The planning and structuring of your production workflow is at the heart of creative thinking. This episode of Motion Sketches looks at the importance of planning your digital workflow and developing a creative assembly process that is flexible and matches your particular creative impulses. It also looks at practical ways of planning and organizing a workflow using Celtx to ensure that everything gets done when it needs to be done.
The environment of the non-linear editing system can all too easily and unwittingly become and unruly nightmare of lost and orphaned clips, wrong file names and missing media.
To keep your edit sessions focused on meaning, drama and engagement rather than file-wrangling you need to get organized.
As regular readers of Digital Basin will no doubt be aware, one of the more regular soap boxes hauled out to berate from upon is the old chestnut of 'industry standards'. The absurdity of the idea that there is a standard and accepted means of creative production is not just stupid, it's also an insult to very notion of creativity and creativity explanation.
Yet this time around I feel no need to haul out the old soap box to beat on about software innovation, alternative workflows and forward rather than stagnant software design; instead I have the pleasure of drawing up the parallel commentary from friend, colleague and techno-artist extraordinaire Tom Ellard.
Tom has compiled a simultaneously funny and insightful post on his blog entitled Education: Then and Now. And with hope that Tom wont mind I shall re-print it here. (You can read about the extrodinary cretaive career of Tom here)
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Then:
* Teacher: Learn these passages from the Bible by heart. * Student: I shall sir, but may I enquire as to the reasoning? * Teacher: This is the way it is done by all, and ye shall not quibble upon it.
Now:
* Teacher: Here is Maya, you?ll be learning that. * Student: OK, but why Maya? * Teacher: It?s the industry standard.
Don?t be hard on poor teacher, it is the industry standard. But in tonight?s programme we?ll be asking just what makes something the industry standard? Sex? Drugs? Enormous space ships piloted by toads? Or something less obvious?
Industry standard applications are at first glance an ill sorted lot. For every prissy convoluted overly complex video editing tool there?s an almost Neanderthal audio suite. But after some reflection and much alcohol we can start to invent a common thread. As with Shakespeare?s villains we have a noble figure of humanity, troubled by a fatal flaw, which eventually leads to their failure.
Maya.
If you make 3D for a cinema there?s a 90% chance you use Maya. (Unless you?re one of those crazy bastards that uses Houdini because you also like riding your sports bike off a cliff onto a moving trampoline.) Recently Maya was bought by Autodesk because they wanted to lose money on two major applications instead of just Max.Yes, the leading 3D animation tools lose money hand over fist - the ones that actually sell are the ones that professionals would not touch with a stick. Here we can post a rule:
Rule 1: if it?s easy to use and very affordable it can?t be the industry standard.
The quality of Maya can be seen time and time again in the results. A nobleman among programs. But look at the interface:Mayahem
Here we have dynamic menus, pop down menus, pop up menus, radial menus, ?shelves?, dialogues, and a really really bad case of iconitus. If this was a teenager it?d be ?edgy? or just ?pimply?. Now I have very little experience with Maya so far and I may be yet to understand but either this interface grew over years of tinkering or the person that invented it has florid hebephrenic schizophrenia. Either way it breaks so many usability and educational concepts it needs a specially minted medal.
Pro Tools LE.
It?s been said before - it needs to be said again. There is a moment when you are teaching Pro Tools when you have to explain that if you have an hour long programme to bounce down and it?s due on air in 45 minutes, it?s Game Over. The student looks at you like you are insane, knowing at least 5 other programs that will export that audio in 5 minutes and asks, what is this?
You?ve got two ways you can run this message. Official: Pro Tools HD is hardware based and LE has to fit in with that and besides running the mix through the hardware insures always that what you hear in the mix down is what you get - no surprises. Alternative: That PT needs to pass that signal through that big fat blue dongle called an M box to make damn sure it?s a legit copy of PT. The student looks at you like you?re a tool either way.
When you get to RTAS, they are questioning you again. Yes that?s right, the effects that you use in Pro Tools only work in Pro Tools. Yes, industry standard means no one else in the industry uses them. No I am not a tool, kindly refrain from looking at me like that.
Rule 2: there has to be some convoluted reason why it won?t work with anyone else?s software.
Fortunately, Apple has come up with Audio Units as part of their ?we are the computing equivalent of North Korea? strategy. They make Digidesign look good. Speaking of Apple:
Final Cut Pro.
Most common question in any FCP class: why do we use this when every single other application we use is by Adobe? I have Premiere, why can?t I use that? Can I do this at home on Premiere instead? I tried barking at them but recently a stony silence showing lots of teeth seems to work best.
No kids, you have to pretend that the Pr isn?t next to Ae and Ps in the dock. Final Cut is the industry standard, and it?s much to do with a fight between Apple and Adobe over Intel versions that by a process of attrition let Henny Penny reach the top of the coop. Besides Final Cut is fun to use - it comes with games! Adventure game: move your mouse slowly over the interface looking for hidden features! Puzzle game: using the resize bar at the bottom of the timeline, puzzle out which way the timeline is going to zoom. Gambling game: which way will the fields in your PAL video export flip this time? Wish it came with a shoot ?em up.
Rule 3: Overcoming arbitrary behaviour of industry standard tools provides teaching businesses with income.
Actually if you just want to edit video efficiently use Vegas.
Photoshop.
Ps is the good guy. The prince charming. If you ever grumble about photoshop then you need to be forced to use an alternative for a few days. That will learn you. If you are very bad we?ll make it The Gimp.
Quark.
Actually this is a cautionary tale. When I was a layout grunt, there was Quark. That was it. When Adobe first brought out Indesign, there was good natured shaking of heads. Everybody used Quark. The printers used Quark. What would you do with Indesign? There would be nowhere to get the damn thing printed! Just as I was ?being made redundant?, a job came in from somewhere in Asia. An Indesign file. My job was to remake the whole thing in Quark, but we had to get Indesign to open it. It was a bit like Illustrator so that was alright, but no one more senior was going to touch the filthy thing.
Rule 4: Industry standards can change mighty fast.
One the most significant shifts brought about by evolutions toward digital cinema is not just sharper, bigger, better pictures, nor is it the flexibility of digital post or lower production costs, rather it comes in the tangible and profound changes in job descriptions and role expectations.
As a technology develops it invariably expands, it takes on new options, incorporates new features. And in so doing it changes the role of the person whose job it is to drive the technology.
We see this no more clearly than in role of the Editor whose job description, once upon a time, extended no further than the sequential and linear assembly of the images. If we wanted a digital software tool to perform that task we had it 20 years ago. But, of course, it wasnt enough and the tools of the editor kept expanding. Now there simply isnt a editing gig in the world where there isnt expectations that the Editor has working knowledge of colour and sound and compositing and....
The Editor may not necessarily be asked to do final work in all these areas but there is a broadly held expectation that they these options largely sit under the broad banner of the Editors role.
It really is absurd and pointless to argue over whether they Editor 'should' perform these tasks the fact is that the Tool the editor sits in front of to perform their work Can do these tasks, and increasingly can do all of them very very very well. So whether the old-school folks like it or not, the job description has been re-written and the job itself evolves right alongside the technology.
There are many who find this idea scary, many who are afraid of a 'watering down' effect or an 'all-things-to-everyone' scenario that seemingly trades off quality. But there are two asusmptions here that bother me...
The first is the assumption that human beings working in cinematic arts have finite creative and technical capacity, a limit to how skilled they can be - "an editor couldn't possibly ALSO be a sound designer or a colourist...!" This is an idea I profoundly reject and indeed would argue human history of art and science and creative endeavor has continually rejected this idea. I see no precedent to put such arbitrary and artificial constrains on what a skilled artisan is capable of.
The second, perhaps less ephemeral, flawed assumption is the notion that skills of 'editing' and that of ancillary fields such as 'colour grading' are some how so distinct and apart - so un-related as to be dysfunctional if unified... What absolute rubbish! The role of the 'editor' is to assemble, reveal, craft and interpret meaning and story. is that not exactly the role of the colour gradist? Are the two roles not singularly focused on producing the same outcome?
This article from San Francisco filmmaker Eric Escobar, entitled WHY EVERY EDITOR IS ALSO A COLORIST, points clearly towards this idea of seeing editing as a broad umbrella of interweaved and inseparable elements. Elements that share a singular aim and in particular why Editor's should perhaps reject the idea that Colour is 'not their job' and embrace colour as a core part of their job description.
As Eric saids...
"That's the point of coloring. Its not just about correction, or balance, or a mechanical smoothing of any production issues that have found their way into post. Its about leading an audience through an emotional experience. Color matters, take some time to learn how to use it to tell your story."
Of course, on top of all that there is also the fact that tools like Magic Bullet Looks are SO good, SO powerful, SO flexible and such a dead set dream to use that its hard to imagine why on earth an editor wouldn't want to dive into colour grading!
Indeed, on a technical level, Magic Bullet's internal structure itself as a plug-in for NLE systems such as Final Cut Pro and Premiere Pro that you can run straight of the editign timeline, rather than as a external application separate and apart from the NLE, point's firmly towards the idea of colour being more tightly married to editing itself than as a removed and disparate process.
Magic Bullet Looks may well be a step ahead of the pack in its conceptual approach right of the bat. Certainly it makes for one of the most seemless grading workflows around and one that makes the convoluted trip from FCP to Apple Color seem positively archaic.
Color Grading is too often regarded as an arcane, exclusive science not fit for mere mortals. But the digital age is slowly starting to reshape this mentality and allow for a clearer perspective through the haze of hyperbole. Which is a good thing because the tools for getting great color grading results have never been better, cheaper or more accessible.
Any cinematic art can be complex, nuanced, detailed, scientific and specialized - editing, sound mixing, cinematography - but simply because these arts can be highly specialized shouldn't mean you have to be a Specialist to engage with them; they shouldn't be inaccessible or unapproachable.
Contrary to popular belief, Color Grading isn't that hard. It is nether arcane nor unassailable. You CAN color grade your own digital movie and get good results. You CAN color grade on a desktop computer without dedicated hardware. Anyone who tells you otherwise is simply out of touch or a technology snob.
Of course a colorist specialist in a dedicated hardware grading suite with specialized and carefully calibrated monitors will likely get better results than you at your desktop or laptop. But that's absolutely not the point. If we all followed that logic no one would dare pick up a camera until they had been properly apprenticed on a 35mm Panavision; No one would sit down to edit until they had been well schooled on every element of an Avid Symphony; No one would drive a car on the road until they had mastered an F1 racer. Utterly absurd! That is an archaic and dinosauric perspective generally expounded by those terrified that the Digital Generation of filmmakers may show them up with the brazen audacity of their DIY ethic.
It strikes me as somewhat odd that very few would rally against the idea of the DIY when it comes to camera, sound and edit but for reasons unknown there remains an entrenched idea that doing your own color grade is somehow blasphemy and folly.
If you're careful, follow some key principles of color theory, ensure your grading is in-concert with your film's story and theme, understand how to avoid clipping and illegal colors, and have even a half-decent set of eyeballs in your head then there is absolutely no reason whatsoever that you can't get great color grading results on your own, doing it yourself, using low cost software on a domestic computer.
Read the rest of this article in 2 parts HERE and HERE.
One of the trickier post-production processes for indie filmmakers is
working with dual-system (aka double system) sound in post production.
This has been a challenge a number of my students at the International Film School Sydney have been facing of late and, with their
collaboration, we compiled a document which outlines some contemporary
options for synchronization.
Some found that they'd
prefer to get a complete cut of their film first using the temp audio
track and then sync only the clips they need on the NLE timeline.
Others much preferred the idea of getting all the leg work out of the
way upfront, do all the sync-ing before starting the edit so the edit
can take place uninteruppeted by technical wrangling. Further workflow
options include rolling the process of sync and transcode to lossless
intermediate files (ProRes, Avid DNxHD, Cineform)
together.
The document entitled (rather
unimaginatively) 'Dual-System Sound Sync Options' can be read on the
film schools open production website - www.ifssproduction.net It can also be
downloaded as PDF from the Production Bible part of the
site.
Keeping the 'Old School' happy - Innovation, Market-share and Vegas Pro 8c
All creative technologies are inherently cultural. Designed to serve the conjoined bastard twins of 'creative process' and 'industry', technology systems (in particular software) invariably have their development conformed to cultural demands as much, if not more so, than technical ones.
In practical terms we see this in NLE software interfaces with working conceptual paradigms that are driven by how editors 'think' things 'should' be done; and how they have been done before, rather than how they might or could be done better; freed, if you will, from legacy baggage.
In most professional NLE's we see an overwhelming development process of mimicry and replication. As early digital editing systems (the Quantel Harry, Avid, Lightworks, Video Toaster and so on) sought to drag professional editors (often kicking and screaming) to the digital age, they invariably did so by replicating in the non-linear digital environment the concepts, paradigms and language of the linear analog world. 'Source' and 'Output' windows, 'Bins', A/B rolls, Gang monitors, Logging and so on.
By replicating the Old in the New the transition for working editors and filmmakers was made much easier. By conforming the software's development to the 'culture' of editing rather than to the free run of the technology's natural impulses we are delivered a set of tools that, despite their housing inside the metaphysical computer space, still largely function in an analog head-space.
Subsequently the hypothesis that strikes me is that if we could erase all memory of how editing has traditionally been done, and the tools editing was done on, and then sat down with the brief to design a 'software tool for assembling moving images,' it would likely bare little resemblance to the NLE environment we know. If the technology was freed from the culture of editing, unshackled from legacy and tradition, and allowed to work purely on the level of innovative design problem solving, then I'd warrant there'd be a great many off the 'accepted' editing system elements that would be entirely dispensed with and replaced with new, as yet not yet thought of, modes.
In many ways this is the experience I feel using Sony's Vegas; that it is one of the few video production tools on the market that has developed, to some degree, free from accepted norms. Vegas had a number of natural advantages in this regard - some by design, some by circumstance.
The original Vegas 1.0 was not, in fact, an editing system at all. Rather it was a multitracking DAW. So when Vegas 2.0 became Vegas Video it became an NLE built from the foundation of an audio-like sensibility. In that step alone Vegas circumvented the entrenched 'separation of powers' between video and audio production.
The other factor that seems to have shaped Vegas with a paradigm un-attached to legacy editing culture is its market position. By being the new guy with the small market share and low profile Vegas didn't have an existing user-base to protect, nor was it compelled to compete for the mainstream market (as Apple and Adobe have). Instead Vegas was freed from competing head-on for the existing editing pie and could, from the fringe, afford to be far more bold and adventurous in its thinking than other NLE's.
Without doubt some of the most satisfying, engaging and downright exciting cinematic media experiences I've had over the past few years have been on the small screen not the large. The one-hour episodic TV drama has had some great high points of late. US cable and network TV has delivered in spades with the The West Wing, The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, Carnivale and the utterly sublime Deadwood. But the UK has also thrown in some great additions with Spooks, Rome and Wire in the Blood. And still Canada's Newsroom rates as one of the cleverest and most sardonic (and at times wonderfully poetic) media satire's ever written.
What I have found very interesting in looking more closely at the structure of the writing and editing of these drama series' is the various implementations of the 1-hour episode format and how it seems to be subtly evolving. Whilst all episodes in all the series mentioned above run more or less the same length, they are all rendered somehow unique in their structure.1-Hour episodes for traditional network TV in the states obviously conform rather precisely to the specifics of ad-breaks.
As a result the structure of the writing (and by proxy the editing) is built to specific 'act' break dramatic points going into each ad-break. Nowhere is this more evident than in the precise and perfect structure of The West Wing.But cable TV in the US, and BBC TV in the Uk, is ad-free during the program and so there isnt the same reliance in ad-breaks to provide clearly distinct narrative sign posts. The drama is much more continuous and gives shows made for cable, as opposed to those made for network, a distinctly different 'feel' which is largely extraneous to the show's genre.
This article from the US Editor's Guild Magazine explores this topic amongst other in the context of editors working on TV drama series such as the throughly engaging drama series DEXTER.
"a cable episode can run 55 minutes with no interruptions.... It?s not that the peak moments cease to matter on cable, but you can propel the story forward with more inertia. It?s much more like cutting a feature. There?s more time for things to develop and play out, and you don?t have to worry about all those climactic act outs.?
When we were choosing new cameras for the International Film School Sydney we had a range of considerations to take into account. We primarily needed cameras that were going to be flexible; cameras that could adapt to a variety of different shoots, environments and visual styles. We also wanted to ensure that our teaching of camera operation and workflow was future-focused and preparing students for the production world to come rather than just the here and now. And of course price is always a major factor. Not just because we need to spend our equipment budget wisely but also because we want to ensure that IFSS students are creative pragmatists; efficient indie filmmakers who know who to make a great movie out of limited resources.
In this regard, one of the most exciting cameras for indie filmmakers to hit the market over the last few years is the Sony, solid-state, EX1 and it met just about all our criteria. It's relatively small and compact meaning it can be used just about anywhere - fine on a tripod, jib or dolly, but just as happy on a small steadicam and perfect for handheld. It's pretty robust and can take the sort of beating that more than 100 student productions a year can exert. It may not have interchangeable lenses but the lens it does have is excellent and pulling light to 1/2 inch sensors with full raster 1920x1080 HD it certainly delivers a big, bold image.
Being Solid-state and recording to memory cards also ensured we could teach students to engage with a file-based workflow that will undoubtedly be the staple of future production.
As with any new technology, there is always a bit of a gamble involved. Purchasing cameras such as JVC 251, which also form a staple part of our in-house facilities, was an easy choice; a solid camera that has been well proven in the field. But the EX1 was brand new and largely un-tested; especially in a film school environment. But it seems there are a host of indie filmmakers discovering the power, flexibility and sheer cost-effective efficiency of the Ex1 and the XDCAM EX format.
This article - Going Underground - looks at an indie feature being made in the UK set in a cold-ware nuclear bunker that has been shot entirely with an Ex1. Similarly this article - Shooting an Independent Feature with the Sony EX1 - examines the workflow and technique of an independent comedy feature. Both articles give some good insight into the strengths and possibilities of the Ex1 and how to maximize it's potential.
I remember testing and reviewing Adobe Creative Suite 1. It felt bit, full, comprehensive, rich. It wasnt perfect; it groaned and grunted under certain strains, it stumbled and was clumsy in a range of areas. But it felt like the future. It pointed towards an holistic and integrated production future.
Then there was CS2 and I tested it and reviewed it and wrote about for various magazines and websites. And it was big, and dense and packed with features and options and add-ons and extras.
And not long after I had started the deep dive into the CS2 tarpit attempting to wrangle such a huge production entity, they asked what I'd like to see in CS3...? Bugger me, I cant quite get my head around the contents and options of CS2 let alone think about what else you might add for CS3. Bug fixes, changes in process, these are the surface level stuff (important certainly) but considering 'What Else..?" is a much bigger picture.
So along came CS3 and the pieces at last started to fall into place - the integartion become central rather than periphery. The holistic aporoach to delivery become a core function not an ancillary add-on. CS1 and CS2 felt like a good value bundle of separate applications. CS3 at last really started to feel like a singular entity - a singular system with various arms.
There were elements missing, certainly. Ultra and OnLocation felt like outsiders. Adobe Audition was dropped from the bundle which was major loss. Soundbooth has some good tools, Premiere has very good audio tools of its own but even the two together arent a match for the excellent DAW power of Audition.
Then there was the incomplete Mac and PC parity. Premiere on the Mac is a great thing but the number of features in the Help files marked with (Windows only) - AAF support being most notable - left CS3 feeling like a job incomplete.
None the less CS3 did feel like maximum density, the software saturation point. To this stage Adobe had avoided bloatedness and continued to delivery density intrinsically connected with functionality. But how much more can you pack in?
Well here comes CS4. Delivered today to the world. I have been playing with various demos of CS4 applications over the past couple of months and just when I thought there would be little to excite and simple a CS4 delivering refinement rather than advancement, I find I am surprised to be surprised.
I wont get into it here and now. Reviews, articles and tutorials will follow here on DMN and the DigitalBasin but I thought Id compile my short list of 3 key new things in CS4 that have caught my attention (and they are not necessarily the most obvious)
1. Soundbooth is now Multi-Track Whilst its a far cry from being a replacement from Audition and arguably lacks the musicality of Apples Soundtrack Pro or Sonys AcidPro, it is none the less a very functional multitrack tool with great potential for audio preparation and syncing in dual-system sound projects. the audio to text feature is also something that sets the mind buzzing with potential possibilities.
2. The new Adobe ASND file format. Acting like like a hybrid between a project file and a dedicated multi-channel bundle format, ASND has really grabbed my attention. A file for building multi track assemblies that possesses a built-in mix down, can be used as a singular waveform file but is in fact a reference file back to the multi-track with live-update between applications. It also a snapshot feature to remember past history. The possibilities for this format are HUGE and I hope that Adobe continue to develop and exploit the little gem they have created. And dare I even hope that other developers might adopt the format...?
3. Metadata, Metadata, Metadata This is the most important word in 21st century media production and the entire Adobe suite has embraced it like a dog chasing a care tyre. media management, coordination, tracking, revision, workflow, processing, distribution and delivery - all running the engine of effective metadata.
But I do have one question..... Where is Ultra? One of the best keying systems Ive ever used. Adobe acquired it when they bought serious magic. But despite its (windows only) presence in CS3 there seems no mention of it in CS4....
Digital Pre-Vis options for the Digital Indie Filmmaker
As cinema technologies advance, we not only get better/faster/cheaper ways of engaging cinema production process, we invariably unlock or re-invent new cinematic processes themselves.
One area that has profoundly presented itself as a highly dynamic and creative process, now open to anyone with a computer and not reliant on big budget, is digital pre-visualization.
It would be a mistake to narrowly think of digital Pre-Vis as simply a method of making glorified story-boards. Instead it's much more effective to consider digital Pre-Vis as a broad umbrella term covering much more than glorified storyboarding. Digital Pre-Vis envelopes a wide range of computer-based tools, technologies and processes aimed at developing, planning and testing visual sequences and cinematic elements.
The types and forms of tool used for Pre-Vis and visual planning are also incredibly diverse and draw upon some unexpected sources. George Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) has even used the Unreal computer game engine to construct Pre-Vis for films like Steven Spielberg's AI. The observation has been made by ILM's Scott Rosenthal in regard to the use of a game engine to Pre-Vis AI that "The whole goal of the exercise was to expose aesthetic choices or opportunities to Steven Spielberg. So it was a director's tool, not a postproduction tool."
This comment underpins much of the new thinking about the role digital Pre-Vis serves. The mechanics Pre-Vis uses -- 3D environments, animations, motion graphics, frame animatics, color swatches, digital imaging and so on - are tools traditionally associated with post-production. But the opportunities and benefits of Pre-Vis force us to reconsider some of those assumptions; to see Pre-Visas embedded to the art of directing and creative inception.
Whilst we might most readily think of 3D graphics systems as the core of digital Pre-Vis, there are in fact a myriad of other tools and technologies that serve to help flesh out visual ideas and build articulate and dynamic visualizations. More-over these tools need not be expensive; indeed there are a host of free tools and applications available, along with some very low cost solutions, ensuring digital Pre-Vis is well within reach of all production budgets. What unites these various systems is the empowerment they deliver to the director to enact clear and informed directorial choices about the film they are making. But to really exploit Pre-Vis we need to articulate more clearly what the role of the director really is.
Perhaps the most adequate description of the role of the director on a movie is 'Caretaker of the Vision'. The director is a guide through the production jungle ensuring that the collaboration of different departments remain focused on a clear singular vision. Films are made by directorial choices, the auteur decisions about composition, performance, design and assembly. So in this vein the role of Pre-Vis is arguably the most important phase for the director to engage. It's here that they will flesh out what the directorial vision for the project is and deliver it with clarity to the cast and crew -- get everyone singing from the same song-sheet with a clear voice.
What is key to effective Pre-Vis is to remember what Pre-Vis processes are designed for. They are not for the creation of polished works or refined and stylish graphics. Pre-Vis is foremost about communication, experimentation, testing, planning. Pre-Vis projects are a production sketchpad not a finished product.
Below I have laid out some of the best and most available digital tools for indie filmmakers; ones that strike a productive balance between creative flexibility and ease of use efficiency. This in turn ensures the focus remains on directorial decision making and not technical proficiency. A Pre-Vis tool that is overly-complicated and time consuming to use largely defeats the purpose of pre-vis. The tools here also stretch beyond just 3D virtual blocking and include a broader selection of tools for developing visual style, color and form for digital indie film projects.
Adopting the skills of your family - Colour correction and Premiere Pro
Integration is the key buzzword of contemporary digital media and few have doen it so wel as Adobe. But there is another element to the idea of a stable or suite of applications that goes beyond allowing applications to talk to each other; that is to more intrinsically get under each other's skin
On of the great strengths of Adobe software is that each application in the production suite is able to leverage the expertise of its stablemates. This is most evident in Premiere Pro which incorporates some of the key strengths of Photoshop and After Effects in its own arsenal.
For titling Premiere leverages the power and sophistication of the Photoshop text engine and since both After Effects and Photoshop possess comprehensive colour processing tools - that have been built up over the very long life span of these applications - Premiere's built-in colour correction tools are superb and cover a diverse range of parameters.
This tutorial from Layers Magazine provides a clear step by step process through a colour correction workflow using Premiere Pro and privides a good reference for colour correction work we'll do in classes and on projects.
Leading or Following - Reconsidering Film School (part5)
Cinema IS Technology.
[part 5 of a 5-part musing on the idea of Film School and its
relationship to industry learning and art. Its not intended as a set
of fully formed or precisely structured arguments but rather a set of
musings on what the ideals and implications of Film School should could
and might be...?]
Cinema does not and cannot exist for either the creator or the viewer without the technical apparatus of its construction and delivery. As such any filmmaker who thinks of themselves as a non-technical filmmaker is simply deluded.
The difference however in the approach of the Industry Leading Film School as opposed to the Industry Serving Film School is that the former rejects ideas of industry standard tools - invariably a specific brand deemed acceptable in exclusivity - and instead embraces diversity and flexibility in understanding the technical underpinnings of all tools. This is something Ive written about many times before; most particularly the essay HOLISTIC THINKING - INTEGRATED MAKING. A manifesto of sorts, the key items of which reflected upon how to ensure students were not software users but real and empowered artisans. Fundamental therefore is the idea of Software Agnosticism and the Philosophy of the Tools.
One of the great tragedies of media making education over the past decade has been the supplanting of real knowledge, skills and core competencies with software specific, brand allied pseudo-skills. An editor, skilled and knowledgeable in the craft, technology and artistry of editing as a process, should be more than capable of sitting down in front of any editing system, any editing tool, and be able to produce functional quality work. A carpenter is not rendered useless by changing to a different type of circular saw..!
Sadly however we are in an era where instead of demanding this universality as a bench mark from creative artisans we accept the corporate-driven brand allegiance of software specific skills. Software and technology Users rather than real technical creators.
Any institution that teaches software specific functions above, or worse, in place of core processes is fundamentally dis-empowering their students and directly damaging the broader creative industry, making it slavishly adherent to corporate marketing directions rather than the needs and skill demands of production. A Film School seeking to serve industry by adhering to the myth of industry standard tools is intrinsically limiting creative endeavor by insisting there is right or correct tool to be creative with.
Furthermore, any cinematic education that provides only one type, one brand, one form of tool or system of production in exclusivity rather than providing options and diversity of tools to students without hierarchy - so that they might find the right tool that suits them and their internal methodology of working - is detrimentally hobbling those students. These students are rendered under-skilled servants of a software company rather than comprehensively skilled artists and craftspersons with abilities beyond the tools.
Each and every software tool for creative cinematic production carries with it an internally logical philosophy a conceptual mode of perceiving the creative production process instilled on inception into the tool by those who made it and the direct imperatives of the corporation for which it was made. Thus a creative media maker in choosing a particular tool for production is by default buying into a tacit, if not proactive, acceptance of that tools philosophical approach. Their work with that tool is subsequently governed, influenced and shaped by that philosophy.
If however the student through their cinematic education is restrictively indoctrinated into a particular tool (and its respective philosophy), without wider consideration of a personal creative and philosophical approach, then their work will be dictatorially shaped by the tool itself rather than by their own creative imperatives. The tool will dictate what can and cant be done and how it will be done rather than the creator seeking out these pathways to suit themselves and the needs of the project.
Whilst standard technical formats provide functional benchmarks and uniformity, the idea that there are Industry Standard creative tools is fundamentally abhorrent. There is NO SUCH THING AS AN INDUSTRY STANDARD creative tool. The very concept is anti-creative. It is a prescribing that there is only one way to work and that other techno-creative approaches are of lesser value or unacceptable. It implies that a work is only acceptable if made with a particular type of technology and this is absurdly destructive and the very concept must be done away. We must ensure cinematic producers are not conforming creative vision to the needs of the tool but seeking out the tool to extol the creative needs of the production.
The only true measure of intelligence and knowledge is the ability to learn, acquire and apply new skills and knowledge. Thus an editor whose comprehension of editing process, technique and technology has been built solely through the confined prism of one particular tools presented philosophical paradigm (on the idea that its an industry standard) is fundamentally weak; dis-empowered. They are at the mercy the ever changing whims of software developers rather than a servant of the creative process where by the tools are means to an ends.
A conceptual method for implementing this approach is the idea of Technology Transparency that we have endeavored to implement into the curriculum at the International Film School Sydney - embodied in the Technological Philosophy statement on the schools website.
The aim is to educate filmmakers whose creative vision is never limited by a lack of technical knowledge. Filmmakers for whom the tools of cinema are an invisible and transparent conduit to creativity.
In other words the goal of any Film School should Not be that students are expertly proficient in the particular creative tools the school has deemed industry acceptable but rather that they possess a solid degree of technology transparency; the ability to quickly and easily adapt to any given tool they are presented with. This stems directly from the idea of Teaching students How to Learn first and foremost before any particular skill.
The more self-confident part of me would like to think that my students, at the end of their course, could sit down in front of Any given editing system on the market and given a small amount of time to orient themselves, be able to effectively produce quality work. They would be able to do this NOT because they have learned ALL the systems on the market but because they have learned the fundamentals that underpin all the NLEs on the market. That they have consummate ability to acquire, process and apply new information. With that skill they will be perpetually in-work and capably able to adapt to any future develops in cinematic process.
This kind of learning flexibility and adaptability is virtually impossible within a Film School focused on serving the industry and meeting obtuse industry standards. This kind of learning is only really possible when the Film School as institution works outside and looks beyond industry. When it frees itself from the dogma of how things have traditionally been done and instead embraces how they might be done...
Film School is an institution to be treasured and respected but it only has the opportunity to live up its potential when its unshackled from industry. When its free to challenge and explore and investigate.
Leading or Following - Reconsidering Film School (part4)
Language and Learning
[part 4 of a 5-part musing on the idea of Film School and its
relationship to industry learning and art. Its not intended as a set
of fully formed or precisely structured arguments but rather a set of
musings on what the ideals and implications of Film School should could
and might be...?]
When we boil down to the very essence of Education and Art there are, in truth, only two things that a Film School can teach - everything else is just the trappings and trimmings. Moreover both are things that are extremely difficult to garner outside of formal learning and a dedicated institution. (Ironically however I would venture that these two things are very often either neglected or curtailed by many film school curricula).
The first and foremost is Cinema Literacy. Watching a lot of films and reading a few books is all well and good but a litany of shot framings and what they are supposed to mean is not Cinema Literacy. Such distillations of cinema language are the equivalent of my 2 year old daughter reciting the alphabet. The basis of literacy certainly, but until she can read (and more importantly Write) a novel its not a true sophisticated literacy. Its simply regurgitation.
Cinema Language is more intricate, more sophisticated, more complex and varied than any written form known to human kind. Its a vibrant and endlessly dynamic mediascape of runic audio-visual hieroglyphs where subtle serifs are the nuanced inflections that fundamentally alter meaning. Moreover it is a language that grows and evolves with every new cinematic work, with every new technology, with every new viewing medium.
So to suggest that you can begin to attain a comprehensive literacy of contemporary cinema from watching a lots of movies and reading books is either grossly naïve or profoundly arrogant...
Of course there will always those aiming for lowest-common-denominator filmmaking. In which case ignorance is bliss. But for the purposes of my soap-boxing Im going to pretentiously assume a more broadly held desire by aspiring filmmakers to be fucking exception rather than putridly banal.
The central and fundamental element Film School can (and should) teach is Cinema Literacy. All the technical skills in the world are merely the means to enact Cinema Literacy. Film School provides the most viable crucible to teach how to speak and write with all the sophistication of the cinema language. Film School is uniquely placed - if its outside and looking beyond industry, if its embedded in a concerted environment for engagement with cinema process - to build a more rich and dense vocabulary of cinema language than could ever by obtained outside of formal learning. Learning the words that make up the language of cinema is one thing, stringing them together into articulate and engaging audio-visual sentences of profound viewer engagement is quite another. Thats cinema literacy.
But still there is another step that true cinema literacy delivers...
Good cinema happens when the filmmaker can exploit the detailed audio visual language of the cinema - But GREAT cinema happens when the filmmaker invents their own language for the cinematic experience itself.
All the truly great works of cinema, over the century of cinema history, have in some way invented new cinema language. From Meliese and the cinema of the fantastical effect, to Cecil B DeMille and inscription of a true Epic cinema vocabulary, on to Kubrick who with every film he made invented entirely new cinema words subsequently used and exploited by all filmmakers to follow.
Its this possibility for true cinema literacy that is the potential beating heart Film School offers. Film School should, and can, be the most effective cauldron for smelting language into new cinematic words, new phrases, new inflections and dialects.
Film School cant teach talent and raw skills are just not enough. But what Film School can teach (or, more correctly, provide a dynamic environment for the exploration of) that cant be effectively learned on your own, is Cinema Literacy; The vast combination of knowledge, skill, experience, instinct, understanding and energy that when forged together by a distinct and focused environment produces a linguistic platform far exceeding the sum of its parts.
But there is one other unique offering Film School has, one it shares as the true pedagogical promise of all education institutions. Whilst a Film School on the surface may portend teaching camera, sound, editing and writing, these are all micro-level implementations of the one true thing Film School should and can teach... How to Learn, the art of learning itself.
The the overarching single thing any education can, should and must deliver for a student is a tangible and consummate ability to Learn. Students must be taught the process and art of learning itself, how to acquire, absorb, process and, most importantly, apply new skills, knowledge and ideas. Its here that I find flaw in the way many Film Schools position their learning.
Far too often the focus can fall to software-use rather than creative process, camera operating rather than the art of cinematography, emphasis on the here and now rather than the broader concepts of creative process that expand beyond the here and now. And its the misguided idea of what the industry wants is what drives this lowest-common denominator approach to skills.
A Film School focused on serving the needs of the industry rather than leading it largely sets itself up to become an institution that will fail to teach students How to Learn. It may well build skills to guarantee an immediate job, but it stands a good chance of failing to equip students for life-long learning, self-improvement, dynamic flexibility in creative application.
When a school aims to serve the industry it invariably bogs itself down in brand-loyalty, proprietary technologies, specific applications and inflexible models of production. We see film schools training Final Cut Pro/Avid Users (who know every software menu and function) Rather than real Editors (who can manipulate narrative, meaning and ideas regardless of which system they sit in front of - both now and 20 years form now.)
The Film School intent upon serving the industry effectively embodies a ideology of teaching the right way to make a film. To serve the industry is to declare that there is a right and accepted way to make cinema. And if it doesn't meet with current practice it must be wrong, incorrect, not-viable.
This idea of an acceptable way and an unacceptable way to make cinema is plainly farcical in a contemporary cinema landscape where we are making cinema (moving image media) in ways, means and modes never seen before, in diversity not seen before, in scale and flexibility weve not seen before, delivering via mediums weve not known before. Machinima and real-time environments, compositing and motion graphics, 3D environments, interactive forms, online streaming media, mobile devices, gaming, download and on and on and on.
When a Film School focuses on Leading the industry rather than Serving it, it aligns its priorities in a fundamentally different polar pattern. It frees itself from slavishly adhering to malformed ideas of industry standards. Software brands and camera types take second place to Assembly, Form and Process. It dispenses with the idea of a right way to create cinema and instead intrinsically aligns itself with an exploration of the many ways to create cinema and moreover shifts focus to the analytical process to work out the Best way to make cinema commensurate with the needs of the creator and the creation.
The Film School focused on Leading the industry is one focused first and foremost on teaching students How to Learn. As a result it positions itself to be able to build skills and knowledge of cinematic processes that transcend the here and now, that can grow beyond the here and now and inform cinema production regardless of how modes, means and methods change over time.
To do this a Film School education must primarily provide an Environment not a Curriculum. The Curriculum dictates What to learn but the Environment dictates and shapes the learning process itself. Its the environment that makes Film School unique; an environment of experiential learning, collaborative learning, an environment where mistakes are not just allowed but encouraged. A Film School focused on making highly polished festival successful, industry-approved, films is one that is failing its students. A student learns infinitely more form making films that are ambitious and fall short than those that are conservative and succeed. Polished films are low hanging fruit. Films that dare to fail, that reach far beyond ability have the potential to teach infinitely more and have a far more profound impact on the pedagogical journey of the student.
All this is not to suggest that an education from a Film School aiming to lead and challenge the industry, rather than serve it, is divorced from technical craft and grounded production process mechanisms. It is a great myth to suggest that the two are mutually exclusive.
Leading or Following - Reconsidering Film School (part3)
[part 3 of a 5-part musing on the idea of Film School and its
relationship to industry learning and art. Its not intended as a set
of fully formed or precisely structured arguments but rather a set of
musings on what the ideals and implications of Film School should could
and might be...?]
So if Films Schools should aim to lead the 'industry' (or industr-ies) how exactly do they do that? What are the benefits? What are the downsides? And are there comparative precedents to understand the perspective of Indusrty Leading rather than Industry supporting institutions?
The 'industry', by nature of its commercial framework and economic imperatives, will always hold conservative, traditional, well established and tested ideas and processes at its heart. It is not now, nor has it ever been, in the best interests of the bulk mainstream cinematic media to experiment or explore or challenge established workflows, concepts or even stories.
As with any artform, change always comes from the fringes, from the periphery, never from the centre. Mainstream feature film and TV is always the last to implement new technologies, ideas and processes. Picking up on the 'new' once the fringe has tested and proven viability of the new.
Film Schools, as institutions, are in this context uniquely placed. They are in a privileged position to exploit the 'new', to chalenege and lead with a level of impunity. It is often said that Film School for students is a great opportunity to fail; a rare and fleeting chance to experiment with permission, an opportunity that is rarity afforded in the 'real-world'. And yet whilst this idea is often expressed to students it's very rarely exhibited by the institution itself towards the 'industry'.
Film Schools, with their oftentimes emphasis on serving rather than leading, squander their chance to push the industry, to be the test-bed for industry change. So concerned are they with guessing what the establishment wants and preparing students for the fleeting here and now that they avoid any chance to focus on the future and prepare students for what might be...?
There is in fact nothing new about this idea of an education institution serving as the primary progressive test-bed for new ideas and new processes. It is in fact the premise that Universities are built on. In science, engineering, architecture, medicine and hundreds of other fields it is the University that serves as the driver of industry. The 'new' begins in the University; is tested, challenged, considered, researched and implemented within the privileged environment outside the 'industry'. Then the discoveries, ideas and processes developed, explored and engaged by students are then filtered through to industry to become the common practices of tomorrow.
If this is the standard modus operandi for other formal education institutions - that of leading and driving the industries they represent - why is it that Film Schools are more often than not focused on the subservient inverse?
If this system of Education Institutions being future-focused and educating students in an environment of experimentation, exploration, testing and leadership of industry process and practice, can work for a host of otther technology-based industries then why not cinema?
The argument is often made that Film School students need to be educated to serve current industry practice and needs or else be irrelevant. But the same argument can also equally be made that students educated to serve current industry needs will possess knowledge and a skill set quickly outdated, made irrelevant before theyve had a chance to put it into practice.
The perspective that may tip the balance is to recognize that a Film School focused on leading the industry, focused on what cinema might be rather than what it has been, has a far greater ability to prepare students for longevity and flexibility rather than more dogmatic current pracice that is specific to the now which may be soon obsolete.
It's here that we need to consider what Film Schools Should teach? And indeed what they Can teach
One of the common weapons leveled at the concept of Film School (as with any art education) is the idea that Talent cannot be taught. This statement is often hurled as a Molotov cocktail to immolate the validity of Film School. If talent can't be taught what need is there of Film school?
Whilst this kind of questioning may seem somewhat facile it does serve to prompt more a significant and deeper question about what exactly Film School Can teach if not Talent?
The common and immediate answer would be Skills; the practical and often technology-based, skills by which cinema (as a techno-art) is assembled.
What strikes me is that both these permutations above are flawed. Sure, there is a strong argument to the idea that Talent cannot be taught but it can be fostered, shaped, developed and expanded. To dismiss Film School on the basis that Talent can't be taught demonstrates a gross lack of respect for the art of cinema. The Godfather wasn't made by talent, Talent simply isn't enough to make a film That good. Godfather was made only after many years of developing, fostering and shaping that talent into a refined directorial instinct and consummate artistry.
Similarly, and conversely, to reduce filmmaking to a set of raw skills in operating the mechanical aperati of cinema is absurdly narrow and dysfunctional.
A monkey can be trained to use a camera. A child can be taught to operate an editing system. Yet all the skills in pushing buttons won't make the monkey a Cinematographer or the child an Editor. All the skills in the world won't forge directorial instinct; won't build the ability to make informed and deliberate artistic decisions.
Again we arrive at the ingrained dilemma; if Film School can't teach talent and skills alone simply aren't enough what Can Film School teach that cannot be readily garnered by non formal learning? What is left to teach other than talent and skills...?
