Blackmagic Design Press Conference

[Simon Ubsdell]

Thanks, Mike, for a really interesting account.

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Tim Wilson]

Yes, Mike, thanks! What a great story! Exactly what I was looking for.

To clarify for anyone else who’d like to chime in, by “using Resolve for heavy lifting as an NLE” I just meant as their primary NLE, whether for one project, or overall.

[Mike Parfit] “as Grant said more than once in the press conference, color is emotional. Just as I incorporate music very early in the editing process, so I want to see what my color is doing, or can do, early on.”

I couldn’t agree more with this. Although I haven’t really edited since the turn of the century, you describe my style to a T. Most of what I did was science and nature magazine stuff, so there was a heavy emphasis on facts (back when people cared about ANY of those things, much less ALL of them ????), but I always went straight for the emotional beats.

I did most of my own shooting, so I always had my cameras tuned to within an inch of their lives, and I placed tremendous effort into the most classical sense of “framing”and composing even the most prosaic shots, but I still couldn’t imagine a single final shot in post without multiple masks for adjusting color, focus, etc. For me at the time, it was first After Effects, then later, because I could do it faster in my NLE I turned to Boris FX for the majority of it, saving AE for my mograph finesse. Working in an NLE tuned for grading from the outset would have been a dream for me.

(btw, none of this should be taken as any suggestion that I was any good. ???? But a man’s gotta have goals, and them were mine.)

Again noting that I haven’t edited in 18 years, which is now almost the amount of time I DID edit before that (and some notion of how long I’ve been at this game), so I’m no position to endorse anything even by implication….but like you, Mike, I very strongly responded to Grant’s description of the emotional intent of the control surface, and by extension, that dimension of Resolve itself. That’s what I responded to you in your description as well!

It’s taking me a bit longer than anticipated to put together proper coverage of the event yesterday (surprise!!!), but for anyone who missed it, I do still recommend watching the full 80-minute+ press conference. Here’s the link again. Grant strikes a number of beats that some folks might not expect — you’ve probably not seen many CEOs dismantle their featured product with a Torx wrench mid-demo — but I especially appreciated the emphasis on the different needs that “an editor who grades” and “a color grader” might have from a control surface, and how the Mini in particular is aimed at people who edit and grade in particular.

It’s highly likely to me that the control surface will actually make some converts to Resolve as an NLE. My highly inappropriate (and oft-to-be-revisited) jokes about handling DaVinci’s balls notwithstanding, it’s not like other control surfaces, certainly not in this new price range.

There’s also a fundamental difference between external hardware controls to a software application (say, a Wacom tablet for FCPX or After Effects or whatever), and finally having affordable access to the heart of the way that the application was always designed to be used. There was never intended to be any difference between hardware and software. It’s not like a keyboard. The two are one.

Resolve is obviously entirely capable in its software-only state, which is how it has reshaped so much in this business so quickly. Still, the kinds of advanced features and finesse now literally at your fingertips, though, in a physical interface meant to be used emotionally, and dare I say it, intuitively, potentially facilitate new kinds of expression in the context of nonlinear editing.

Certainly new dimensions of expressiveness. It’s the functional equivalent of plugging in. This obviously isn’t only true for Resolve. I hope you’ve all had a chance to see a world class grader work. It’s like watching a DJ, except that they never take their eyes off the screen. So it’s also kinda magical, too. Bringing this magic into the heart of editing, made possible with the reunified hardware-software interface, strikes me as a big deal.

This is, needless to say, another example of my enthusiasm getting the better of me. ???? This forum’s history is replete with them, as so many people here are so fond of reminding me of, going back to my prediction before it was even released that FCPX would have 10x the customers that FCP ever did by the end of its first year. And I stand by that prediction, dammit! ????

Anyway, thanks again, Mike! I appreciate your insights on using Resolve to edit, and am reminded by your description of your specific approach so similar to mine that it’s always going to be part of who I am. It’s easy to forget when we intentionally wrap ourselves around the axles of a million passing arguments that this stuff can actually matter in how we live our lives and express our creative intent.

[Mark Raudonis]

This is pretty interesting!

Black Magic’s pace of innovation and release of new products is very impressive.
Extrapolate that development curve and you’ll have AI in the edit bay before you can
say, “The Singularity is near”!!!

mark

[Walter Soyka]

[Mark Raudonis] “Extrapolate that development curve and you’ll have AI in the edit bay before you can say, “The Singularity is near”!!!”

It might be closer than you think:

https://nofilmschool.com/2016/10/ibm-watson-edits-morgan-trailer

https://www.adobe.com/sensei.html

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Noah Kadner]

AI editors are already here. Memories in the iOS photo app actually does a surprisingly nice job of cobbling together photo montages leveraging metadata. Also DJI’s Go App does an occasionally decent pass on drone highlight edits. The latter’s irony is not lost on this human.

Noah

FCPWORKS – FCPX Workflow
FCP Exchange – FCPX Workshops
XinTwo – FCPX Training

[Mike Parfit]

Hi, Tim,

In case you’re curious, the show that we edited and finished on Resolve has its US premiere on Nat Geo Wild tomorrow night (Sunday, March 26), 9pm/8c. “Call of the Baby Beluga.” It’s a whale film. 52 min. It’s showing in a bunch of other countries, too. We delivered in 4K. Lots of drone footage from a Phantom 3.

Another advantage of editing in Resolve I was thinking about after this discussion is that people are always saying that these days, because tweaking in any NLE is so easy, they can’t get the director to lock picture so they can send it to Resolve. When you’re in Resolve anyway, that’s less of an issue.

Cheers,

Mike

[Tim Wilson]

[Mike Parfit] “In case you’re curious, the show that we edited and finished on Resolve has its US premiere on Nat Geo Wild tomorrow night (Sunday, March 26), 9pm/8c. “Call of the Baby Beluga.””

Thanks for the tip, Mike! I can’t wait!