The Editing Process - Thrash Bus II Comes Together.
A few years ago, I made a little short film entitled "The Editing Process" whislt my brother was off getting footage for his film "Hello Annabel". The short, 60 second piece involved Box trying to edit a piece of footage while others stood about him and told him what to do, something he in real life found quite annoying. While the point of "The Editing Process" was humour, and the underlying theme of too-many-cooks rang true for all involved, there was something that that short film never accomplished: to let the viewer understand how much pain and sufferring any filmmaker goes through while trying to edit their masterpice.
In the olden days, back when computers were merely used to calculate Holocaust victims and programme simple arithmetic problems, film was edited on film, cutting and taping the film together in the back room at the studio while the executives breathed down your neck about how much time there was left until release. It was a hard, painstaking process because if you wanted alternate takes, different angles, or to make the scene slightly shorter/longer, much effort was involved.
These days, the power of the silicon chip has come the rescue of many a harried filmmaker. And many a harried editor is probably rueing the day filme went digital.
These days, digital technology has opened up the filmmaking business with a freedom and cost-effectiveness never before seen on screen. Scenes can be edited quickly, with minimal fuss, so a director can see what he has, and what he still needs, before moving on to the next scene. Of course, when you are working on a big budget feature, with camera everywhere, the volume of footage able to be captured and processed quickly is exponentially larger than you'd expect. Therefore, editors have much more material to trawl through to find what they need.
Having just finished the editing process of Thrash Bus II, and now commencing to move into the post production sound editing and music scoring stage, I have come to understand the importance of planning and brevity. Having almost 30 hours of footage filmed to work through, trying to bring the film to a manageable and enjoyable length, I have to admit to being some kind of sadist. I truly did bring this upon myself. While in more recent times I have learned to film exactly what is required and nothing more, earlier efforts at filming were haphazard to say the least.
Case in point: this weekend I completed the final production on the opening credits, utilising footage gleaned from each of those 30 hous worth of digital tapes. Thats a lot of footage to go through, just to find bits that are not in the final product, that are worthy of being included on screen with the final product, and that are not boring. Hopefully, I have succeeded.
Editing: its a painful thing.
More on the Making of Thrash Bus in a later post.
In the olden days, back when computers were merely used to calculate Holocaust victims and programme simple arithmetic problems, film was edited on film, cutting and taping the film together in the back room at the studio while the executives breathed down your neck about how much time there was left until release. It was a hard, painstaking process because if you wanted alternate takes, different angles, or to make the scene slightly shorter/longer, much effort was involved.
These days, the power of the silicon chip has come the rescue of many a harried filmmaker. And many a harried editor is probably rueing the day filme went digital.
These days, digital technology has opened up the filmmaking business with a freedom and cost-effectiveness never before seen on screen. Scenes can be edited quickly, with minimal fuss, so a director can see what he has, and what he still needs, before moving on to the next scene. Of course, when you are working on a big budget feature, with camera everywhere, the volume of footage able to be captured and processed quickly is exponentially larger than you'd expect. Therefore, editors have much more material to trawl through to find what they need.
Having just finished the editing process of Thrash Bus II, and now commencing to move into the post production sound editing and music scoring stage, I have come to understand the importance of planning and brevity. Having almost 30 hours of footage filmed to work through, trying to bring the film to a manageable and enjoyable length, I have to admit to being some kind of sadist. I truly did bring this upon myself. While in more recent times I have learned to film exactly what is required and nothing more, earlier efforts at filming were haphazard to say the least.
Case in point: this weekend I completed the final production on the opening credits, utilising footage gleaned from each of those 30 hous worth of digital tapes. Thats a lot of footage to go through, just to find bits that are not in the final product, that are worthy of being included on screen with the final product, and that are not boring. Hopefully, I have succeeded.
Editing: its a painful thing.
More on the Making of Thrash Bus in a later post.
posted by Fernby at Monday, September 18, 2006
1 Comments:
well, I CAN'T WAIT to see it! I'm sure it's awesome!!
Ang
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