[Chris Bové]

Yeah, we had this explained to us at a Carl & Bob Avid Interplay demo at our station a number of months ago. The thought of it impressed our Executive Producer to no end… to the point he wanted to recommend the Interplay purchase to all the producers just to get it. (Techno-tard!)

As an editor of PBS docs, the idea intrigues me. With so few hours in the day, any opportunity to remove a mundane task is most welcome… for me or the producer. It translates into more time dedicated to the story. I can’t wait to see it in action! Honestly I don’t care if it works or not, so long as producers have new things to do OUTSIDE of the edit bay.

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

I’d be interested to know how the assistant organized it for you. Is it a case of just throwing locators at the head of every shot or full transcriptions in the bin’s Script view?

Anyway, get this book and look specifically for the “Scene Cards” section. It’s only a couple pages, so you might wanna sit in the aisle at Barnes and Noble taking notes.
https://www.amazon.com/Behind-Seen-Walter-Edited-Mountain/dp/0735714266

_________________________
Some of my own processes:

For Biiiig projects, I’m a devout subclipper. It adds time to the head of the edit, but subtracts significantly more from the middle. Load all the tapes in whole chunks; have myself or the assistant subclip each shot into another bin (named for that tape). Briefly sum-up the shot in bin script view. If you have a producer sitting next to you, they LOVE the quick call-up ability of this manually-created feature.

I’m also Hell’s color coder. Set timeline to display “source”. Switch to bin text view and color-code each clip – then with colored paper and Post-Its, make the Walter Murch scene cards and stick ’em to the wall. Sometimes up to twenty different colors. This manual process helps you get immediately familiar with your characters; their subject matter; and their corresponding tapes. You can walk fresh into a project, and a week later know as much about it as the producer.

BTW: I blame my neurotic color-coding on the guy that invented these: https://p.office1000.com/mrp/MMXC13UBIC.jpg

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

Yeah you can zoom in all you want to with Avid’s DVE. Eventually you can go so tight as to be two pixels wide and one high. Realize though that Avid’s DVE is nothing more than rolling your chair towards the TV until your nose touches it. It doesn’t add pixels to your TV. There is no such thing as a de-interlacing thingy for Avid, Final Cut, etc. It only exists on CSI. The closest you can come is in After Effects, but only because the folks at AE know how to cheat better than anyone else.

The theory is all the same – if you shoot an SD image (720×486 pixels), then that’s exactly how many you have to work with. Honestly the best way to zoom in is to shoot HD and edit in SD. That gives you 1920×1080 pixels to play within your 720×486 frame.

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

I usually keep the height consistent, thereby using 720×540 for 4×3 and 960×540 for 16×9.

Also if you’re ever confused about maintaining correct shapes, remember that true 16×9 HD is 1920×1080. Create a blank new image in Photoshop with these dimensions and do an “Image/Resize” while keeping “Constrain Proportions” on. This way you can type whatever size you want into the height and the width will automatically snap to the right number that maintains the 16×9 shape. (it also works for 4×3 and PAL sizing.)

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

Couldn’t agree more. That said, I edit for a station, and thus by default use the station’s DVD Authoring Guy (not exactly his title). What might you suggest we do to combat the supers problem – encode two separate versions of the show onto the DVD?

It’s a team effort.

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

[grinner] “I do my own authoring. I don’t trust this stuff int he hands of others for the final produt.”

Oh Grinny, you’re such a control freak. I’d bet you change your own oil as well. Let the Authors have a career, will ya? They’re people too. (So I’m told)

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

Saw it – illuminating! They did a wonderful job. (Looove the imagination involved in creating the title sequence as well as the animations.)

Admit this is passively on-topic at best. I hear the opinions of the ‘creative’ side all the time, so I’m real interested in what folks in business circles think.

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

[mr_gfx] “where is the pan and zoom effect located? i have media composer software only version.”

It’s located here…
https://www.stagetools.com/

(Don’t use pan/zoom or pan/scan. They’re both heavilly flawed with clunky interfaces; and especially stay clear of offlining them on one system and onlining them on another – or trying to go between SD and HD. Crash! Stage Tools Moving Picture is soooo much better. And, it’s only a couple hundred bucks.

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

Yeah, been waiting on that one from Avid forever – the ability to open your tool palette (hamburger) and drag effects from the effect editor. Making the 20 or so effects (with parameters) that I use on a regular basis part of the user settings would rock.

Quick Transitions takes care of a lot of this though because it is a bin that works in any project (file/open bin).

Here’s an idea – in your “Quick Transitions” bin, name all effects that are NOT transitions so that the name starts with a “Z”. this way when you hit the Quick Transition button, all the non-transition effects that start with “Z” are out of your hair at the bottom… but that they ARE visible in the bin – which migrates from project to project.

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.

[Chris Bové]

Hmmm… never saw David Krall and Lee Iacocca in the same room together. Hmmm.

So if Xpress 3.0 was a Neon, would Pro with Mojo be a PT Cruiser?

______
/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)

A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.