[Alex Elkins]

[Ned Miller]
“• Someone who does not own a car, meaning they don’t drive the greater Chicago metropolitan area all the time, will be late 100% of the time to a far flung suburban location, especially if they are young. We no longer have defined rush hours, we have horrible construction areas, terrible weather, etc. They will borrow a car or rent from Zip car etc. and being young they tend not to use maps like us old codgers or listen to live traffic radio. They will believe what their GPS arrival time says or what Mapquest predicts. That is why it has been a 100% rate of tardiness.

• I avoid hiring someone who work nights such as a bartender, waiter/waitress, actor etc. for a crew member because my experience is that they will have been out late the previous evening. And even if they are not working the night before our shoot their circadian rythms are of a night owl, so a 6AM call is not in their best interest.

• I prefer to hire people at least in their thirties because I am not running a film school and need crew members who have been doing their craft for preferably ten years. PAs can be younger or perhaps a Lite Grip, but key positions forget it. In fact I prefer the Lite Grips to be in their twenties for strength and stamina.

• Married: depending on the person, if I have a shoot on let’s say Thursday, I may first say, “What are you doing Wednesday night?” If the response is “My buddy’s band is opening at a club” or “I have a date”, then I will most likely not book the person. Our call times are usually around 7AM and with the drive time that means waking up at 5AM. I need for the person to be there fresh, alert and bouncing on the balls of their feet like a point guard. If someone is married then I am more assured that during the week they aren’t out late. Also, if they have kids, they are more likely to appreciate the work.”

This is most bizarre, and frankly offensive, set of assumptions I’ve ever read on Creative Cow. I understand not hiring people who work nights, fine – but presumably if you’re paying good people a good rate then they don’t have second jobs in bars anyway, so it seems largely irrelevant. I just don’t see how age and marital status have anything to do with whether or not someone is able to get up early, read a map and lift equipment.

Ned, I’m glad your hiring system has worked for you, but I honestly think you’re confusing ‘age’ with ‘experience’. They’re two different things. The guy you hired here was not ‘experienced’ enough to know not to hand out his business card to your client. I’m roughly the same age as him and I am ‘experienced’ enough to know this. I’m not married, but believe it or not I don’t spend every waking hour dating and staying up late, and the same can be said for 100% of my young colleagues. Some people possess common sense and a work ethic, other don’t. That applies to all age groups.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour grading reel

[Alex Elkins]

Hi Ned,

It sounds like the way this guy conducted himself was completely unprofessional, right from the moment he arrived (late). As an under thirty myself I’d like to think that this is not the norm! One big problem I have with film school (and education generally, really) is the lack of preparation for the ‘real world’. When I was studying I was amazed that there was no ‘film business’ module. It seems the only way to learn the business side of filmmaking is by just trying it out, and in the case of your freelancer this can lead you to make some very foolish decisions.

“I broke several of my rules such as- Don’t hire people under under 30, hire only married people, car owners only, etc. etc.”
I have to take issue with this. Yes, your recent experience was a bad one, but that’s not because the guy ‘didn’t own a car’ or any of the other criteria he didn’t fit into. He didn’t know how to be professional on set. If you only hire people who are married then by definition you wouldn’t hire any homosexuals, for instance. Or people who have been divorced. Or maybe someone who doesn’t own a car simply chooses to ‘go green’. Refusing to hire someone based on age, marital status or some irrelevant lifestyle choice is ridiculous, not to mention illegal.

Anyway, getting back to your overall point here, I think mentioning to the guy what he did wrong would be beneficial to both of you – you’re paying him so he should know why you weren’t happy with his conduct, and at the same time it will stop the guy from making the same mistakes again. If he has any interest in rebuilding broken bridges he’ll invoice for the lower rate.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

[mike taylor] “I did batch transcodes using standard ProRes LT codec in Compressor”
You may find that Compressor hasn’t maintained the correct reel name and/or timecode, which could make re-connecting automatically a bit difficult. Assuming you’ve already run the conversions I’d suggest importing it into FCP and comparing its timecode and reel name to the original. I have a feeling you might need to re-transcode everything through Media Manager overnight.

[mike taylor] “I will use a copy of the current working file of the proj to re-attach, not the current working file, just don’t want all the render files etc to get screwy–lots of motion quads involved.”

Your render files will be lost regardless. You’re changing the codec of the files and therefore the sequence, so the effects will need to be re-rendered to the new codec.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

[mike taylor] “Can i just attach the LT same-named files to the project, which are in the same relation but on a different drive, like I would with Proxies?
“

Yes, assuming that the files also contain the same reel names as the ProRes originals. If not then FCP may have issues reconnecting to some of the files automatically. However, in any case you can force it to by manually pointing it to the file you want it to connect to.

Did you do the transcoding through FCP’s own Media Manager? If so, then you’ll have no problems reconnecting to the ProRes LT files.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

[Juan Salvo] “You most certainly can’t expect anything close to 4K 50fps from any hardware in r3d, unless you’ve got like four red rocket cards to do debayering.”

Yeah I did have my doubts! Still, should be quite a bit faster than the Apple Color system I’ve been using.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

I was talking about Mac Pro. And Paul, I think you’re probably right about processor speed being the bottleneck these days, particularly for Macs. Here’s hoping the ‘Spring 2013’ rumours turn into something positive…

I’ve been told by a couple of people that I can expect very good performance from the 3x GTX 680 cards (50fps with 10 nodes on 4K R3D or something similarly crazy), which really is not going to have me complaining any time soon! I’ll believe that when I see it though. Just thought it was worth checking if people thought the Titan card would be significantly better.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

Thanks Eric, appreciate the info.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

I’m in the same boat. About to purchase 3x GTX 680 inside a Cubix and then this comes out.

Juan, I’m assuming you’ve not had a chance to test yet, but you seem to be knowledgeable about these things… in your opinion, would the Titan be a better option inside a Cubix running on OS X?

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

Hi Richard,

I’m not entirely sure what you mean when you say you’re at the ProRes stage. I presume you mean you’re ready to export…

It sounds like what you’re doing is going to File > Export> Using QuickTime conversion…
What this does is it mixes down all of your audio channels into a single stereo mix.

What you need to do instead is go to File > Export> QuickTime Movie…
If you’ve followed my instructions correctly (specifically points 4 and 5) you will find that the QuickTime file that is exported will contain 4 tracks (or rather, 2 stereo tracks) – you can quickly verify this by re-importing it into FCP and seeing how many tracks it has.

Tip:
If you set in/out points on your timeline before exporting you will be able to test all this on a short segment rather than the entire sequence.

Good luck.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel

[Alex Elkins]

I’m wondering if you might be better off delivering an image sequence rather than QuickTime. If this is running off a projector I would expect them to be able to play DCP files as well as QuickTime. There are free tools that will allow you to convert DPX or TIFF sequences into DCP, links to which can be found if you check out the Wikipedia page for DCP/Digital Cinema Package. From memory I believe one is called OpenDCP.

If that’s not an option, perhaps rendering out a TIFF sequence and opening in QuickTime Pro would give you 48fps as a playback option. I’m not at my computer right now do can’t confirm this would work, but will have a look later when I get a chance.

Alex Elkins
@postbluetv
http://www.postblue.tv
View my new colour correction reel