's one great benefit of NUGEN plug-ins. Another thing I like about Halo Upmix is that it has relatively low latency. Some upmixing plug-ins have incredible processing delays and that's not very useful. People in my line of work can't use extremely high-latency plug-ins while working in real-time.
Halo Upmix has become a staple on Wales' scoring work as well. It played a huge role on the Fall of the House of Usher,' he adds. I use it on all sorts of audio elements, including things you wouldn't expect like individual stereo background files. Sometimes I like to deploy it just to see what happens. With music especially, there are always songs we try to make sound bigger. One of the great things about this plug-in is when you expand a track and then later have to fold it back down, your efforts aren't working against you. There are plug-ins out there that do an okay job making tracks sound bigger, but when it comes time to make the tracks smaller, they start sounding really strange. Halo Upmix doesn't suffer from that problem. It's very up-down compatible. NUGEN was also one of the first companies that provided a way to fully upmix beyond 5.1, into Atmos, in a way that makes sense.
As many of Wales' latest projects are for Netflix, keeping his projects to spec has become especially critical. We use NUGEN's VisLM loudness meter as a sort of bible on level specs, he says. That plug-in is very important because it maintains a history of what you've been doing over the length of the program. So, if something isn't quite in spec, you can find the exact placement of the problem and go directly to that section to make corrections. The results are reflected in real-time, so you can decipher if you're making something better. It provides exceptional visual feedback of the information that you need.
Wales says NUGEN Audio's Halo Downmix is another of his go-to solutions. There are many downmix plug-ins, and, to some degree, they all do the same thing, but Halo Downmix actually gives you a level of base management control when going from 5.1 to stereo, he says. Its feedback also massively exceeds all other plug-ins. As we're having to cope with even larger formats folding down, I think Halo Downmix has become an increasingly important tool for me. It used to be that it didn't make a difference which fold-down software you used, but all the extra tools you get from Halo Downmix are very important and they have a good reason to be there.
As a longtime NUGEN user, Wales says Halo Upmix, Halo Downmix and VisLM those three plug-ins are in every template I have. There is no scenario where I'm not using them. The plug-ins are very well written, by people who really care. When you're using tools that are involved in your final delivery chain, that's really important.
Wales continues on, saying The plug-ins are also very efficient. They're not processor hogs that you can only use offline to experiment. When you get facetime with a director, you want to be able to make changes right there in real-time; these tools allow that. NUGEN is also very good at issuing updates for compatibility or corrections. That level of dependability is important. You want to use tools that you can trust, from companies that stand behind their solutions.
For more information about NUGEN Audio products, visit: https://nugenaudio.com.
North America Stories
26/03/2026
Extron and Audio-Technica have announced that their Design Solutions devices, Ce...
26/03/2026
SPORTEL Asia took place March 24-25 at the Orchard Hotel Singapore, drawing 370 participants representing more than 220 companies from 35 countries. Approximate...
26/03/2026
LTN will demonstrate satellite-to-IP migration solutions for broadcasters, cable networks, MVPDs, and station groups at NAB Show 2026 (Booth W2100).
The C-Ban...
26/03/2026
The Seattle Mariners have partnered with Daktronics to install an upgraded outfi...
26/03/2026
The Esports Foundation (EF) has awarded National Team Partner status to organizations and individuals across more than 100 countries and territories for the Esp...
26/03/2026
Telestream has announced expanded integration between its Vantage workflow platf...
26/03/2026
FOR-A Corporation has announced a partnership with Nippon TV and NVIDIA to distr...
26/03/2026
CBS Sports and the WNBA have expanded their partnership through a new long-term, multiplatform rights agreement. CBS Sports will feature up to 20 regular-season...
26/03/2026
Zac Brown Band will star in the Sunday Night Baseball show open on NBC and Peacock, NBC Sports announced. The open was filmed at American Family Field, home of ...
26/03/2026
Major League Baseball opens the 2026 season with nationally televised games across multiple media partners. Fans can visit MLB.com/Watch for a complete schedule...
26/03/2026
DIRECTV has announced an agreement to carry nine new MLB-operated team channels, covering the Cincinnati Reds, Detroit Tigers (Detroit SportsNet), Kansas City R...
26/03/2026
Nationals.TV, the Washington Nationals' local broadcast channel, is now avai...
26/03/2026
Starting Thursday, March 26, MLB.TV will be available on the ESPN App, giving fans access to more than 2,000 out-of-market regular season games. Fans can also r...
26/03/2026
By Matt Klein
Hello to everyone reading this - whether you're a current YEP, HPA member, or just YEP-curious. I'm Matt Klein, one of the co-chairs of t...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
28 participating companies, from start-ups to blue-chips, lead the UK Group as part of the GREAT Britain and Northern Ireland presence across all the Halls at N...
26/03/2026
Arkona Unveils BLADE//planner and Major Usability Enhancements at NAB 2026
Brie Clayton March 26, 2026
0 Comments
New graphical configuration tool and...
26/03/2026
Bitfocus showcases complete control at NAB Show 2026
Brie Clayton March 26, 2026
0 Comments
Continuing development drives advances in security, availa...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
26/03/2026
Nevion introduces powerful new Panel Builder to enhance VideoIPath broadcast con...
26/03/2026
2026 Oscar Nominated Films Powered by Blackmagic Design
Brie Clayton March 25, 2026
0 Comments
DaVinci Resolve Studio used on 27 of this year's no...
26/03/2026
Leader to present full suite of advanced Test & Measurement solutions at NAB Sho...
26/03/2026
Boston Conservatory to Present New England and Collegiate Premiere of Groundbrea...
26/03/2026
Back to All News
Have a Wish Worth Dying For? Netflix's First Korean YA Hor...
26/03/2026
Back to All News
The Truthers, Starring Jose Coronado and St phanie Magnin, Pre...
26/03/2026
Editor's note: This post is part of Into the Omniverse, a series focused on ...
26/03/2026
That gaming backlog won't clear itself - GeForce NOW is here to help. Stream the latest titles straight from the cloud across a variety of devices.
This we...
25/03/2026
Live match directors Sarah Cheadle (Sky Sports), Rob Levi (TNT Sports), and Andrew Swift (BBC Sport) sit down with the Premier League's Rachel Nightingale t...
25/03/2026
The senior from Upstate New York is manning the mic while also interning for the athletic department's sports-information team
In the live-sports-video ind...
25/03/2026
Synamedia has announced ContentArmor Edge Watermarking, a server-side solution t...
25/03/2026
SES has announced meoSphere, a medium Earth orbit (MEO) satellite network targeted for operation by 2030. The first phase will pair SES-developed software-defin...
25/03/2026
TVU Networks is working with Reuters on a phased migration from satellite to a c...
25/03/2026
Nielsen has announced three senior appointments. Seth Ladetsky has been named Head of Global Sports. Trevor Fellows will lead Nielsen's advertiser and agenc...
25/03/2026
Anoki and Amagi have launched In-Scene Ads powered by Anoki ContextIQ across Amagi's portfolio of in-content ad formats for Free Ad-supported Streaming TV (...
25/03/2026
Arkona Technologies will announce a series of enhancements to its BLADE//runner platform at NAB 2026 (Booth C.1808). The updates focus on usability and workflow...
25/03/2026
Daktronics has installed two tower displays and a video wall in the Lexus Club at Petco Park in San Diego ahead of the 2026 season.
Continuing to improve the ...
25/03/2026
MultiDyne Video & Fiber Optic Systems is celebrating its 50th anniversary as NAB Show 2026 approaches. The company was founded in 1976 by Vincent Jachetta, an N...
25/03/2026
IPC, a provider of integrated communication solutions, will make its NAB 2026 de...
25/03/2026
Live production categories were led by NBC, FOX, and ESPN's NFL coverage...
25/03/2026
The Atlanta Braves and Spectrum have announced a multiyear distribution agreemen...
25/03/2026
(L-R) Charlie Tyrell and Daniel Roher attend The AI Doc: Or How I Became An Apocaloptimist Premiere during the 2026 Sundance Film Festival at The Ray Theatre ...
25/03/2026
L3Harris Technologies and RFTEQ Pty Ltd signed a memorandum of understanding to ...
25/03/2026
L3Harris delivers combat-ready Torpedo Tube Launch and Recovery system, which deploys and retrieves Iver4 900 autonomous underwater vehicles through submarine t...
25/03/2026
The company expands leadership team under Chief Revenue Officer Amilcar Perez
S...
When it comes to horror films, production teams work hard to find new approaches to scare audiences. Today, with Dolby Atmos and immersive sound growing in popularity, there are even more ways to give viewers a fright. That's exactly what Re-recording Mixer Jonathan Wales accomplishes for the horror shows and films on which he works, both as a freelancer and for Warner Brothers Studios. 
