Mike Jones Digital Basin
cinematic media rinse cycle

What are Editors afraid of?

Recently a discussion arose around the relative compositing/multi layer capabilities of NLE systems. I ventured that sadly where a  particular, very popular, NLE had superb linear sequencing options and outstanding off-line capabilities, it was sorely let down by not embracing a more holistic and future thinking approach, with comprehensive compositing being noticeably absent and under nourished.



The distinct response that came back was :
"As if any of us have enough time to mess with any of that nonsense...I like to worry about cuts, and not about compositing... Give me a Moviola."

A strange response? Or a very common one? A blinkered perspective? Or an uncluttered one?

My reply runs something like this.....

I would argue this is cutting with a very traditional, blinkered and intensely conservative notion of what editing is. Not pushing at, or sadly even considering, what editing is capable of and what it might be...?

Theres nothing 'wrong' with that but as a moving image culture our visual expectations are evolving very quickly and new audiences have expectations of the moving image that are far beyond the cuts-only limitations of flatbed and Moviola editing. Why limit yourself? Why not explore and exploit the possibilities the technology provides? Why work with a lowest common denominator archaic editing paradigm when we have an ever growing audience of viewers who possess an infinitely more sophisticated visual language than that paradigm can accommodate - an audience that will increasingly be unsatisfied with a mode of visual sequencing more than 100 years old.

Just as many cinematographers are developing a new conceptualization of what cinematography is - that it isn't something that only happens in the camera; that colour grading, 3D environments and virtual cameras are as much a part of the process of 'shooting' a movie as the camera itself - so too should editors be pro-actively re-thinking the role of editing and What editing is capable of?

The distinction between EDITOR and COMPOSITOR is now largely an arbitrary and un-useful distinction. Instead it all becomes, in broad terms, the 'assembly of moving images'. The editor's job is to make meaning by assembly right? Well, the future of cinematic form is assembly as much Vertically in layers as it is Horizontally in sequence.

Turn on the TV on any given day - from news, to documentary, from music videos, to title sequences to straight up drama - multi-layers, compositing, motion graphics, animation, 3D  are everywhere. Not as 'Special FX' but as core visual communication; mainstream visual language and more importantly, intuitive viewer expectation.

Frankly, I don't understand an editor who is not excited and energized by those possibilities...! How can any editor who cares about their craft not find those possibilities a dramatic and exponential expansion of their artistry? That's like being a Builder and not wanting to use any material other than bricks! In turn, what is possible for you to make, to craft, is invariably cut off at the knees; curtailed by a blinkered, head-in-sand perspective; confined by the rejection of newer forms.

This is at the heart of what has frustrated me enormously over recent years with Final Cut Pro (in particular but certainly not alone...)  as a long-time Final Cut user. FCP began as an incredibly forward thinking all-digital tool, one set to challenge the old-school notions of the Avid mindset, to break from those shackles and find more efficient and flexible ways of making meaning with the moving image. It was to this that I, like so many others, were attracted to FCP in the early years. Indeed we might invoke Apple's own marketing campaign "Think different" that sadly, tragically, is exactly the opposite of what FCP has become, the opposite of what FCP allows you to do, as Apple seemed intent upon perusing Avid for their market share and to become the Brand New, Old-School establishment.

Thus whilst FCP's credentials as an off-line tool, as an editing platform for projects originating on film, have grown strong, reliable, robust and efficient without question; this has been to the utter neglect of much more adventurous, exciting and forward thinking concepts of production and tool functionality. The big and obvious two being that FCP's options for audio production are virtually non-existent and woefully clumsy and its functionality for compositing, motion graphics and multi-layer work horribly hamstrung and ineffectual.

But Apple are not stupid, they know full well that there is a huge swathe of editors out there who are entrenched in old thinking, quagmired in pedantic articulation of the cuts-only edit as an act of purity, editors more than happy to disparage the all-digital, all-flexible, all-integrated future where job descriptions are hazy, where paradigms shift perpetually and where audiences are seeped in visual complexity. And whilst that mindset continues the tools will continue to fail us, fail to live up to all that they could be, and fail the expectations and possibilities of a new generation of creators.

The truth that so often eludes both the tool makers and the old-school tool users,  is that one is not at all traded for the other. The layer doesn't supplant the sequence; it enhances it. The composit doesn't dilute the cut it expands its context. The animated doesn't overtake the power of the still. A broad tool set simply expands what is possible; it doesn't replace what was there before.

I would simply ask any editor dismissive of such tools in an editing system what exactly it is they are afraid of....?

Posted at 01:00AM Jun 11, 2007 by Mike Jones in general  |  Comments[2]