O-span, Breaking News: Bat Loose in Congress

This was an interesting one from a post-production perspective. The Onion’s in-house graphics team (great work, BTW) and I (as a freelancer working in my own studio) had to go through several stages of revisions, coming closer and closer to creating a reasonably believable bat effect.

BREAKING NEWS: BAT LOOSE IN CONGRESS

I’m personally a bit bummed we had to deliver in mono, because I had some great binaural panning as the bat flew across the room in my first mix.  But because stereo just wasn’t an option, in the end I took more of a natural “as you’d hear it live from from the mics” approach–which is, I reckon, how it would sound if you were watching it on C-Span.

(Are there stereo room mics in the Capitol building? Maybe somewhere someone has a copy of Joe Wilson’s “you lie!” in stereo.)