Gary Rydstrom

Last updated
Gary Rydstrom
Born
Gary Roger Rydstrom

(1959-06-29) June 29, 1959 (age 66)
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Occupation(s)Sound designer
Re-recording mixer
Supervising sound editor
Film director
Years active1984–present

Gary Roger Rydstrom (born June 29, 1959) is an American sound designer and film director. He has been nominated for twenty Academy Awards for his work in sound for movies, and has won seven times. [1]

Contents

Life and career

Rydstrom was born in Chicago, raised in Elmhurst, Illinois where he attended public school K-12, graduating in 1977 from York High School. He graduated from the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts in 1981. [2] He began his career at Skywalker Sound in Northern California in 1983, having been offered the job by a college professor, which enabled him to work with his mentor, Star Wars sound designer Ben Burtt.

After gaining invaluable experience as a sound technician in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom , Rydstrom went on to do sound design for the comedy Spaceballs . The sound design for Backdraft was created from scratch and later served as the foundation for his work on Terminator 2: Judgment Day . The original sound effects from Backdraft are constantly referenced and have been used for numerous other films including The Lord of the Rings film trilogy and Shrek . [3]

He won an Academy Award for his work on Terminator 2: Judgment Day, for which he pioneered techniques still used today for creating realistic sound effects. Rydstrom also worked with Terminator 2 director James Cameron on a new 5.1 surround sound remix for the original Terminator.

His sound work on Jurassic Park led to further innovations, as he and his team set out to create dinosaur sounds by mixing together numerous different animal vocalizations [4] to make the audience feel as though giant bellowing prehistoric beasts surrounded them. The Academy Award-winning film was the first motion picture to be presented in DTS. [5] The T-Rex roar created by Gary was later re-used for Dim in A Bug's Life , Thanator in Avatar and the Hydra in Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief .

He subsequently went on to work on sound for numerous films including Titanic , Saving Private Ryan , Minority Report and Finding Nemo . He won an MPSE lifetime achievement award, and regularly speaks at various sound design forums sharing his extensive knowledge and enthusiasm with aspiring sound design artists.

He made his directorial debut with the Pixar short Lifted, earning his fourteenth Academy Award nomination. It was included in the Animation Show of Shows in 2006. His debut feature film, Newt, a story about two blue-footed newts learning to cooperate, was announced in 2008 and reportedly entered early production but was ultimately cancelled by Pixar in early 2011 due to story issues. He has also directed the Pixar short Hawaiian Vacation and the Lucasfilm animated feature Strange Magic . [6] [7]

Rydstrom has also served as English language director on Tales From Earthsea , Arrietty , From Up on Poppy Hill , and The Wind Rises , all of which were produced by the Japanese animation company Studio Ghibli.

Awards and nominations

Rydstrom has been nominated for 20 Academy Awards (7 wins), 12 Golden Reel Awards (5 wins), 5 C.A.S Awards (2 wins), 5 BAFTA Awards (2 wins), and 1 Grammy (1 win).

Academy Awards
Motion Picture Sound Editors - Golden Reel Award
  • 2005: - Career Achievement Award
  • 2004: Finding Nemo (Best Sound Editing in Feature Film - Animated - Sound) - Nominated
  • 2003: Minority Report (Best Sound Editing in Domestic Features - Dialogue & ADR) - Nominated
  • 2003: Minority Report (Best Sound Editing in Domestic Features - Sound Effects & Foley) - Nominated
  • 2002: Atlantis: The Lost Empire (Best Sound Editing - Animated Feature Film, Domestic and Foreign) - Won
  • 2002: Monsters, Inc. (Best Sound Editing - Animated Feature Film, Domestic and Foreign) - Nominated
  • 2002: Artificial Intelligence: AI (Best Sound Editing - Dialogue & ADR, Domestic Feature Film) - Nominated
  • 2002: Artificial Intelligence: AI (Best Sound Editing - Effects & Foley, Domestic Feature Film) - Nominated
  • 2001: Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport (Best Sound Editing - Dialogue & ADR, Domestic Feature Film) - Nominated
  • 1999: A Bug's Life (Best Sound Editing - Animated Feature) - Won
  • 1999: Saving Private Ryan (Best Sound Editing - Dialogue & ADR) - Won
  • 1999: Saving Private Ryan (Best Sound Editing - Sound Effects & Foley) - Won
  • 1998: Hercules (Best Sound Editing - Animated Feature) - Won
Cinema Audio Society - C.A.S Award
  • 2004: - Career Achievement Award
  • 2000: Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (Outstanding Achievement in Sound Mixing for a Feature Film) - Nominated
  • 1999: Saving Private Ryan (Outstanding Achievement in Sound Mixing for a Feature Film) - Won
  • 1998: Titanic (Outstanding Achievement in Sound Mixing for a Feature Film) - Won
  • 1994: Jurassic Park (Outstanding Achievement in Sound Mixing for a Feature Film) - Nominated
BAFTA Award
  • 2000: Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (Best Sound) - Nominated
  • 1999: Saving Private Ryan (Best Sound) - Won
  • 1998: Titanic (Best Sound) - Nominated
  • 1994: Jurassic Park (Best Sound) - Nominated
  • 1992: Terminator 2: Judgment Day (Best Sound) - Won
Grammy Award

Filmography

References

  1. ↑ "Gary Rydstrom". Skywalker Sound. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  2. ↑ Notable Alumni Archived February 24, 2008, at the Wayback Machine , USC School of Cinematic Arts, Accessed August 10, 2008.
  3. ↑ "July's Featured Sound Designer: Gary Rydstrom". Designing Sound. Retrieved August 18, 2025.
  4. ↑ Buchanan, Kyle (2015-06-09). "You'll Never Guess How the Dinosaur Sounds in Jurassic Park Were Made". vulture.com. Retrieved 2021-08-25.
  5. ↑ "When dinosaurs ruled the cinema: remembering "Jurassic Park" on its 25th anniversary". thedigitalbits.com. Retrieved 2019-04-19.
  6. ↑ Desowitz, Bill (2015-01-23). "Immersed in Movies: Gary Rydstrom Talks 'Strange Magic' as Animated Rock Opera". IndieWire. Retrieved 2019-09-28.
  7. ↑ Freer, Ian (2016-07-29). "Before Finding Dory there was Newt: the Pixar movie that got away". The Telegraph. ISSN   0307-1235 . Retrieved 2019-09-28.
  8. ↑ "Oscars 2016: Full list of nominees". Oscars. Retrieved 2016-01-23.
  9. ↑ "Oscars 2013: Full list of nominees". BBC News. 10 January 2013. Retrieved 2013-01-10.
  10. 1 2 "The 84th Academy Awards (2012) Nominees". oscars.org. Retrieved 2012-01-26.
  11. ↑ "The 72nd Academy Awards (2000) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 2011-11-19.
  12. 1 2 "The 71st Academy Awards (1999) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 2011-11-19.
  13. ↑ "The 70th Academy Awards (1998) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 2011-11-19.
  14. 1 2 "The 66th Academy Awards (1994) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 2011-10-22.
  15. 1 2 3 4 "The 64th Academy Awards (1992) Nominees and Winners". oscars.org. Retrieved 2011-10-22.
  16. ↑ Times, The New York (2023-02-05). "Grammys 2023: Winners List". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2023-02-06.
  17. ↑ Wolff, Rob; Volotta, Tom (1991-07-01). "MARS NAVIGATOR: An interactive, multimedia exploration of the red planet". ACM SIGGRAPH Computer Graphics. 25 (3): 145–146. doi: 10.1145/126640.126643 . ISSN   0097-8930. S2CID   17197378.
  18. ↑ Graser, Marc (November 11, 2014). "Disney Dates Lucasfilm's Animated 'Strange Magic' for January 2015". Variety . Retrieved November 11, 2014.
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