Brazilian guitar legend and Grammy winning musician/composer/songwriter Heitor Pereira received his first nomination from the News and Documentary Emmys in the Music & Sound category for his score to Sonic Sea, a moving documentary that examines noise pollution in the ocean and how it affects sea life. The Grammy-winning Brazilian-born guitarist (Simply Red) turned Hollywood film composer (all the Despicable Me films, The Smurfs, the upcoming Pitch Perfect 3) created a deeply poignant, heartfelt and imaginative score for Sonic Sea.
Organic, electronic, and musical sounds were incorporated into the documentary score. The sound of the shipyard, the engines themselves created or joined the rhythm section. Long drone sounds were used as if being played by members of the orchestra. The score needed to reflect the diverse aspects of the film. The percussion evolved by incorporating the shipyard sounds and sonar. Horn sounds were manipulated to be used as chords in the score. These elements were used to reflect an aggressive musical element. These elements reflected negative aspects and the conflict affecting the whales brought on by man.
Conversely, for beautiful moments such as the whales migrating from Alaska to Mexico, clarinets were played in a pitch along with the feedback of guitars to mimic the sounds of the whales. Accitionally, the sounds of whales and other creatures harmoniously living together along with a full orchestra deliver an epic dynamic to reflect the greatness and expansiveness of the underwater world of these creatures; this was to immerse the viewer both visually and aurally.
On another musical note, near the end of the documentary, a fisherman who came from generations of fishermen and was passing his profession to his children, saw his way of life disappearing because the underwater exploration was driving away his source of living. The music needed to reflect that, so a lullaby was created. The lullaby is as if the fisherman is singing to his grandchildren; the ocean will be okay. It’s a lullaby to show the problems but also the solutions. Sonic Sea addresses this issue with so much information critical to the ocean’s survival, the audience needed a lullaby—a melody of hope.
Google Opens Its Defense In Antitrust Case Alleging Monopoly Over Online Ad Technology
Google opened its defense against allegations that it holds an illegal monopoly on online advertising technology Friday with witness testimony saying the industry is vastly more complex and competitive than portrayed by the federal government.
"The industry has been exceptionally fluid over the last 18 years," said Scott Sheffer, a vice president for global partnerships at Google, the company's first witness at its antitrust trial in federal court in Alexandria.
The Justice Department and a coalition of states contend that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly over the technology that facilitates the buying and selling of online ads seen by consumers.
Google counters that the government's case improperly focuses on a narrow type of online ads — essentially the rectangular ones that appear on the top and on the right-hand side of a webpage. In its opening statement, Google's lawyers said the Supreme Court has warned judges against taking action when dealing with rapidly emerging technology like what Sheffer described because of the risk of error or unintended consequences.
Google says defining the market so narrowly ignores the competition it faces from social media companies, Amazon, streaming TV providers and others who offer advertisers the means to reach online consumers.
Justice Department lawyers called witnesses to testify for two weeks before resting their case Friday afternoon, detailing the ways that automated ad exchanges conduct auctions in a matter of milliseconds to determine which ads are placed in front of which consumers and how much they cost.
The department contends the auctions are finessed in subtle ways that benefit Google to the exclusion of would-be competitors and in ways that prevent... Read More