Sound Specialist
Full Member / Fellow
It is impossible to encapsulate in so few words, the vast contribution that Dennis has made to the music and audio postproduction industries. In fact he has achieved so much and there are so many stories about his various adventures, it is hard to imagine how he has managed to fit them all in. From an early age his almost geeky obsession with sound led him to hang out at some pretty groovy “garage” studios of 1960’s Los Angeles. Soon Dennis befriended some of the in-house mixers and after a while was engineering in his own right, both on music recordings as well as film and TV projects. Moving to London in the early seventies, Dennis established himself as a successful music engineer and producer, working with artistes as diverse as Jeff Beck, Supertramp, Queen, The Real Things, Talk Talk, Blancmange and French Rockers Trust.
In 1983, seeing a gap in the market, Dennis set up one of the UK’s first independent audio post facilities. Videosonics was a huge success, partly because of its innovative application of new technologies to the post workflows, such as the early adoption of the first generation of Audiofile workstations, AMS Neve Logic and DFC digital consoles and Akai non-linear dubbers. By the 1990’s, becoming a leading force in TV drama and film, Videosonics was one of the most prolific independent audio post facilities in the UK and its success was attributable to Dennis himself and the talented and professional team he hired around him. More recently Dennis has been heading up Post Production at Pinewood-Shepperton Studios, and steered them through two of their most successful years of recent times. But throughout his career Dennis has given so much back, he has been a huge supporter of the industry through his work with APRS, APPS, AMPS, UK Film Council, JAMES, UK Screen and of course The Conch Awards. Dennis is passionate about our industry and has been our best ambassador of recent times, endlessly promoting our services around the world particularly to our cousins in North America, not to mention his ongoing efforts in advancing education within the industry. But what makes Dennis so different is that he genuinely cares. He cares about audio and he cares about people. Whether as a chairman of an industry body, a manager of a successful company or merely as a loyal and compassionate friend, Dennis has a heart of gold and can always be counted on, especially when it comes to getting up and confidently talking to a roomful of people. There is very little Dennis doesn't know about post production, cars and of course music - especially the Anglo-American jazz funk scenes of the seventies and early eighties.
We are pleased to award him Fellowship of the Association.
The Council of the Association of Motion Picture Sound
13th February 2011
