Chris Bové
Forum Replies Created
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[nateboston] “I sort of feel like I need to prove myself as an editor right now, and to do that I need to be able to cut great things on my own.”
Ah, got it now.
You won’t be able to achieve this status of “holy cow, how did you come up with that idea” in the documentary world without knowing your footage back-to-front. Doc editing is intriguing because it is only ever as good as its editor. Heavily scripted work (motion pictures, TV sitcoms and so on) has a set agenda which has to be achieved by the editor. A doc can seriously be “Here’s 100 tapes. See you in two months. Make sure it turns out good.”
The best thing to research – book wise – is organization of the footage. As un-glamorous as it sounds, the best storytelling for a doc happens when you can access the footage as quickly as your brain thinks-up an idea.
Look at the chapters on logging and scene cards in Walter Murch’s “Behind the Seen” book. Since anyone can take 52 weeks to cut together a doc, research ways you can maximize your familiarity with the footage so you can do so in 12. It’ll take time. I used Murch’s scene card method on my last doc, and although it added about 4-5 days to the “logging” schedule, I estimate it subtracted about 15 days from the actual offline edit… all because I found an organization method that allowed me to access exact moments on the tapes that supported the direction the story was heading.
My 2
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Ahee heeee heee… the ‘Platform Wars’ forum is looking kinda barren. Why go there when we got this one?
Man do I miss the old AVBV MC. Blows my Adrenaline out of the ‘stability’ waters. May it RIP. But it was perfect for only one day in six years. The day after that perfect day, some producer came in and said, “hey, can you do ___ effect?” That was it. Another effect that needs another QuickTime upgrade that offsets previous Avid settings that causes Avid Tech Support to tell you to “trash your user settings” that forces you to notice new settings that engages you to try those settings that makes you realize you can do more effects that makes you upgrade to the newer version of MC that makes you giddy about telling your next producer about all the cool new stuff you can do that makes them say “that’s great, but can it do ___ effect?”
And that’s just for one line of work. What if you do ad agency editing on Tuesday, HD transcoding for your documentary on Wednersday and indie film work on Thursday?
But FCP isn’t any better. It’s a consumer program for a consumer world. Apple has been smart by marketing FCP machines to all the film schools, but those students are now graduating into the job market finding that the fun, artsy, indie jobs they’ve been hoping for are plentiful for FCP users – but the salaried jobs with 401k’s or 403b’s are more Avid based.
Do I think Adrenaline is unstable? Yes. But it’s no Corvair. It ain’t no GTO either. Hmmm… reminds me of a Dodge Intrepid. Sleek lines; cab-forward design; exceeeeedingly uncomfortable; in the shop a lot; but at least gets you from point A to point B while looking better than the guy in the rusty Caprice.
Not to sound granola here, but the only edit system that has ever been 100% stable is a Moviola Syncronizer and a Griswold splicer. Not because of snobby film reasons, but because there’s no upgrading – ever. It has one use. The problem is – none of us have only one use anymore.
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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Hmmmm… interesting.
Because everyone who owns a $399 Dell computer can be an editor at home nowadays, I wonder if the professional future of nonlinear editors will be based greatly on their ability to strive in a collaborative environment. There’s a whoooooole lot of folks out there that can’t make collaborative criticism work for their creative outlet.
Probably will be based on the nature of the gig, huh? More so for the motion picture industry – like Pirates of the Caribbean, and less for ad agency or low budget indie films.
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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Nice debe.
Nateboston – but to answer the literature question (sorry got off-track):
https://www.amazon.com/When-Shooting-Stops-Cutting-Begins/dp/0306802724/ref=sr_1_23/002-3205459-1503255?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1179247637&sr=1-23______
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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[nateboston] “I want to focus on the organic. Any thoughts?”
Yes, one thought.
Spent much of the free time in my twenties playing rhythm guitar in bands. Mostly original music – everything from rock to funk. Was pretty good too, until Carpal made me choose between the Les Paul and the Avid. (The Paul is now in an oak, glass-front gun rack.) Absolutely, positively the best tunes we made were ones that WE made – collectively. The “lone creative genius” is very hard to reproduce again and again. Having five people sharing the same brain kept the “mission” (if you will) of the music consistent.
Same holds true for editing. Without question, of all the films and programs I’ve churned out over the years the best are ones that nurtured a strong collaborative environment. The producer or director sitting next to me, arguing, clawing, molding footage, trying, failing, trying again, succeeding…
Literature on both theory and techncial advancements have helped the career about 10% total. The rest is by trial/error and collaboration. I’m a huuuuge advocate for aprenticeship editing. Find an editor who is more experienced. Even if he/she makes your skin crawl. Sit and learn. Load tapes, make coffee, get paid nothing, and watch. If he/she doesn’t actively teach you anything, at least you’ll learn passively. Actually I think that makes up more than half of how I’ve learned – by formulating my own opinions while watching others, and quietly saying “wow how stupid, I would do it differently.”
The rest of my learning has been the opposite – kids I’ve taught that tell me I’ve done a 12-step process when it could’ve been done in only eight.
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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[Ted Levy] “This forum is for people like myself who care about Avid and want to work with it.”
No public internet forum deals in such absolutes. Not even the forums on avid.com.
I’ve never met Grinner; never seen his work; never seen his edit suite; and am usually too busy editing to watch the SuperBowl. But I like many of his 3771 insights.
Ron – if you cleaned house and only recruited hosts that were evangelical, I would no longer take the Cow seriously. I already bought an Avid. Why try and sell it to me again? I want to hear how to fix my car from a seasoned mechanic – not the guy paid to sell me the thing.
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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Way back before modern medicine, there was a theory about the many curves and folds that constitute the human brain. Basically, each fold was believed to be a direct result of a life-changing experience.
There’s a bunch of books and articles out there that can add insights to flat editing. (Half of them are written by Walter Murch.) But the best learning process – the one that got me the most “brain folds” – was through other editors saying “why the hell did you do it that way? That’s stupid. I would have…”
The other way is via a “brick wall” producer. One who says “I know I’m asking you to do thirty hours of work in nine hours – I don’t care. Just make it happen, and make it look like you did it in thirty hours.”
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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[grinner] “where are these files coming from?
have you tried re rendering them in AE?
I know this is the third time in three threads I have suggested this but a nice clean QT with the proper avid codec often solves alot of issues.
I have gotten this error with certain avi files and making a fresh quicktime fixed me up.”Hey Grin – always a pleasure.
1. I create them – QT (H.264) export from the Avid, placed in a folder, then re-imported at a later date. They’re low-res reference files with BITC, by which I have audio people sync their mix up to. I need to re-import them just to line’em up – satisfying my frame-accurate neuroticies.
2. I’m completely AE inept. Looove too mant Avid 3rd party plug-ins that do much of the AE job.
3. Agree… but don’t have much luck using Avid codecs. Too many edits for indie and student filmmakers that hire audio folks and FCP assistant editors that don’t understand/are incompatable with/have no time to dnld/are just dumb about Avid codecs.
I’ve heard that some errcodes are the result of bad/corrupt Windows folders that the QTs are stored in. Not sure how good that info is.
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\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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[grinner] “Everyone knows the top dog is the client’s wife.”
HA!
Can remember at least three times where the client’s wife sat-in at the final screening and started a cat fight over how much better she could do the voice over. Usually leads to hiring another agency… who doesn’t hire me.
Aaah the mounds of never-seen work…
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/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.
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[Mark Suszko] “The in-viewfinder talley for record had a red and a green light. The intuitive thing was green meant “go, you’re recording” to me. Turned out in that camera green meant “paused in record mode” Red meant “rolling record””
Heh… yeah I did that too. Mine was during a live studio shoot. My first day on the job, we had the usual setup with a field cam mounted on rolling sticks and a massive viewfinder mounted atop it all… with red tally lights on either side of it.
Two stories in the same day actually (talking heads show – I’m supposed to get cutaways):
1) REHERSAL: Tally light is red – on or off. Idiot here thinks that red means it’s not being used. So for the whole rehersal I see no light on, so I think I’m the primary camera, slooowly panning to follow the action. Sweating bullets the whole time. Of course when the light finally turns red, I let go of the arms.2) LIVE: They take my shot, and my editor’s brain takes over. Looking right at my viewfinder I mentally drift and start ‘watching TV’. Inner voice says, “Hmmm… that guy has a lot of headroom. Wow, now he’s got a whole lot of headroom. Wow, somebody on these headsets is really angry… someone must be in trouble… $#!T!”
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/-o-o-\
\`(=)`/…Pixel Monkey
`(___)A picture says 1000 words. Editors give them meaning.