The DVD replicators called yesterday to say that they had rigorously tested my disc and all was well, but suggested I make a few very minor changes to increase compatibility. I made the changes and sent off a new disc this afternoon. When they get it, they can go ahead and make the glass master.

The last two days were quite annoying. Every time I thought the DVD was finished, I would find another tiny little error – half a second of sound in the wrong place, a button that links to the wrong place, a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it picture glitch. However, I’m pleased to say that it’s now DONE. Time to chill.

The DVD still isn’t quite finished, though it’s frustratingly close. On Tuesday morning, having largely recovered from the exhausting weekend, I sat down in front of my brand new Sony home cinema system and watched the movie. It kicked ass.

As the credits rolled, my flatmate JP stuck his head round the door. “Dude, what are you watching?” he asked.

“Soul Searcher,” I replied.

“Dude – that is sick!” he enthused, “sick” being a modern slang term to describe something of particular merit, as I understand. He continued, “I’ve been sitting next door thinking, ‘Whatever that movie is Neil’s watching, it sounds amazing.'”

It wasn’t quite perfect, however, the main problem being that the really BIG moments – namely the explosions – were no louder than anything else. I made some notes, then on Wednesday visited my friend Rob in Ealing and Lara Greenway to hear what some of it sounded like on their systems. The results were the same, so I went on to Neil’s to sort it out.

Neil did the Picard Manoeuvre: he energized the explosion waveforms. Warp factor 500%. Very, very loud.

I slept in the studio again, running off the finished files one by one until seven in the morning. An hour later I got up, came home and tried to incorporate the mix into the DVD, only to discover part of it was a 240th of a second out of sync. Man, I really hope I finish this tomorrow.

Today was the delivery date for the DVD. I didn’t quite make it. Friday and Saturday were supposed to be the last days at Neil Douek’s, finishing the surround mix, leaving me with Sunday to make a few last little changes and check everything over.

Unfortunately, the mix overran on Saturday. On Sunday morning, after just three hours of sleep, although we had all our premixes complete and everything was balanced up, it still wasn’t sounding as good as we both knew it could. Unable to keep my eyes (and more importantly, my ears) open any longer, I retired to Neil’s spare room for a couple of hours’ kip. I drifted off to sleep – interrupted only by Neil’s two-year-old daughter bursting in and trying to tell me something about her t-shirt – hoping that I would awaken to find that Neil had waved a magic wand and the mix was sorted. After dreaming of an audio waveform with peaks which kept distorting no matter what I did, I awakened to find that Neil had indeed waved his magic wand. He had applied some light compression to the entire mix, bringing up the quiet passages and generally giving the whole thing more punch.

Fantastic as the mix now sounded, it still needed work, and once again we found ourselves seated at the computer as the wee small hours graced the clock face. After another deficient night’s sleep, we finally got it licked at about eleven this morning (Monday). Having not planned on staying over for three nights, I was glad to get home this afternoon and change my clothes.

Wysiwyg don’t mind that I haven’t been able to deliver the DVD today. I need to spend tomorrow and probably Wednesday testing and checking before I hand it all over.

Neil Douek has broken lighting gaffer Colin Smith’s record as Longest Serving Crew Member as he enters his fourteenth month of work on Soul Searcher since he first recorded ADR for us back in November 2004. An emotional Douek remarked, “In your face, Colin…. whoever you are.” In your face, the lot of you; I’ve been doing this for four years.

We’re still on reel five and we’ve only got ten days left till the delivery date. On the plus side, Going To Hell is finished and I just have a list of tweaks and changes to make to some of the other extras and the menus.

Neil and I finished the vats sequence yesterday. It sounds amazing. If you don’t have a surround sound set-up at home, you’ve got about three months to buy one before the DVD’s out. Damn it, I’d better buy one myself…

The bulk of the work on the DVD is now done. I burnt a prototype yesterday for testing. There’s more tweaking and clean-up to do on Going To Hell and one more featurette to edit, plus of course the surround sound mix. Neil and I are still on the vats scene, with our friend Rick O’Shay, due to us having to break off to mix the new trailer the other day. We’re starting to feel the pinch; we’ve only got three weeks left to finish it, but saying that, three weeks before the premiere we were only just starting the original mix.

Happy New Year.

Going to Hell has reached its target length of 90 minutes. The few people who have seen it, including Tom from Wysiwyg, say it’s thoroughly entertaining -“great viewing,” were Tom’s words – but have suggested that I should put some more stuff going right into the film, as it’s pretty much all things going wrong. Problem is, I don’t have any footage of stuff going right….

Apologies if any of you haven’t been able to access the site for the last few days. You’ve got the muppets at Telewest to thank for that.

Just a quick one to say that Neil and I have reached reel five of the surround mix, which is the fun bit with all the rumbling vats and Rick O’Shay sounds, Tom and I have recut a leaner, meaner Soul Searcher trailer, and Going to Hell is going just fine.

After peaking at a ridiculous three hours, Going to Hell is down to an almost-reasonable 102 minutes. I think it’s turning out pretty well. Tom Swanston and I caught up the other day to discuss progress on the DVD, which I have to have finished by January 23rd.

Neil and I spent Thursday and Friday on the 5.1 mix. We finally finished the stampede sequence after recording and laying some more Kurt Russells, stomping feet and breathing. Then we moved onto reel four, which we’re now about a third of the way through – that’s the end of the rain fight.