If you haven’t seen the video here it is:

How it was made:

It took a few hours of repeating lines to get the inflections to be funny/interesting. I tried to keep the timing of the words to be exactly the same as Javier’s but I found that if I needed to fudge the timing to make it funnier that was fine.

Next I muted the original to play only when the gas station attendant speaks.

At this point the sound of each character still didn’t sound like they were in the same space. I added the slightest room reverb to my voice to match the original. I then played back the audio of each character in a room with wood floors about the same size of the room they were in. I recorded this back into my DAW and we were almost there.

I added a room tone, the music and a distant ringing telephone to heighten the tension. If you recall the original scene has almost no music at all. I made sure not to over do it.

This first started as a funny idea I had. It turned into a way to show off my sound design chops.

UPDATE:

No Country For Gay Men has been mentioned in this weeks Entertainment Weekly.

Web Obsession of the Week

SWEET AS CHIGURH

Remember that heart-pounding confrontation in No Country For Old Men when Anton Chigurh, Javier Bardem’s coin-tossing killing machine, taunts an elderly store clerk who has no clue he just might be ringing up his last sale? Well, some online joker has turned the scene on its head, replacing Bardem’s gravelly intonation with a hyper-effeminate voice-over. The clip is a dandy, not only because its flamboyant Chigurh is so jarringly different from the Coen Brothers’ assassin, but also because the clerk’s bewildered reaction works perfectly with either voice. When Chigurh says, “You’ve been putting up your whole life – you just didn’t know it,” try not to titter at a bloodthirsty villain who sounds a bit like Linda Richman. – Jeff Labrecque

In the May 23rd, 2008 issue on page 105.