Software criticism

[Gary Huff]

[Walter Soyka] “Is this a senseless anthropomorphization, or is there something to the idea of company as author?”

I think, more often than not, it’s the former. Easier to think in monolithic terms as opposed to the reality of the push/pull amongst a decidedly large team of individuals each responsible for tiny pieces.

[Michael Phillips]

I can only speak to my experiences as the product designer at Avid from 1990 through ~2002’ish (when my role changed). At the time, there were two product designers as they were called. It was important that these roles were individuals who were editors, and come with production experience. My experience was all film based, film production and workflows, while Tom Ohanian came from a video and facility background editing corporate, commercials, news,etc. We acted as the intermediary between all the customers and engineering to “translate” what is meant when an editor says this, or what does it mean when an engineer says this. Then we write up design docs as to how the function/solution should be enabled, work with engineers to make it even better as they understood what could really be done with the code base, then worked with the customers in beta for final. Our experience in the entire production allowed us to see what was happening before it got to post, and how to best prepare for what happened after post as part of a workflow solution.

A small example of this; many people asked why IN and OUT were defaulted to E and R on the keyboard in addition to the more obvious I and O keys (as long as you spoke English). It is because there are more right handed editors in the world based on averages, their right hand is on the mouse, and your left hand naturally fits at the keyboard where your fingers fall on the E and R keys. Two of the more common functions being done on the keyboard at the time. The early years of NLE was a fascinating time to be on that side of the business. But even working full time, I still produced and edited features as it was a complete circle of using what was develop in a real scenario, as well as coming up with new ideas and solutions as you edited and be able to go back in and tweak and invent.

I learned an awful lot from the engineers, who are extremely creative in their own right. From what I learned on what was possible, I was able to co-invent the first digital 24 frame editing system named the Film Composer. A lot of work went into that, not just capture and playback at 24, but the metadata and list management, audio pullup/down, ABCD, and how it applied to both NTSC and PAL at the time. This eventually led to the first Universal Mastering solution with Symphony in 1999 when picture quality finally reached uncompressed and the ability from a single sequence delivery PAL and NTC with progressive and interlace, 16:9 and 4:3 at a time when HD cameras were just at the dawn of their arrival on the scene.

Can’t really speak to how the process works today – I am sure they have similar type individuals in similar roles, regardless of company. But the market pressures today are far more varied in needs and distribution, so the feature sets seem to be more IT than what can be done to take storytelling to the next level. I believe there is still more to be done in that space.

Michael

[Simon Ubsdell]

Fascinating post.

But why has no-one yet mentioned Roland Barthes (let alone Derrida) here?

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo-uk.com

[David Mathis]

I remember seeing and hearing about Film Composer while a student at The Art Institute of Dallas. We had two Media Composer systems on the old pizza box Mac computer. I think After Effects was a young buck at the time. Back then storage was not cheap and not much either. Went to class then saw a film next door, we were next to the General Cinema which is now part of the school. Sadly the one by the mall was torn down a few years later, a relly nice theater. Those were the days. We also were shooting on S-VHS and Betacam SP, and had the linear editing system. Times have changed, so has the workflow.

Perhaps we might be critical of technology as a whole, not just software. Think back when the new Mac Pro came about. That along with companies being proprietary with their equipment and ones that have gone rental only. My two cents.

[Richard Herd]

[Michael Phillips] “your left hand naturally fits at the keyboard “

I end up turning the keyboard all around depending on what I’m doing. When I type, obviously, it’s regular. Using the keyboard for me while editing includes moving it clockwise or counterclockwise as I proceed, turning it around and in various angles so that I can hit the keys I need. As a guitar player, I tried using it like a keytar before (ha!) but it made mouse moves ridiculous.

Overall: Keyboard on the left, mouse on the right, wacom on the far right.

[Michael Phillips]

That sounds about right. Keep in mind that this was 1990 and most offline creative editorial was still flatbeds, even in the high end commercial market that bought the first Avid/1 Media Composers. Computers themselves were not an everyday thing, so the transition from a flatbed to a keyboard was an important move from a comfort factor. The point being that creative editor UX was also part of the design going into these systems.

These days, there are so many offerings, and users growing up on game controllers, mobile devices, and such that there is a lot to consider. There is no one perfect device, yet, but combining technologies will still be the way to go for a while.

Michael

[Richard Herd]

[Simon Ubsdell] “But why has no-one yet mentioned Roland Barthes (let alone Derrida) here?
“

At first I laughed pretty hard at that. It would’t be so bad if some of the corporate types applied post structuralist critique to their inventions. Keyboards and mice (as mentioned above) are silly peripherals. I would love to see adobe actually make a device for NLE.

[Douglas K. dempsey]

Avid posted an interview with Alan Bell on editing Hunger Games, and I believe he used a programmable game controller, a touch screen and a mouse … with keyboard mainly for text/data entry. Wild.

As for early NLE keyboard mapping to reflect flatbed editing, I was told the J-K-L layout was inspired by the KEM buttons even more than the Steenbeck controller? A friend who was a KEM editor told me that the buttons were so ergonomically ingrained in his muscle memory that he would sit at a dinner conversation, become bored with someone’s storytelling, and find that his left hand, resting on the table, was twitching, trying to punch the fast forward button!

Which brings me to Randy and the FCPX interface. Much as I enjoy using X, I DO wonder about the editors who were consulted, versus a design that reflects the pure, creative expression of a single software designer.

Doug D

[Michael Phillips]

You are correct. JKL was the keyboard equivalent of the KEM – another good example of that “transition” from one tool to another. JKL was suggested by Steve Cohen at the time. Even flatbeds had their differences between KEM and Steenbeck. There are so many approaches to storytelling that can affect how a solution gets developed. I believe that that genres themselves can suggest different approached, narrative versus documentary, versus montage, etc. The design goal was always to keep the eyes focused on the image, and not the tools which speaks to the game controller approach. Those devices are designed to always have you watching the screen, not the hardware interface.

Michael

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Walter Soyka] “I think the idea of software criticism is just as valid as film criticism, but I wonder if we need to revise our critical methods. “

It is valid, but I think that film and software have two very different goals, and therefore different decision making processes in what essentially brings the medium to ‘market’. Film is widely understood as a visual art or cultural commentary, and most of the time, a form of communication or source of entertainment.

Can the same be said for software, especially NLE or video design software? Am I wondering about the existential problems of designers when I try and open a multiple page PDF in Illustrator without scrubbing the internet for a javascript that will do just this very action?

I’m not condemning, I’m just asking, as I think the framework around which film and software are conceived (and to what end) is important.

[Walter Soyka] “We speak of Apple, Adobe, and Avid almost add if they were auteurs. Is this a senseless anthropomorphization, or is there something to the idea of company as author? What exists in the developers’ minds and what do we read into after the fact? What role do the individuals in the development teams play?”

I would think individuals have important roles, but how much are they allowed to do within the current framework of more mature applications that are on the market today?

If there’s a younger developer that is hired on to help further the development of any application, can they do what they want? Perhaps they have great ideas to make Photoshop less destructive, but can’t due to the nature of the program or without blowing up the entire application (like you mentioned in another thread)? What role do they have? At what point does the individual have control, or is the code base of the software itself in control, after years and years of writing and rewriting?

What responsibility, really, do developers have to support older versions? Because certainly, carrying legacy workflows in order to preserve older documents created in decades gone-by, must inform the design of the current version? Who is responsible for that and what are the values by which they make that judgement call?