Editing Review: Friends

Friends is a well known comedy sitcom, this style of comedy is filmed in front of a live studio audience so the laughter you hear isn't tracked. With this in mind the editing style is a little different to your standard studio based film production. 

Edited By: Stephen Prime

First of all Characters cannot speak, or have to wait for the laughter to die down from whatever joke or pun has just been made before continuing their lines. Friends I believe for at least the first seven seasons was not only filmed by recorded live as well. This meant there would have been a director in a back room eyeing all the monitors and calling camera numbers for the operator to switch to.

We who watch the show through various technological mediums are made to feel as though we are part of the live studio audience, and with that in mind, a lot of shots are either wide or mid shots. Close up are rare because if we were sitting watching the show that's how we would see it naturally, the only way to zoom in, in real life if too move closer to the subject or the subject to you, and as that is not the case then they keep to wides and midshots.
As you can see from the scene in the coffee shop the camera is directed at who ever makes the joke then subsequently to the reaction of those around them or whoevers line is coming next. When Ross explains the sandwich situation we only get a midshot reaction shot from Joey and Chandler/Monica. Although Joey doesn't speak he is on the left side of the main character so it is natural to look in his direction, and as with Chandler and Monica, they have lines coming up and it more natural to get them in a midshot two shot than to move the camera back and also get in Rachel. This gives the audience to much to look at and might divert attention from the scene. This is why Rachel does not speak throughout the scene and is only seen in a wide/Establishing shot to the scene when Ross walks in.
The next scene is interesting because although both characters are positioned so that the audience gets a full profile of them in a two shot the camera has elected to go for an over the shoulder match on action. This is because it helps slowly build the tension. The characters are lobbying conversations back and forth, slowly at first until Ross finds out he ate his sandwich then the cuts between them get fast and faster with Ross' bubbling rage. This would not have been as effectively accomplished in a two shot where the camera would have had to have been stationary or pan from character to character.

Lesson: Feedback and Q&A

Today we got feedback on the documentary piece we have been editing. The feedback was generally decent. Their were two main issues that were picked up on that we need to work on before the submission date to boost our grade. The first was that there was no image of Emanuel talking to camera which doesn't help the audience relate or sympathise with him. Also that the audio needs to be fixed up in terms of the placement of the final audio track as well as general levels and the starting and stopping of the main soundtrack piece. As you know already know, me and Clarice split up the work based on Picture and Sound, so after the lesson I added some face time with Emmanuel and the camera, and Clarice was going to work on the audio over Easter. We will most likely analyse this piece and the Night journey one when we come back so that we no longer have to worry about it and can focus on the next individual assignment.

DCP File Format
Digital Cinema Package File Format refers to the commercial format that your film needs to be in if you want it played in any cinema world wide without any technical problems ensuing.

The Films Of Joseph Losey
Losey's films tend to focus more on the character than the story, making the outside world a depiction the characters inner thoughts and feelings. On a whole his films are about the individual and how they view themselves, other people and the world and society

Adam Curtis Documentary
Curtis' a journalist first and goes on to make films/Documentaries about topics he finds interesting.



This segment is in reference to his All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace (TV series) trilogy, namely the last instalment; The Monkey In The Machine and the Machine in the Monkey 
He talks about his idea of the machine which also has a very interesting psychological and psychophysical approach although it stems from a journalistic one.

BlooDrop (Short Film)



BLOODROP (HD 2D) from Alexei Popogrebsky on Vimeo.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this short film but I was pleasantly surprised by the way the story flowed, the picture of the room within the room as the starting picture which in a way was a form of foreshadowing for future events. And the train that goes past both at the beginning and at the end was a really good transition catalyst. the entire events were strange and the bloodrop at the end of the film brought you back to realise the meaning of the film away from all the fantasy of the falling dolls house. What I didn't like was the interaction between the two characters. I felt that it should have been a little slower or ended on an "Almost" moment. Overall as previously stated this was a really imaginative and unique short film.

Assignment: Final Picture Cut

I came in and put the final touches on the picture edit of our Climbing Documentary which mostly consisted of me adding visual transitions and getting it down to the 4:30-5:00 minute time frame.

As me and Clarice often had conflicting schedules, she was coming in tomorrow to work on the sound and narration placement, levels etc.

The Reading List: Screencraft - Editing & Post-Production By Declan McGrath

Screencraft - Editing & Post-Production By Declan McGrath

15 of the worlds greatest editors come together to talk about the mechanics behind the edit as well as revealing a few tricks of the trade. The introduction to this book warns that once read is will be like hearing every instrument individually in the orchestra of your favourite classical piece, over time you will be able to hear the music as a whole and appreciate it even more. 

Looking at an editor I haven't talked about before: Ralph Winters, who directed what was at one point my favourite movie Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954) about this film he says that "In dance numbers and audience should see as much as possible of the full figure at all times. Hence less cutting if the shot holds up" he says this comparatively to a previous comment about stage director and choreographer turned film director Chuck Walter. Walter saw everything from the view of a stage so therefore often had longer takes, and thought that if the two characters related and were emotive enough in the wide there was no need for a close up. Such can be said and understood from the point of a dance scene, where full body movements tells us more than any close up could. Though Walter admits holding this technique to a gold standard the bitterness can still be heard as he says "He did not know enough about the cinematic medium to to use shots as well as he could have" this comment stems from his earlier comment about people thinking they can play all roles, namely directors who thinks they're editors, and the sad fact is that they are doing a poor job at what they think they're an expert.

Despite the bitterness Winters does make a really good point early in the chapter where he talks about how over the years once cutting could be done on a computer, which is a more personal form of editing that people thought they could do the job themselves, as opposed to the days of actually cutting when there were many editors needed to help do the job and they were like a family. Though Winters does not condemn the progression of the technological age I feel that he is holds an incredible double standard whereby praising the progression but slating the progressors.

Editing Review: Pride & Prejudice

Pride & Prejudice Directed by Joe Wright in 2005

Edited By: Paul Tothill

Looking at this particular scene the editing can be deconstructed as follows
-The Sound: The music everyone is dancing to, the conversation between Elizabeth and Mr Darcy and the faint murmurs of conversation in the crowds. The music everyone is dancing to is the has the most sombre tone out of the whole film, it holds a heavier and more deep meaning tone than the more jovial ones that appear throughout. The conversation they are having turns from a back and form directed civility to Elizabeth trying heavily to probe Mr Darcy about his knowledge of Mr Wickham. Also Elizabeth states her preference of Private balls to public ones, which in a way mirrors the sequence of the two of them being the only ones in the room while they dance. This sequence is something that only lovers imagine, as they gaze into each others eyes so the fact that this happens between two people that seem to tolerate each other at best is a big neon arrow to events that will eventually occur. Lastly, though there are other people in the room, you scarcely hear them as we follow the melodic words of Elizabeth and Mr Darcy.
-A lot more can be said about this scene, the way that two unnecessary dancing characters just move in front of the camera giving you the sense of watching the two central characters through a crowd, as if we are eaves dropping. How the characters look at no-one but each other despite Elizabeths current contempt for Mr Darcy. This scene leads on to a long take that helps to compress the time of the ball, showing what each character gets up to over the night [Clip 22 and 23 of 65]
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/an-XqKmJ4YnmhbJmm/pride_prejudice_2005_netherfield_ball_2/

The compression of time is something that is something that is dealt with very well throughout the course of the movie. For people that know a lot about the behaviour and society of the times whereby people would visit one another and stay for months at a time they, will appreciate the way that "Time" as a factor is kept out of the movie or speech to thus allow more fluidity, or how events overlap to make it look like many things are happening at once to distract away from the amount of time a character has really been away.

Assignment: Rough and Final Cutting

For this next editing session we started working off of the Assembly of all the good clips that I had made the previous week. Also after discussing my thoughts on the "Story" we should tell with Clarice, we made a few adjustments then got into cutting. Clarice wrote a manuscript of all the interview questions and answers to make it easier for us to know where everything was and in deciding where to put the voice-over.

We split the work load a little like we did with Night Journey, whereby I focused on the picture edit and Clarice did the sound edit, coming together to bounce ideas and opinions off of each other. So while I decided on the picture order Clarice went and gathered a range of royalty free music that we could possibly use. It was difficult to pick the best one, as though Rock Climbing is classed as an extreme sport it's incredibly slow, so we couldn't have the music to fast as it would energise the audience more than the footage and that would just make everything off balance. Yet finding something that was more mellow but didn't put you to sleep was also hard because Emmanuel isn't the more interesting subject that would keep the audience entertained on his own. It was a trying process picking the right soundtrack. The one that was decided on works well as a mix between mellow and energetic, but it was the shortest.

We finally started working on the final cut where I started the process of trying to get the sequence we had cut down to be within the time constraints. As we had made a table what was in each clip, Clarice was trying to synchronise that with the manuscript she had written.

We were half editing around each other. We cutting to the beat, Clarice stopping me every now and then to add in the voice-over.
We stopped there for the day knowing what we had left to do in time for the presentation the following week.

Lesson: Q&A, Blogs and Boyle

In today's session we watched the opening sequence of 127 Hours (Boyle, 2010)

The frame was sectioned into a three way split screen which showed a range of different crowds, sports, religious, music, work, street etc. all at the same time. The crowds were mostly wearing short sleeved/sleeveless tops, or had their arms in the air in cheer, which is a form of foreshadowing for the connotation of the movie. All the shots of the crowds and the business was a clever way to help denote how alone the main character would later on, for the majority of the film.

The editing of which flowed, as each split segment changed with the beat, in sequence for the most part. Finally the soundtrack that played over this opening sequence [Never Hear Surf Again by Free Blood] was a give away to the characteristic of the protagonist with lines such as:
Take it if it makes you numb, Take it if it makes you come, Take it if it makes you make it perfect.
Though easily read to be singing about drugs, it also connotes another kind of junkie; Adrenalin
All the points mentioned put together show a very well though out montage, as it subliminally sets the tone and mood for the rest of the movie, but one first instance of watching it, you are unaware of the thought that has been put into it.

The difference between Chroma Key and Luma Key
Keying [In reference to final cut pro] basically means to get rid of something in the frame and make it transparent, or black depending on whether there is a layer underneath it. Keying allows you to show two frames in one by removing specific colour and light.
Chroma Key: Removes on specific colour (such as the green on the green screen)
Luma Key: Replaces colour, depending on lighting, and is harder to control, say while you two different scene but in one forgot to use lighting, you would use the Luma key to try and get the two scenes looking like they were both lighted the same

The relationship between Michael Kahn and Steven Spielberg
Michael Khan is a well known and respected film editor, even belong to the ACE (American Cinema Editors) his relationship with Steven Spielberg has spanned over 30 years and 23 collaborations. Though Michael Kahn can edit digitally, when working with Spielberg he edits on film, as that's what Spielberg prefers to film on.

What is an Edit Droid?
The EditDroid (Unsurprisingly developed as a subsidiary of LucasFilms) was the fist Non Linear Editing system. There are a number of reasons why it never took off, prices to record on laserdisc, George Lucas never actually using his own merchandise and storage space. Although only 26 were ever made, it paved the way for other NLE software's such as Final Cut Pro and Avid.

The Reading List: Making Movies By Sidney Lumet

 Making Movies By Sidney Lumet
Lument, S, 1996, Vintage

Based mainly one Chapter One - The Director: The Best Job In The World

This book has a strong and gripping first chapter which makes you readily want to read more, Sidney's deliberate and slow introduction of each "Character" and a short description of tell-tale characteristics is both informative and light.

Often last to arrive is the writer. He is the last because he knows that at this point he is the target. At this moment, anything wrong can only be his fault, since nothing else has happened yet. So he moves quietly to the coffee tab;e, stuffs his mouth full of Danish so he won;t have to answer any questions, and tries to become as small as possible (Page 6-7)

Joking aside, the book, namely the first chapter focuses on not only a lot of facts that we as young filmmakers in the making have not yet even thought a moment about such as budget controls, actor and their entourage or what location to have the first script run through etc. but also that there are no rules to being a director, no step by step guideline you can follow to ensure the success of your vision, there's only you and what you believe is right. Also understanding that you aren't in complete control, and that that's okay.

Defining the Emotional Theme of your work is important, What is the theme of the movie, the spine, the arc? What does the movie mean to me? Personalising the movie is very important. I'm going to be working flat out for the next six, nine, twelve months. The picture had better have some meaning to me. (Page10) I believe that the idea behind this is that, of course you are physically and mentally connected to the film and the project, but emotionally helps to tie the bond, and it doesn't matter what it means to everyone else, as long as you can make your own definitive conclusion then that's all that matters.

Overall in this book there is a lot of  Me and I, what do I want to achieve, what does this mean to me, and although movie making is a collaborative process (No matter how hard you try do it all alone) it's till important to have that personalised selfishness to keep you level headed and on track.

Editing Review: Fear and Loathing In Las Vagas

Though the success of this film was heavily down to the performance of the actors, the believability or the uncanny resemblence to what it feels like (I imagine) to be heavily intoxicated on drugs is a marvel.

Edited By: Lesley Walker

In this scene in particular when the main character Raoul Duke (Johnny Depp) starts tripping it feels like a journey within itself. This is down to the pacing as the outrageousness of what Raoul sees slowly grows from believably stemmed to out right foreign.
The scene stars out slowly, the first sign of a drug induced state when Raoul takes a second look at the valet, whom transformation is smooth, leading us by breadcrumbs to put ourselves in Raouls state of mind. The way he tries to keep his mind straight by repeating the facts about who he is and why he's there through voice over whilst the sounds around his outside of his head seem distant and echoed denotes the way that even in a drug haze you have some form of rational thinking, though it is trapped and ignored. The second wave of distortion of the carpet moving and crawling like vines, is plausible though still outlandish and makes for a good gateway for the next sequence which drags us out of the mind of Raoul and into the observation state. How his behaviour, though internally rational is seen outwardly as weird.
I appreciate that there is no need for a soundtrack over the scenes as it has there are already so many factors to contend with, being pulled in and out of Raouls mind and keeping up with his cracky tales.

 Fear and Loathing In Las Vagas (Gilliam, 1998)

Assignment: Assembly

We had problem with the media connection so had to start again, which meant that the footage labelling I did  the previous week was gone.

Me and Clarice decided to split the initial work process. She went through the footage and labelled the majority of it and put together a very vague assembly. I then came in to get started on the rough cut, I started by going through all the folders that Clarice had labelled and picking the best footage from all the different folders and putting them in the timeline.

After I selected the best bits and put them on the timeline it came up to sixteen minutes of footage. I blocked all the clips from their individual folders on the timeline and started to think of a storyline for the final cut, and I moved around the blocks of footage to best portray this so that when we came in to work more on the rough cut it would be easy to work out.

There were a number of different routes the sequence could take so I wrote them all down so that I could present them to Clarice to see which one she liked better and we could work towards .

I wanted to the scene to feel like the audience were climbing a rock surface, watching him practice and fall and eventually climb and make it to the top. This scenario can be edited in different narrative structures, the one I was aiming towards was non linear with an element of the Love Scene from Out Of Sight (Soderbergh, 1998) that we watched in class.

The soundtrack is something we haven't started to look at yet though a few ideas have come to mind. I wanted something that slowly climax or that had peaks and troughs, for example The Kill or Attack by 30 Seconds To Mars or a piece of classical music. Being that the project is 5 minutes more than one track is more realistic, and will help set the emotion for different parts of the project. Of course finding royalty free music with such elements may prove a little difficult to acquire especially when you being really specific so I need to keep an open mind for what we might find. Also picking a track that intensifies or helps to fraudulate the audience emotions might prove necessary because the central character seems as cold stiff and distant as the rocks he climbs and I think it will be easier getting a performance from the bag of chalk.

Lesson: Q&A Clooney and Avid

The Career of Anne V Coats
A: Anne V. Coats is a well known British film editor, having been in the industry for 40 years and has worked with the likes of Steven Soderbergh and British Director David Lean with whom she had her first job as a film editor on Lawrence of Arabia (Lean, 1962). At the age of 87 she is still going.

Q: What is the difference between Apple ProRes 422 and Apple ProRes 4444?
A: From my research ProRes is a codec that you use which determines the quality of your video output and the smoothness of editing based on the compression size/storage size, in this case the smaller the better.
That being said, ProRes so far has five formatted versions which include; 4444, 422 (HQ), 422, 422 (LT) and 422 (Proxy). In terms of the two in question (422 and 4444) the latter has better overall RGBA picture quality than the former, which is two small steps behind (because of the 422(HQ) which just has a higher data rate due to the support of HD) but most forums agree that you don't loose a lot by using the 422 as it has less data storage rate.
In conclusion the difference between the two is quality and compression quantity. With ProRes 4444 you gain the quality but lack the compression you would get with the 422 which lacks in picture quality.

Out of Sight (Soderbergh, 1998) 
Starring George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez (Edited by Anne V. Coats)





This scene we watched showed the building of the two characters sexual tension. It was cleverly done by showing the inevitability of where their conversation would end up, making the scene non linear. Yet at the same time parallels were drawn between hand gestures and movements in the bar to those in the bedroom. This keeps the viewer engaged, because usually knowing what's going to happen means you loose focus when watching. The attention was kept by the pause in the visuals that occurs for a few frames hear and there, this not only helped the audience to pay attention to these pause moments, but it also in a way  kept the audience wanting more as the tension was rising and we wanted to see the outcome, and it was being kept from us by these strategically places increments of freeze frames. All of this was conceivably helped by the music which flowed with the pauses and the parallels and the scene as a whole. The whole rhythm worked really well and had a lasting effect on me as an audience.

Avid Media Composer 6

We started looking at Avid Media Composer, as it is the most industry used editing software as well as the version of Final Cut Pro (7) that we use is slowly becoming obsolete. We didn't go as far as actually creating anything, but we uploaded some already made footage and played around with how to do the most basic editing, such as cutting and selecting a piece within a clip, looking at where the effects are stored etc.

Admittedly it took a while to get my head around, even now the set up of Final Cut is so programmed in my mind that anything else is just bizarre but to help the process I have been watching a few YouTube video tutorials on Avid Media Composer 6.

The Reading List: 100 Ideas That Changed Film By David Parkinson

100 Ideas That Changed Film By David Parkinson

The best thing about this book for me is that there are so many techniques we see today that we are so used to, and we don't realise that it at one point had the possibility of jeopardising the film industry, even for good in some cases. This book not only gives you a brief history of techniques, movements and ideologies that are commonly used to but also how the industry has managed to adapt and mould what may have been a possible threat to their advantage.

Idea Number 63

Television

No medium has had a bigger impact upon cinema than television. Its emergence in the late 1940's exasperated the economic crisis that threatened Hollywood's very existence. But, given more people now watch movies on TV than on big screens, television has become a major partner in film production worldwide. (page 133)

Editing Review: Doctor Who

Season 6 Episode 12: Closing Time [Screen Grabs taken from BBC iPlayer] In reference to the first few minutes of this episode. [0:00-3:21]

Edited By: Anthony Boys

The pacing though seemingly quite slow has a speedy effect on your nerves as you watch the juxtaposition of one happy situation with the impending doom of a person in another. The editing links the two by the simultaneous flickering lights in both situations. Reading the clips from Left to Right, the first picture shows the flickering of the lamp in the street which sets the tone for the rest of the episode in terms of foreshadowing impending doom.
This then leads to the second picture, as it directly follows it signifies that this is the source of danger. as the lights behind the two sales assistants, as well as all over the store flicker, showing that they are again in danger, as one of them leaves this implies that the one left behind will be in danger.
The third picture of a light flickering happens in a home as we flip to the parallel effects, as this flickers it is cut with the forth picture leading us back to the eerie department store and the lone shop assistant*. The fifth and sixth pictures show the parallel between the assistant paying attention to the flickering lights and the husband and wife thinking nothing of it. The term "Ignorance is Bliss" comes to mind as we feel that the shop assistant is stepping closer and closer to danger. The seventh picture with The Doctor doctor stops, though his back is to the light he knows that something is off showing he is in charge of the situation, whereas the assistant back is to the light, as if it is creeping up on her with its final steps. Lastly the eighth and ninth pictures are layered over one and other in time with a few flickers in a "horror" type aesthetic. The last picture is paralleled with the The Doctor in the house as he believes something alien is there, he rushes up the stairs and as he slowly opens the door and discovers nothing more than a baby named Stormaggedon, the shop assistant in the changing room opens a curtain that reveals a Cyberman and her predicted death.

The music is jovial in the house and we are left with silence in the shop, as though both the two situations are linked we associate The Doctor with safety, whereby any where he is not is in danger.

*Note that though both location have lights one, the department store is still darker giving again the impression of danger, whereby the house is flooded with light giving the impression of safety.