Today we’d like to introduce you to Ally Hustings.
Hi Ally, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I became obsessively interested in music when I was around 12 years old. I found myself listening to certain albums on repeat for days and weeks on end and was fascinated with focusing in on different instruments every time I listened back to a song. This interest began to encompass film and television audio also as I got older. All of my friends expressed their creativity in different mediums, and many were musicians. I wasn’t able to articulate it back then, but I knew I wanted to be involved in the audio process without being the performer. Once I discovered engineering and mixing, I pursued it fully.
After studying in Minneapolis, I packed my belongings into my old pickup truck and drove out to Los Angeles at 19 years old. I began interning and assisting in all sorts of sound studios – some provided full sound packages for film and television, others specifically for animation, others were solely music, and some dabbled in a little bit of everything. I hit my stride one day when an engineer called out of working on a dialogue recording session with a large client and I was asked to fill in. Everyone was pretty pleased with my work and it turned into my becoming an ADR mixer around town for nearly a decade. Almost four years ago, this lead to a transition into dialogue recording for AAA title video games.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
I would say it’s been a dynamic road! There were certainly financial struggles with attempting to pursue a gig-based craft in a more expensive city where many others are vying to accomplish similar goals. There was a time when I was working between four different jobs/gigs from 7 a.m. to 2 a.m., six days a week, for about a year. This time was split between working in a restaurant to pay the bills while working for free or low pay at studios to gain experience.
There were also struggles with practicing the discipline needed in all areas of my life to truly be present – to listen and learn as much as possible while pushing my skills to the next level.
Early in my career, I encountered an unfortunate situation with a small studio owner who I trusted and he began harassing me after I left. At the time, I was in turmoil over if I would find work again. I didn’t have much experience and I thought I needed a good reference from him in order for other places to give me a shot. I’m thankful that as I continued to meet new peers, I was given grace and additional opportunities.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I specialize in dialogue recording and replacement for film, television, and interactive cinematics (known as Automated Dialogue Replacement, or ADR for short). This means that if for some reason the dialogue from the original shoot is unusable, the actor is brought into a sound booth where they re-perform certain lines and it’s my job to make it sound as close to the original production as possible while maintaining sync. Since the pandemic, I’ve also been a part of a team that can accomplish ADR while capturing HMC (Head Mounted Camera) data. The HMC portion consists of small cameras attached to the actor’s head that capture all of their facial data – how their face moves while they perform so it can be mapped to a 3D character model. In addition to this, I also capture all of the non-sync lines that a character will speak or emote in a video game (including efforts).
I’m most proud of being trusted to connect and collaborate with teams all over the world to actualize a portion of their visions.
What matters most to you?
Trust. If you and your circle really know that you have each other’s backs, you’ll accomplish anything.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: lahusty
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ally-hustings-0a88b838/
- Other: https://imdb.me/allyhustings
