Combining foley sounds with location recordings can pose a few challenges. Most notable perhaps is the task of getting the stuff you record in the studio to match the acoustic profile inherent in the audio recorded on set. We previously looked at using Chameleon 2 to match ADR takes to the reverb characteristics of location dialogue.

Chameleon 2 is an intelligent reverb plug-in which is able to learn and imitate the room reverb of any source recording. It works by analysing a few seconds of audio and building a reverb profile which exactly models the original room conditions. This can then be applied to a dry studio recording in order to perfectly match it. Its functionality isn’t limited to just ADR though. It can be used in a variety of scenarios, including with foley.

It’s common to supplement a scene with foley sounds. In cases where all of the dialogue is re-recorded as ADR, this doesn’t pose too much of a challenge since a suitable sounding reverb can be selected and applied to both the ADR and foley. The real challenge arises when foley has to be combined with location dialogue. It’s often very difficult to tailor a reverb by ear in order to get close to the acoustic profile of dialogue or other sounds from location. Chameleon 2 makes this process significantly easier by doing the hard work for us and analysing the location recordings, creating a reverb profile and allowing us to use it on our foley.

In the video below I demonstrate the process of using Accentize Chameleon 2 to match foley to the reverb characteristics of location dialogue. The video contains two examples of this followed by another example where a reverb profile is extracted from some footsteps recorded on location and subsequently applied to some dry foley footsteps.