-
More Bricklayers and Sculptors from Oliver and Simon
-
[Oliver Peters] “The process goes back to film, of course, which is why we still refer to string outs as KEM rolls. But, in my experience, it wasn’t followed as much in linear editing, since we were worried about generation loss and often had multiple source machines. Edited master tapes were often only the second generation from the camera image.”
Interestingly, my experience was quite different in respect of what happened with tape.
We almost always operated on an offline/online principle, in which we built the edit with U-matic tapes with BITC and sometimes (if we were lucky) VITC as well. Once the creative edit was complete we would take an EDL into the online suite. (Oh, floppy disks, whatever happened to you?)
With VITC we were usually able to run the offline master through a VITC reader and extract a workable EDL, although we typically needed to manually edit the EDL (using an excellent EDL editor whose name I can no longer recall) in order to sort out how the audio edits were meant to work, and of course clean up any errors.
When all we had was BITC, we would manually log the edits and enter them into our EDL editor, which was not a lot of fun, but pretty good for sharpening up your numerical entry skills.
The reason I’m mentioning all this ancient history here is that we would usually create a U-matic sub-master from our source U-matics that was conceptually the same as a string-out or KEM roll. Obviously the point of this was to avoid having to load each individual source tape and shuttle down to find the next shot that we wanted. The sub-master string-out saved a huge amount of time and meant that we could keep some sort of creative momentum. (Often we would create a further sub-master from the sub-master to refine the selection – not easy when you had to worry about generation loss, but still well worthwhile in terms of the time saved.) Loading tapes was seriously disruptive to the creative process and I still think of excessive reliance on Bins/Browsers or what-have-you in the same way. Not unreasonably, I think.
For me, the notion of working with string-outs originated here in this tape-based method, and of course with what you call KEM rolls, but which in Europe we didn’t refer to as such.
Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki -
[Simon Ubsdell] “I’d certainly agree that Media Composer doesn’t lend itself naturally to working this way, but for all that I still found it faster and more productive to do so and many of the editors I trained and worked with back then felt the same. “
I would add that Avid for me remains the single fastest NLE system. I’ve abandoned Avid now for several years but I’ve yet to be able to duplicate the editing workflow that Avid allows. It was considered the superior NLE for many years because of it’s phenomenal design and overall ease of use.
And even after several years of working on Premiere and some FCPX experience, I can’t duplicate the perfect efficiency of Avid’s user interface.
Adobe Premiere 2017.1.1
Windows 10 Pro
Samsung SSD 850 EVO system
Samsung SSD 850 EVO Adobe cache
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970
OWC Thunderbay 12t x 2 in Raid10 configuration (thru Storage Spaces and Disk Management) -
[Simon Ubsdell] “We almost always operated on an offline/online principle, in which we built the edit with U-matic tapes with BITC and sometimes (if we were lucky) VITC as well. Once the creative edit was complete we would take an EDL into the online suite. (Oh, floppy disks, whatever happened to you?)”
I didn’t really have that luxury at first. Our clients went straight to online editing. We did have a few who cut their “offline” on a flatbed and my boss had a system for matching back their edits from work print to the film transfer of the negative. At that facility we did eventually put in a cuts-only 3/4″ room, but cutting was strictly from burn-ins.
Most of our shoots (single-cam production vehicle) or film transfers for commercials yielded 1-2 reels of raw footage. Then we’d make a “B-roll dub” (as in the sense of A and B-rolls) of each reel, which was just a dupe of the full reel – for dissolves. This was in the mid-70s.
It was really only in the 90s – working on TV series – when the “traditional” offline/online workflow was a normal way to work at the facility I was at. Of course in major commercial markets like NYC, LA, Miami, Chicago – a lot of the previous film editors had transitioned to owning full, computer-assisted, offline edit suites much earlier. That was in order to have less money slip through their fingers on their post bids.
[Simon Ubsdell] ” Obviously the point of this was to avoid having to load each individual source tape and shuttle down to find the next shot that we wanted. The sub-master string-out saved a huge amount of time and meant that we could keep some sort of creative momentum.”
In the first facility mentioned above, we had a similar process for one house client – a grocery retail chain. Our prod/post pipeline was a bit of a one-off for their needs. TCs were picked in the studio during production and at the end of the day you received a stack of scripts with all TCs selected for each item to be shown. The editing commenced overnight, unsupervised, and was completed, reviewed, and revised the next day.
To facilitate this process – and because we also used a series of library reels with saved shots from earlier shoots – the editors created checker-boarded A and B-roll submasters. Once created for all of the spots in that session, the editor would sync-roll these two source A and B-rolls and then cut or dissolve between items in real-time according to the script. The process happened 2 and later 3 nights a week, enabling us to bang out 40-80 unique spots a week.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Simon Ubsdell] ” we typically needed to manually edit the EDL (using an excellent EDL editor whose name I can no longer recall) in order to sort out how the audio edits were meant to work, and of course clean up any errors.”
Perhaps you were using Shotlister? Invented by my friends Nick Repin & Jack Swart in Sydney it was an EDL manager system that then became a capture system for U-Matics whilst editing with an RM440 controller. Brilliant software and I still have use for it these days to display and manage EDLs for doco reversioning.
-
Yes, you’re quite right – it was Shotlister!
(Scary to find oneself forgetting the names of things one used to use every day.)
It was a really great tool.
Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki -
At least we’re paying attention. 🙂
-
If you want a copy it was released into the wild by Digiteyes without needing a dongle. It runs on every version of WIN OS I have ever used and also runs on Linux Mint via WINE. It was developed for Win3.1!
I can send you a copy if you feel a need for it.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up