My entire day was spent staring into the computer screen, following the familiar process of right click save, double-click downloaded video, watch, send to Trash or move to Mogulween Contest folder. Rinse, repeat times 100, easily. Some videos were really good, showcasing some skill among the pool. Some were very forgettable and cliche. Not much else to say regarding this since it's something I've been talking about for a couple weeks now. Grace was sick today so the break in the monotony that is shooting Beyond The Trailer didn't even happen. Once the contest is over, my work may branch off to other things but for now...
Worth noting, I'm NOT complaining. If this is my job, then I will do it to the best of my abilities.
The largest breach from the usual submission watching and YouTube account managing was when I was trying out the new tricks in Final Cut I learned from Erik on Friday. Motion blurs, image screens, fun key framing. For a first time, it my dummy titles didn't come out so bad, but the effects weren't rocket science either. Definitely good tricks to know and I'm glad I had a chance to test them out. My title graphics shall never be the same...
Monday, October 26, 2009
Friday, October 23, 2009
DAY 10 - Kings of Halloween
Sitting here at the office on Day 11 with Day 10 not even written up has me feeling a bit out of sorts. To prevent my brain from jumbling days up, I'm going to try to bang out this entry before the ball begins barreling down the hill that is Monday.
My alarm decided to take a day off on Friday so I woke up with the sun uncomfortably blaring in my eyes and the realization that it was almost 9:00 am! Not too incredibly late but it upset me all the same. After all was said and done I got into the office at about 11:30 am, just in time to be invited to lunch at the Shake Shack with Ryan Nugent, Justin Johnson (whose proper title is "Creative Services Lead" and who I made promos for at the beginning of this internship) and Daniel Delaney, the host of VendrTV. I learned that, according to Justin, I am the "superstar intern". Props for me. Things were definitely discussed at the luncheon that were fun to listen in on, details of which are foggy and unobtainable with all the office chatter buzzing in my brain. One detail I don't forget, though, was spotting Philip Seymour Hoffman. Yeah, this guy.
There was major confusion regarding the videos downloaded for the 60 Second Horror Short Contest. Apparently the other intern watching submissions, Tracey, downloaded many of the same videos I did, but didn't rename them or place them in the proper folders. Just downloaded, watched, and moved on. While Ryan and I were trying to figure out how to organize and make sense of it, I couldn't help but be eternally grateful for my anal desire for order and organization. Listen to your Mom and Dad, kids. Start young and clean your room because someday, all that "structure" leads to a grand work ethic. Anyway, silly life lessons aside, seeing my logically separated folders in comparison to the jumbled videos with abstract letter-and-number titles was a highlight of the day. In the end, Ryan just reasoned that he would talk to Tracey when she came in on Tuesday. (Why did I just relay all of that? As noted, my brain is jumbled.)
The meat and potatoes of my day came when Erik IMed me asking if I could cut together a trailer for the test film, "Kings of Halloween", that would be inserted into the Backyard FX episode airing on Monday. "Why of course!" I was sent a 20-25 second clip and asked to shrink it to ten seconds, using music and graphics to really entice the audience. After a short time I cut together what I could, running at almost exactly ten seconds with elementary graphics and a doctored music track taken from the Test Film itself. Erik watched it and laughed, seeming pleased by what I had done up to that point.
And then the "master" went to work. Erik reached into the computer and pulled our sound effects and composite explosions, added them to witty, keyframed titles and utilized some of his favorite motion effects to make the trailer pop with life and "gangsta" intensity. Watching it really did make me want to see the whole Test Film and I already had seen it twice before! Being able to look over his shoulder, throwing in my own opinions here and there, was, in laymen's terms, awesome and I learned a great deal from just that hour or so of observation. Final Cut Pro has a lot of tricks I have yet to find the bags of. (As much as I want to say it made me run home, open up my version of Final Cut and test them all out, my computer's processor would choke on the first attempt at a imported explosion from Det Films.) There's a greater lesson in all this, one that applies to the mission statement, but I can't really find it at the moment. Office chatter is blamed once again.
Elaborations may come? I feel like I say that too often and then never come back to the old entires. Seriously, I'm trying.
My alarm decided to take a day off on Friday so I woke up with the sun uncomfortably blaring in my eyes and the realization that it was almost 9:00 am! Not too incredibly late but it upset me all the same. After all was said and done I got into the office at about 11:30 am, just in time to be invited to lunch at the Shake Shack with Ryan Nugent, Justin Johnson (whose proper title is "Creative Services Lead" and who I made promos for at the beginning of this internship) and Daniel Delaney, the host of VendrTV. I learned that, according to Justin, I am the "superstar intern". Props for me. Things were definitely discussed at the luncheon that were fun to listen in on, details of which are foggy and unobtainable with all the office chatter buzzing in my brain. One detail I don't forget, though, was spotting Philip Seymour Hoffman. Yeah, this guy.
There was major confusion regarding the videos downloaded for the 60 Second Horror Short Contest. Apparently the other intern watching submissions, Tracey, downloaded many of the same videos I did, but didn't rename them or place them in the proper folders. Just downloaded, watched, and moved on. While Ryan and I were trying to figure out how to organize and make sense of it, I couldn't help but be eternally grateful for my anal desire for order and organization. Listen to your Mom and Dad, kids. Start young and clean your room because someday, all that "structure" leads to a grand work ethic. Anyway, silly life lessons aside, seeing my logically separated folders in comparison to the jumbled videos with abstract letter-and-number titles was a highlight of the day. In the end, Ryan just reasoned that he would talk to Tracey when she came in on Tuesday. (Why did I just relay all of that? As noted, my brain is jumbled.)
The meat and potatoes of my day came when Erik IMed me asking if I could cut together a trailer for the test film, "Kings of Halloween", that would be inserted into the Backyard FX episode airing on Monday. "Why of course!" I was sent a 20-25 second clip and asked to shrink it to ten seconds, using music and graphics to really entice the audience. After a short time I cut together what I could, running at almost exactly ten seconds with elementary graphics and a doctored music track taken from the Test Film itself. Erik watched it and laughed, seeming pleased by what I had done up to that point.
And then the "master" went to work. Erik reached into the computer and pulled our sound effects and composite explosions, added them to witty, keyframed titles and utilized some of his favorite motion effects to make the trailer pop with life and "gangsta" intensity. Watching it really did make me want to see the whole Test Film and I already had seen it twice before! Being able to look over his shoulder, throwing in my own opinions here and there, was, in laymen's terms, awesome and I learned a great deal from just that hour or so of observation. Final Cut Pro has a lot of tricks I have yet to find the bags of. (As much as I want to say it made me run home, open up my version of Final Cut and test them all out, my computer's processor would choke on the first attempt at a imported explosion from Det Films.) There's a greater lesson in all this, one that applies to the mission statement, but I can't really find it at the moment. Office chatter is blamed once again.
Elaborations may come? I feel like I say that too often and then never come back to the old entires. Seriously, I'm trying.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
DAY 9 - The Competition Pt. 2
The Internet is a crazy thing. Answers come within seconds of posing them. Help is around every corner and if not immediately presented with it, a directional arrow (or twelve) usually steer you down the correct path.
I played the role of immediate answers on Monday. Noticing a lack of submissions for their 60 Second Horror Video Contest, Indy Mogul posted a video online with details about the contest, acting as an additional reminder to the various mentions that had already taken place throughout October. Aside form the bone-headed comments from people pointing the finger at us for "advertising late" and from people who claim to have never heard of the contest until after watching the video, a slew of inquisitions sprouted up all over the video's YouTube page. "How do I submit my video?", "What if I'm only 18?", "Can it be animated?", "Can I re-cut a past film?", etc, etc. Being the able and willing intern that I am, I charged forward, answering as many as I possibly could. As I did, I couldn't help but realize a few things...
There is a lower third in the video with the website detailing all the contest rules and instructions. Plain as day, it says where to submit the video and that all videos should be submitted with "Mogulween Film Fest" in the title, along with title of the submission itself. PLAIN AS DAY. And yet, the majority of questions received ask where to submit the video. Half of the submissions that could be downloaded properly do not have the preferred file name. How do people miss these details? Can they not merely scroll down on the page to see the Official Rules and the answers to all their questions?
Granted, a large portion of the audience is much younger, still in middle school and granted, where to submit the videos should be highlighted "above the fold" not near the bottom of the page. (The "18 and over" rule is foggy, since it goes unmentioned that with a parent's permission, anyone underage is eligible. Those questions I take with satisfaction and diligence.) But the rest create confusion in me, bringing to mind stories and theories about how impatient we are as a people. Answers not in front of us are demanded without attempts to find them ourselves. But the frustrating part is the answers are there! Scroll down once or twice and it plainly says where to submit the video. Are people just that lazy? Do they skim that fast, missing crucial details and only seeing half the story? Jumping to conclusions and into a blind panic have become our forte.
Not to say that people panicked. Not to say all these questions were posed with innocent intentions. The world won't end because of this, but I'm unsettled by other's impatience, whether they mean to showcase it or not. One to talk, I am not. I'm guilty of the same crime! But why is the ever ominous question. There is definitely more that can be said on this topic, but for now the well of creative thought has run dry. (I may go back and edit later.)
Beyond the Trailer called upon my help once again. Shooting for that was a little rough. Grace didn't get a suitable amount of sleep, so usable takes came after countless tries and Spencer was late coming back from an interview so I had to monitor camera, sound, and run the tele-prompter. Personally, I didn't mind doing all three. Eventually he did come back, though, and we plowed through the material as best we could. (And Grace let it slip that Ryan told her I'm the "star intern". Hello confidence!)
And so was Day 9 at Next New...
I played the role of immediate answers on Monday. Noticing a lack of submissions for their 60 Second Horror Video Contest, Indy Mogul posted a video online with details about the contest, acting as an additional reminder to the various mentions that had already taken place throughout October. Aside form the bone-headed comments from people pointing the finger at us for "advertising late" and from people who claim to have never heard of the contest until after watching the video, a slew of inquisitions sprouted up all over the video's YouTube page. "How do I submit my video?", "What if I'm only 18?", "Can it be animated?", "Can I re-cut a past film?", etc, etc. Being the able and willing intern that I am, I charged forward, answering as many as I possibly could. As I did, I couldn't help but realize a few things...
There is a lower third in the video with the website detailing all the contest rules and instructions. Plain as day, it says where to submit the video and that all videos should be submitted with "Mogulween Film Fest" in the title, along with title of the submission itself. PLAIN AS DAY. And yet, the majority of questions received ask where to submit the video. Half of the submissions that could be downloaded properly do not have the preferred file name. How do people miss these details? Can they not merely scroll down on the page to see the Official Rules and the answers to all their questions?
Granted, a large portion of the audience is much younger, still in middle school and granted, where to submit the videos should be highlighted "above the fold" not near the bottom of the page. (The "18 and over" rule is foggy, since it goes unmentioned that with a parent's permission, anyone underage is eligible. Those questions I take with satisfaction and diligence.) But the rest create confusion in me, bringing to mind stories and theories about how impatient we are as a people. Answers not in front of us are demanded without attempts to find them ourselves. But the frustrating part is the answers are there! Scroll down once or twice and it plainly says where to submit the video. Are people just that lazy? Do they skim that fast, missing crucial details and only seeing half the story? Jumping to conclusions and into a blind panic have become our forte.
Not to say that people panicked. Not to say all these questions were posed with innocent intentions. The world won't end because of this, but I'm unsettled by other's impatience, whether they mean to showcase it or not. One to talk, I am not. I'm guilty of the same crime! But why is the ever ominous question. There is definitely more that can be said on this topic, but for now the well of creative thought has run dry. (I may go back and edit later.)
Beyond the Trailer called upon my help once again. Shooting for that was a little rough. Grace didn't get a suitable amount of sleep, so usable takes came after countless tries and Spencer was late coming back from an interview so I had to monitor camera, sound, and run the tele-prompter. Personally, I didn't mind doing all three. Eventually he did come back, though, and we plowed through the material as best we could. (And Grace let it slip that Ryan told her I'm the "star intern". Hello confidence!)
And so was Day 9 at Next New...
Saturday, October 17, 2009
DAY 8 - The Competition
My fourth Friday at Next New was probably my least exciting. The beginning of the day was spent checking the inbox of the Indy Mogul YouTube account. I went through and replied to a small handful of the hundreds that they have received over the last few months. Most of them are requests for certain costumes or special effects so a polite "Thanks for the suggestion! We'll consider it for the future!" is all that's required in a reply. I tried to make them a little more personal but it's hard when you know there's a slim to none chance their wishes will be granted. So is the business...
From 12:00 PM until 5:30 PM, I went into the "back room" of the website, so to speak, and watched video submissions for the One Minute Horror Short Contest and for Your FX. After the first couple hours it became monotonous work. There are only so many short action and horror videos made by 15-years-olds you can watch before they begin to blend together. I had to have watched around 75 to 100 videos, but the contest claimed only 12 of them (though a lot didn't upload properly so we couldn't watch them at all). One is leagues and bounds beyond the others in terms of quality but once again, so is the business...
(That said, some of these kids out there have a great grasp on such advanced programs as Adobe After Effects. It's a bit scary. May the inferiority complex begin...)
That was my day, though. Watching videos. Not exceptionally exciting but not boring either. Every day can't be action-packed. I was wondering how long it would take until those more intern-esque jobs came along.
From 12:00 PM until 5:30 PM, I went into the "back room" of the website, so to speak, and watched video submissions for the One Minute Horror Short Contest and for Your FX. After the first couple hours it became monotonous work. There are only so many short action and horror videos made by 15-years-olds you can watch before they begin to blend together. I had to have watched around 75 to 100 videos, but the contest claimed only 12 of them (though a lot didn't upload properly so we couldn't watch them at all). One is leagues and bounds beyond the others in terms of quality but once again, so is the business...
(That said, some of these kids out there have a great grasp on such advanced programs as Adobe After Effects. It's a bit scary. May the inferiority complex begin...)
That was my day, though. Watching videos. Not exceptionally exciting but not boring either. Every day can't be action-packed. I was wondering how long it would take until those more intern-esque jobs came along.
Monday, October 12, 2009
DAY 7 - Shorter!
The art of omission, the art of cutting down and eliminating excess fat and content is something I'm learning ever more about. My first act of the day was to take a 15 minute interview between Erik Beck and the director of Paranormal Activity and reduce it to three to five minutes. The story of that film is quite interesting within itself. Made on a budget of under $15,000 by a man who never picked up a video camera in his life, Paranormal Activity is the horror film sweeping the nation. It's been called one of the scariest films ever made, drawing its horror not from exuberant gore and special effect villains, but from what's not seen, what's invisible. It's a "imagination of the audience" kind of film, like Blair Witch Project. Actually, the formula is incredibly similar.
Anyway, unrestricted by video I was able to form questions and answers however I wanted, cutting out whole chunks without worrying about jumps. The cuts aren't perfect. When I listen through I can tell where I've made adjustments but that could be because I'm aware of it. Erik took a listen to it while I was shooting BTT and his only comments that I remember were, "Good. It could be shorter, though". Doesn't really instill too much confidence in me but, regardless I sent it to him and wasn't asked about it for the rest of the day.
Speaking of Beyond the Trailer, that was probably the highlight of my day. Nothing out of the ordinary happened but the comfort level was mind-blowing. Comfort with the process, with the Panosonic HVX, lights, sound equipment and just being able to walk around the room knowing what I'm doing and how to do it is a great feeling. (Though it may seem I harp on this a lot, for me it really is important.) I really enjoy working with Grace and every time we shoot these things it gets easier and easier. Jokes were told, laughs were shared, insights on film and Apple's imminent takeover of the world were rampant. Thank you, BTT, for making my day.
With that footage in the can and the Paranormal Activity interview "finished", I went back to Working Class Foodies footage and tried to put together more pieces of the rough cut. When I went to watch a previous episode to double-check on how title cards were done, I found this: Bratwurst with Theo Peck, my first rough cut episode. At first I was excited, but after watching it, discouragement hit me hard. My work had definitely established a process of the show, but Rebecca fit it all together in such a cohesive, engaging and entertaining manner, doing things I never would have thought of. Her vision for the episode and use of the footage worked so well! My discouragement is unsound: I'm not the director of these videos, merely a helper putting labels on the pieces and putting a few together. I never expected to be anything more, but watching the video made me realize I have much further to go as an editor. Or maybe these thoughts are all senseless worries? Probably. From now on I'll take it as a learning experience, not a blow to confidence. Sorry for the personal-esque ramblings.
By 3:00 pm I was without much to do. Strange, I know! Ryan put me to work answering messages on the Indy Mogul Youtube account and I rode that wave until 6:00 pm.
What did I learn today? When you think it's short enough, cut off another minute. Things are never too short for the Internet. People's attention spans are really that ADD. And, for what it is, it works. Get used to being the skeleton of the video. Other people will make it a whole, living breathing entity and may swap out a few bones in the process.
Anyway, unrestricted by video I was able to form questions and answers however I wanted, cutting out whole chunks without worrying about jumps. The cuts aren't perfect. When I listen through I can tell where I've made adjustments but that could be because I'm aware of it. Erik took a listen to it while I was shooting BTT and his only comments that I remember were, "Good. It could be shorter, though". Doesn't really instill too much confidence in me but, regardless I sent it to him and wasn't asked about it for the rest of the day.
Speaking of Beyond the Trailer, that was probably the highlight of my day. Nothing out of the ordinary happened but the comfort level was mind-blowing. Comfort with the process, with the Panosonic HVX, lights, sound equipment and just being able to walk around the room knowing what I'm doing and how to do it is a great feeling. (Though it may seem I harp on this a lot, for me it really is important.) I really enjoy working with Grace and every time we shoot these things it gets easier and easier. Jokes were told, laughs were shared, insights on film and Apple's imminent takeover of the world were rampant. Thank you, BTT, for making my day.
With that footage in the can and the Paranormal Activity interview "finished", I went back to Working Class Foodies footage and tried to put together more pieces of the rough cut. When I went to watch a previous episode to double-check on how title cards were done, I found this: Bratwurst with Theo Peck, my first rough cut episode. At first I was excited, but after watching it, discouragement hit me hard. My work had definitely established a process of the show, but Rebecca fit it all together in such a cohesive, engaging and entertaining manner, doing things I never would have thought of. Her vision for the episode and use of the footage worked so well! My discouragement is unsound: I'm not the director of these videos, merely a helper putting labels on the pieces and putting a few together. I never expected to be anything more, but watching the video made me realize I have much further to go as an editor. Or maybe these thoughts are all senseless worries? Probably. From now on I'll take it as a learning experience, not a blow to confidence. Sorry for the personal-esque ramblings.
By 3:00 pm I was without much to do. Strange, I know! Ryan put me to work answering messages on the Indy Mogul Youtube account and I rode that wave until 6:00 pm.
What did I learn today? When you think it's short enough, cut off another minute. Things are never too short for the Internet. People's attention spans are really that ADD. And, for what it is, it works. Get used to being the skeleton of the video. Other people will make it a whole, living breathing entity and may swap out a few bones in the process.
Friday, October 9, 2009
DAY 6 - Bo Ssam
Ryan Nugent (slight paraphrase): "It's good to know everyone's fightin' over you. Everyone who has worked with you has had good things to say."
Thursday afternoon I received an email from Rebecca Lando that went something like this:
As Rebecca promised, I walked into the office today and it was minutes before someone approached me with the familiar LaCie HD full of footage for the new episode. Bo Ssam, Scallion-Ginger sauce and Jalapeno-Garlic sauce. Logging took about four to five hours, broken up occasionally to deliver extraneous props and wardrobe to the studio that Erik had accumulated in his office over time. (Included were Jason masks, a tool belt, two toy pistols, a plastic Jack-O-Lantern bucket, a plastic cauldron bucket, a styrofoam cheese block hat, a lab suit, and various shirts of all shapes and sizes, a variety of things too comical to omit from this recount.) Rough cutting was difficult to begin, confused as I was as to where to start, but once the ball rolled it never stopped!
In a few hours I had the entire cooking segment of the show thrown down on my timeline. Total time of the rough cut: approximately 4 minutes 30 seconds. That's it! I can't help but wonder if maybe this rough cut is too finely done around the edges, but I have the weekend to mention it to Rebecca and all of Monday to play around with it if need be.
A theory as to why it's so short: As opposed to just blindly following the show list, I'm adopting the show's quick-paced style and trying to capture that in the edit from the start. I know that the episode's final cut will show a two second clip of dicing scallions as opposed to six or seven seconds. So, naturally, the clip I add will be closer to two or three seconds. Hence the insanely short rough cut...
Major point of interest. Ryan Nugent sent me a message asking to talk with me regarding my work with Rebecca and Working Class Foodies. When he finally approached me, he prefaced by saying that Hungry Nation is a network in it's infancy and that the company was really trying to get behind it and push it towards success. WCF is one of two shows it currently has, so any and all help that could be given to make it exponentially better was welcome. This is where I fall into play, Rebecca raved about my work so much that she asked Ryan and another woman at NNN if I could work exclusively as an intern for WCF. Exclusively.
I pondered this for a moment and my reaction to it was both surprising and mutual among myself and Ryan but was most surprising of all was that I vocalized it. When in these sorts of situations, I bite my tongue, choosing to help the team however I can and keeping my own desires out of the picture. But today, I plainly told Ryan that I would do anything they asked me to, for my purpose as an intern is to help Next New Networks however I can. That said, I didn't want an exclusive internship under Hungry Nation and Working Class Foodies to prohibit me from gaining additional experience from other jobs for other networks. For example, would I ever get to shoot another episode for Beyond The Trailer if I was spending my days putting together rough cuts? Obviously, I did not present this as bluntly as I am now but my sudden ability to articulate these thoughts left me a little awed. Seriously.
Ryan, bless his soul, felt the same way. (About my opinion, not my articulation.) He said he had hired myself and the other interns with the promise that we would work in a variety of different environments for a variety of shows and people. Restricting us to one project was taking away from the experience he and Next New promised to give. Hallelujah! Rebecca is an awesome, professional, personable and intelligent person to work with but I'm there to help her and Grace and Erik and Justin and any one of the other equally great individuals at my internship.
What did I learn today? Whether this is a legit rule to stick by has yet to be seen but, adopt the style of the show you are creating a rough cut for. It not only saves time, but makes you look better for knowing what your boss is hoping to see in the final product. (God I hope this is true!) The deceit of the Internet is strong. After watching the raw footage of WCF and contrasting what's actual true with what is said in interviews, a lot is inferred and a lot of stock is put into people simply believing what you are saying because you're on the screen and they, the viewer, is not.* Most importantly, stick up for what you believe in. You never know who might have your beliefs in mind.
*Probably should expand on this...maybe next time.
Thursday afternoon I received an email from Rebecca Lando that went something like this:
Wow! Great work on the episode. I was blown away that you got so much accomplished, and your rough cut was super helpful and really well put together. You are a fucking rock star.My pride did backflips after reading this email and my whole body may have as well were I athletic enough. It's not a feature film, it's not a big prime-time television show, but it's something that I did and did well enough to be referred to as "a fucking rock star". Swimming in a pool of Hofstra students, I am aware that my talents are slightly above average, but this email is something I'll carry with me as proof of it and a small inkling of an assurance that I can make out there in the big bad world once I finally graduate in May.
We're going to bring the drive by NNN Thursday night so it'll be there for you Friday AM with the footage for the Bo Ssam on it. I have a mtg at NNN Tuesday evening, so I'll just pick it back up then.
Thanks again for all your hard work. You're the best.
As Rebecca promised, I walked into the office today and it was minutes before someone approached me with the familiar LaCie HD full of footage for the new episode. Bo Ssam, Scallion-Ginger sauce and Jalapeno-Garlic sauce. Logging took about four to five hours, broken up occasionally to deliver extraneous props and wardrobe to the studio that Erik had accumulated in his office over time. (Included were Jason masks, a tool belt, two toy pistols, a plastic Jack-O-Lantern bucket, a plastic cauldron bucket, a styrofoam cheese block hat, a lab suit, and various shirts of all shapes and sizes, a variety of things too comical to omit from this recount.) Rough cutting was difficult to begin, confused as I was as to where to start, but once the ball rolled it never stopped!
In a few hours I had the entire cooking segment of the show thrown down on my timeline. Total time of the rough cut: approximately 4 minutes 30 seconds. That's it! I can't help but wonder if maybe this rough cut is too finely done around the edges, but I have the weekend to mention it to Rebecca and all of Monday to play around with it if need be.
A theory as to why it's so short: As opposed to just blindly following the show list, I'm adopting the show's quick-paced style and trying to capture that in the edit from the start. I know that the episode's final cut will show a two second clip of dicing scallions as opposed to six or seven seconds. So, naturally, the clip I add will be closer to two or three seconds. Hence the insanely short rough cut...
Major point of interest. Ryan Nugent sent me a message asking to talk with me regarding my work with Rebecca and Working Class Foodies. When he finally approached me, he prefaced by saying that Hungry Nation is a network in it's infancy and that the company was really trying to get behind it and push it towards success. WCF is one of two shows it currently has, so any and all help that could be given to make it exponentially better was welcome. This is where I fall into play, Rebecca raved about my work so much that she asked Ryan and another woman at NNN if I could work exclusively as an intern for WCF. Exclusively.
I pondered this for a moment and my reaction to it was both surprising and mutual among myself and Ryan but was most surprising of all was that I vocalized it. When in these sorts of situations, I bite my tongue, choosing to help the team however I can and keeping my own desires out of the picture. But today, I plainly told Ryan that I would do anything they asked me to, for my purpose as an intern is to help Next New Networks however I can. That said, I didn't want an exclusive internship under Hungry Nation and Working Class Foodies to prohibit me from gaining additional experience from other jobs for other networks. For example, would I ever get to shoot another episode for Beyond The Trailer if I was spending my days putting together rough cuts? Obviously, I did not present this as bluntly as I am now but my sudden ability to articulate these thoughts left me a little awed. Seriously.
Ryan, bless his soul, felt the same way. (About my opinion, not my articulation.) He said he had hired myself and the other interns with the promise that we would work in a variety of different environments for a variety of shows and people. Restricting us to one project was taking away from the experience he and Next New promised to give. Hallelujah! Rebecca is an awesome, professional, personable and intelligent person to work with but I'm there to help her and Grace and Erik and Justin and any one of the other equally great individuals at my internship.
What did I learn today? Whether this is a legit rule to stick by has yet to be seen but, adopt the style of the show you are creating a rough cut for. It not only saves time, but makes you look better for knowing what your boss is hoping to see in the final product. (God I hope this is true!) The deceit of the Internet is strong. After watching the raw footage of WCF and contrasting what's actual true with what is said in interviews, a lot is inferred and a lot of stock is put into people simply believing what you are saying because you're on the screen and they, the viewer, is not.* Most importantly, stick up for what you believe in. You never know who might have your beliefs in mind.
*Probably should expand on this...maybe next time.
Monday, October 5, 2009
DAY 5 - Working Class Rough Cut
I entered my internship with the expectation that I would spend the entire day working on the Working Class Foodies episode 107 logging/rough cut and I am pleased to say that that is exactly how events unfolded.
Logging has always been a big thing of mine. Whenever people ask me about it, I stress to no end it's importance. How are you supposed to be an effective editor if you have no idea what your clips are, what happens in them, where the good points are, etc? As an editor you should be able to quickly grab anything you need and from there the rest is easy. At first I felt weary at how long it took me to mark and name the 99 clips in my bin. Certain portions, such as six minute clips of sausage links being made and tied off, made me nervous but after a quick email to Rebecca Lando regarding how to handle it, I felt much more at ease.
I find that every time I sit in front of a computer and start to edit for the first time in a while (or do anything that has to do with filmmaking after having done nothing of the sort for a long period of time), important details such as specifying shot names, reading foot candles and lighting effectively escape me. (The latter two things are irrelevant but the first is very important when logging!) Thank God Rebecca made a mention of it in her email or I would have omitted them from my clip names entirely! Of course, I then when backwards and renamed all that I could... Okay, getting a little too technical here. When all you do in a day is edit, it's hard not to!
I guess my point is that hopefully all this constant exposure to working with editing and various shows in a real environment will help me retain some of these important details from one project to the next. I should not have the option of shutting my brain off to these things over the course of a summer, as if the details being blocked were dates and names of paintings or mathematic properties. Specifying shot types when logging footage is important and hopefully next time it won't take an unsuspecting email to remind me!
Throwing together a rough cut is a new thing for me. My style of editing is very...different. Before moving on I'm going to explain:
When you edit, standard procedure is to log clips, then create a rough cut to establish the sequence, create an assembly cut to get the flow and then fine tune the crap out of it until you are left with your "Final" cut. You start with large clips, then trim around the edges. Perfect cuts and transitions don't happen until after the rough cut. Transitions in general don't come until after a rough cut. Audio mixing comes after the final cut and so on and so forth... I may have a few details jumbled here and there...
When I edit, I skip the rough draft process and dive straight into my surgeonesque fine-tuning. Rough cuts just don't work for me. Once I have a vision for how a project will work out, I barrel through, creating that vision as best as possible on the first try. This is WRONG! But, I do it anyway.
So, when I was asked to make a rough cut, I took a breath, stepped back from myself and had to suddenly get into the mid set that said "Don't finesse!!" For a first time, I was incredibly impressed with myself! At around 1 PM, my last few clips were logged and I started dragging and dropping them into my timeline, following the shot list/recipe that was emailed to me. Keeping the style of the show in my mind, I paid careful attention to keep clips short, jump cuts abound, maintaining the process of cooking the meal as much as possible.
Aside: A cooking show in five minutes if VERY DIFFERENT than one that spans a half hour or longer! The pacing is incredibly fast and after watching previous episodes of the show countless times, the vision of the editing style is something I must become in tune to. It works because of how well each episode is paced, literally cutting out the excess fat that is usually overdubbed with useless dribble on a standard Food Network cooking show. For the market they are catering to, this unique shotgun approach keeps it interesting and easy for anyone to sit and watch, while at the same time containing all the information one could possibly need. (NEED is a key word.) That said, after watching hours of footage, things are definitely left out of the mix that may be important to the viewer, but that is where the editor comes in. I find editing for Net-television, more so than any other medium, is like compressing a novel for Sparknotes: keep the bare necessities of the bare necessities. Anything else can die on the cutting room floor. I can only begin to imagine how this will affect my editing for longer productions! Will it be positive or negative?
After that initial drag and drop session, I was left with seven plus minutes of video for what will eventually be a 4-5 minute short! This was without the intro, outro, etc. Beads of sweat started forming on my forehead. "I know rough cuts are generally long, but did I do this right? I'm not even done yet!" I thought to myself. I went back, cutting out and down what I could, hoping that that I could shave off at least a minute of my seemingly bloated rough cut!
Enter Erik Beck, "an actor, producer, filmmaker and master of low-budget special effects who co-founded Indy Mogul in 2007". He came over to check up on me in the wake of my small, hidden internal freak-out. I explained to him my newness to the concept of rough cut and that I was trying to cut down my seven minutes of footage to something more manageable for Rebecca. "Actually," he said (and I'm paraphrasing a little), "seven minutes is really good! Most of the rough cuts we get are at least twice what the intended length of the show is. So, if you're only 20% over, I don't see that being a problem."
What?! Seriously?! I was overjoyed! Ecstatic! I don't suck at my job! Alight with compliments and confidence, I was rearing to forge on, adding the visit to the marketplace clips to the beginning (though the footage was lacking), threw an intro in and logged two seconds of what ended up being an interview that could have really helped me from the start! I accomplished all this easily within ten minutes and could have done more were I not expected to drop the drive off uptown and, oh yeah, actually return to campus that day. No more did I feel burdened with my previous caution and I'm all the more glad for it!
Brittany the Editor was back!
Sidenote: Justin, the man who commissioned me to make Hungry Nation promos, came over and complimented my use of markers. When editing the interviews, I noted parts I thought might make interesting 15 second stories but marking them in FCP. He said that was a really good decision and showed I knew what I was doing. Score!
What did I learn today? My attention to detail and over-anal personality are both things I should embrace when editing and logging. Don't be scared to bring up small things you may be concerned about (I almost never told Erik about my rough cut woes) because if you express problems to the right people, they usually result in constructive criticism (or compliments in my case). Communication is key to this medium and having questions is in the job description for an intern! Sure, a stupid inquiry may come up, but at least an answer will prevent me from yielding stupid results. I can be stupid at so many other times in life and not have it affect my job prospects!
After getting a feel for my first WCF rough cut, I think I have more confidence to do another, this time having the experience of one under my belt and addressing anything I thought I was doing wrong the first time. Don't shamelessly cut out due to length, that's what assembly cuts are for!!! Don't not go with your gut and don't get overwhelmed; I did a little bit of both and it hurt me. I'm not expected to do everything perfect the first time. When I just captured the WCF "vision" and moved with it, everything worked out fine.
(I just hope Rebecca thinks so too!)
Logging has always been a big thing of mine. Whenever people ask me about it, I stress to no end it's importance. How are you supposed to be an effective editor if you have no idea what your clips are, what happens in them, where the good points are, etc? As an editor you should be able to quickly grab anything you need and from there the rest is easy. At first I felt weary at how long it took me to mark and name the 99 clips in my bin. Certain portions, such as six minute clips of sausage links being made and tied off, made me nervous but after a quick email to Rebecca Lando regarding how to handle it, I felt much more at ease.
I find that every time I sit in front of a computer and start to edit for the first time in a while (or do anything that has to do with filmmaking after having done nothing of the sort for a long period of time), important details such as specifying shot names, reading foot candles and lighting effectively escape me. (The latter two things are irrelevant but the first is very important when logging!) Thank God Rebecca made a mention of it in her email or I would have omitted them from my clip names entirely! Of course, I then when backwards and renamed all that I could... Okay, getting a little too technical here. When all you do in a day is edit, it's hard not to!
I guess my point is that hopefully all this constant exposure to working with editing and various shows in a real environment will help me retain some of these important details from one project to the next. I should not have the option of shutting my brain off to these things over the course of a summer, as if the details being blocked were dates and names of paintings or mathematic properties. Specifying shot types when logging footage is important and hopefully next time it won't take an unsuspecting email to remind me!
Throwing together a rough cut is a new thing for me. My style of editing is very...different. Before moving on I'm going to explain:
When you edit, standard procedure is to log clips, then create a rough cut to establish the sequence, create an assembly cut to get the flow and then fine tune the crap out of it until you are left with your "Final" cut. You start with large clips, then trim around the edges. Perfect cuts and transitions don't happen until after the rough cut. Transitions in general don't come until after a rough cut. Audio mixing comes after the final cut and so on and so forth... I may have a few details jumbled here and there...
When I edit, I skip the rough draft process and dive straight into my surgeonesque fine-tuning. Rough cuts just don't work for me. Once I have a vision for how a project will work out, I barrel through, creating that vision as best as possible on the first try. This is WRONG! But, I do it anyway.
So, when I was asked to make a rough cut, I took a breath, stepped back from myself and had to suddenly get into the mid set that said "Don't finesse!!" For a first time, I was incredibly impressed with myself! At around 1 PM, my last few clips were logged and I started dragging and dropping them into my timeline, following the shot list/recipe that was emailed to me. Keeping the style of the show in my mind, I paid careful attention to keep clips short, jump cuts abound, maintaining the process of cooking the meal as much as possible.
Aside: A cooking show in five minutes if VERY DIFFERENT than one that spans a half hour or longer! The pacing is incredibly fast and after watching previous episodes of the show countless times, the vision of the editing style is something I must become in tune to. It works because of how well each episode is paced, literally cutting out the excess fat that is usually overdubbed with useless dribble on a standard Food Network cooking show. For the market they are catering to, this unique shotgun approach keeps it interesting and easy for anyone to sit and watch, while at the same time containing all the information one could possibly need. (NEED is a key word.) That said, after watching hours of footage, things are definitely left out of the mix that may be important to the viewer, but that is where the editor comes in. I find editing for Net-television, more so than any other medium, is like compressing a novel for Sparknotes: keep the bare necessities of the bare necessities. Anything else can die on the cutting room floor. I can only begin to imagine how this will affect my editing for longer productions! Will it be positive or negative?
After that initial drag and drop session, I was left with seven plus minutes of video for what will eventually be a 4-5 minute short! This was without the intro, outro, etc. Beads of sweat started forming on my forehead. "I know rough cuts are generally long, but did I do this right? I'm not even done yet!" I thought to myself. I went back, cutting out and down what I could, hoping that that I could shave off at least a minute of my seemingly bloated rough cut!
Enter Erik Beck, "an actor, producer, filmmaker and master of low-budget special effects who co-founded Indy Mogul in 2007". He came over to check up on me in the wake of my small, hidden internal freak-out. I explained to him my newness to the concept of rough cut and that I was trying to cut down my seven minutes of footage to something more manageable for Rebecca. "Actually," he said (and I'm paraphrasing a little), "seven minutes is really good! Most of the rough cuts we get are at least twice what the intended length of the show is. So, if you're only 20% over, I don't see that being a problem."
What?! Seriously?! I was overjoyed! Ecstatic! I don't suck at my job! Alight with compliments and confidence, I was rearing to forge on, adding the visit to the marketplace clips to the beginning (though the footage was lacking), threw an intro in and logged two seconds of what ended up being an interview that could have really helped me from the start! I accomplished all this easily within ten minutes and could have done more were I not expected to drop the drive off uptown and, oh yeah, actually return to campus that day. No more did I feel burdened with my previous caution and I'm all the more glad for it!
Brittany the Editor was back!
Sidenote: Justin, the man who commissioned me to make Hungry Nation promos, came over and complimented my use of markers. When editing the interviews, I noted parts I thought might make interesting 15 second stories but marking them in FCP. He said that was a really good decision and showed I knew what I was doing. Score!
What did I learn today? My attention to detail and over-anal personality are both things I should embrace when editing and logging. Don't be scared to bring up small things you may be concerned about (I almost never told Erik about my rough cut woes) because if you express problems to the right people, they usually result in constructive criticism (or compliments in my case). Communication is key to this medium and having questions is in the job description for an intern! Sure, a stupid inquiry may come up, but at least an answer will prevent me from yielding stupid results. I can be stupid at so many other times in life and not have it affect my job prospects!
After getting a feel for my first WCF rough cut, I think I have more confidence to do another, this time having the experience of one under my belt and addressing anything I thought I was doing wrong the first time. Don't shamelessly cut out due to length, that's what assembly cuts are for!!! Don't not go with your gut and don't get overwhelmed; I did a little bit of both and it hurt me. I'm not expected to do everything perfect the first time. When I just captured the WCF "vision" and moved with it, everything worked out fine.
(I just hope Rebecca thinks so too!)
Friday, October 2, 2009
DAY 4 - The Run Around
Today, I'm going to try my best to keep a very up-to-date account of what is going on. This could fail, it could work splendidly but we'll see how it goes. I have arrived at the office, right on time and am ready to work! My brain has been in a dark place and I'm hoping that NNN will help loosen me up. For now, I'm heavily enjoying the useless chatter amongst the Fast Lane Daily team.
EDIT: The up-to-date account did not work so well. The day was a whirlwind to say the least. Where should I begin...
I began tweaking Hungry Nation promos when Erik, one of the head honchos of Indy Mogul struck up a conversation with me. He wanted to know what my specialties were, what I would like to do most at NNN and what I had been working on up to that point. Little did I know this was all a lead in for a new, what shall I call it, assignment? One of the shows on Hungry Nation, Working Class Foodies, was looking for a production intern as well as someone to help assemble rough cuts. That day, they were shooting in their usual location uptown on W 86th St and it wasn't long until I was en route to join them!
After a few wrong subway transfers and a couple wrong turns I found my way to the apartment of Rebecca Lando an NYU graduate with a passion not only for filmmaking but also cooking. For those of you out there who don't know WCF, the show is about two siblings, Rebecca and her brother Max, who seek out interesting recipes that can be made with a budget of just $8.00 per person. The show is still in it's infancy, with just a hand full of episodes, but it's quirky, fun, and the relationship between the siblings and the recurring cameos by their dog Humphrey make it fresh and entertaining. (The fact it is shot in beautiful 1080i with the dazzling Canon D6 Mark II by the great cinematographer D.A. Pennebaker's son, Kit, helps a little as well!)
Sadly, I arrived at the apartment at the most inopportune time: when the pork was cooking in the oven. Instead, Rebecca gave me the run down on the editing front and equipped me with everything I would ever want or need to know when the time came for me to sit down and assemble a rough cut for one of the episodes. (I shan't get into the technical descriptions.) I then had two choice: sit and wait for the video files to transfer to the Hardrive I would take back to the NNN office downtown or join Kit and Max as they went to a nearby farmer's market and Whole Foods to shoot the purchasing of ingredients for the next few episodes of the show. As easy and interesting as it was to talk to Rebecca, I decided to join the boys to get some idea of how things were done on the production end of the show if nothing else.
More or less what I ended up doing was follow them around, looking over Kit's shoulder from time to time to watch his shooting. I talked with them a little to get a better idea of how the show is organized but overall it was unexciting. Strange saying that, but perhaps I was just exhausted from the day. I'm sure that if I came to them while in the midst of shooting the cooking portion of the show, things would have been a lot more interesting. Maybe I'll talk more on the shopping later...
After about an hour or so I got back to the 86th St apartment and found the HD fully fitted for my editing pleasure. Then it was the long, confusing and frustrating journey back to Next New Networks, where I spent the last couple hours of my work day logging footage. I was glad to find that their system of logging was a lot less intense than others I had encountered in the past. I'm worried that I should have been able to accomplish more in the couple hours I had available to me, but taking my time and watching all the footage instead of lunging into a rough cut immediately makes a little more sense.
It's a little scary being thrown into this position so early. I've been given all the footage for a single episode and am trusted enough to assemble it into something Rebecca can finalize and then later air on the website. Obviously, if they didn't think I could do it, I wouldn't be writing about this internship, but the pressure it definitely there. Just keep telling yourself you know what you are doing. Once you get the "vision" you cut faster than anyone else you know. So I've never edited a cooking show before, there are six online for my viewing pleasure that I can draw from. To be honest, rough cuts have never been my thing either. My meticulous and perfectionist nature have always caused me to skip the rough step and go straight to finalization. Not to say once a scene is edited it's finished forever. If we were talking about writing a paper, I would just skip the outline and first draft step and go straight from idea to 2nd draft and beyond. Learning to do this will be a great thing for the future, though, and the confidence I get from it will without a doubt carry over to other things at Next New. Slowly, it's building, and I have this internship as much for that as I do for experience.
Wow! A little soul searching there, huh? Hopefully that's okay... That's a rap for the Day 4 entry. Day 5 is just around the corner...
EDIT: The up-to-date account did not work so well. The day was a whirlwind to say the least. Where should I begin...
I began tweaking Hungry Nation promos when Erik, one of the head honchos of Indy Mogul struck up a conversation with me. He wanted to know what my specialties were, what I would like to do most at NNN and what I had been working on up to that point. Little did I know this was all a lead in for a new, what shall I call it, assignment? One of the shows on Hungry Nation, Working Class Foodies, was looking for a production intern as well as someone to help assemble rough cuts. That day, they were shooting in their usual location uptown on W 86th St and it wasn't long until I was en route to join them!
After a few wrong subway transfers and a couple wrong turns I found my way to the apartment of Rebecca Lando an NYU graduate with a passion not only for filmmaking but also cooking. For those of you out there who don't know WCF, the show is about two siblings, Rebecca and her brother Max, who seek out interesting recipes that can be made with a budget of just $8.00 per person. The show is still in it's infancy, with just a hand full of episodes, but it's quirky, fun, and the relationship between the siblings and the recurring cameos by their dog Humphrey make it fresh and entertaining. (The fact it is shot in beautiful 1080i with the dazzling Canon D6 Mark II by the great cinematographer D.A. Pennebaker's son, Kit, helps a little as well!)
Sadly, I arrived at the apartment at the most inopportune time: when the pork was cooking in the oven. Instead, Rebecca gave me the run down on the editing front and equipped me with everything I would ever want or need to know when the time came for me to sit down and assemble a rough cut for one of the episodes. (I shan't get into the technical descriptions.) I then had two choice: sit and wait for the video files to transfer to the Hardrive I would take back to the NNN office downtown or join Kit and Max as they went to a nearby farmer's market and Whole Foods to shoot the purchasing of ingredients for the next few episodes of the show. As easy and interesting as it was to talk to Rebecca, I decided to join the boys to get some idea of how things were done on the production end of the show if nothing else.
More or less what I ended up doing was follow them around, looking over Kit's shoulder from time to time to watch his shooting. I talked with them a little to get a better idea of how the show is organized but overall it was unexciting. Strange saying that, but perhaps I was just exhausted from the day. I'm sure that if I came to them while in the midst of shooting the cooking portion of the show, things would have been a lot more interesting. Maybe I'll talk more on the shopping later...
After about an hour or so I got back to the 86th St apartment and found the HD fully fitted for my editing pleasure. Then it was the long, confusing and frustrating journey back to Next New Networks, where I spent the last couple hours of my work day logging footage. I was glad to find that their system of logging was a lot less intense than others I had encountered in the past. I'm worried that I should have been able to accomplish more in the couple hours I had available to me, but taking my time and watching all the footage instead of lunging into a rough cut immediately makes a little more sense.
It's a little scary being thrown into this position so early. I've been given all the footage for a single episode and am trusted enough to assemble it into something Rebecca can finalize and then later air on the website. Obviously, if they didn't think I could do it, I wouldn't be writing about this internship, but the pressure it definitely there. Just keep telling yourself you know what you are doing. Once you get the "vision" you cut faster than anyone else you know. So I've never edited a cooking show before, there are six online for my viewing pleasure that I can draw from. To be honest, rough cuts have never been my thing either. My meticulous and perfectionist nature have always caused me to skip the rough step and go straight to finalization. Not to say once a scene is edited it's finished forever. If we were talking about writing a paper, I would just skip the outline and first draft step and go straight from idea to 2nd draft and beyond. Learning to do this will be a great thing for the future, though, and the confidence I get from it will without a doubt carry over to other things at Next New. Slowly, it's building, and I have this internship as much for that as I do for experience.
Wow! A little soul searching there, huh? Hopefully that's okay... That's a rap for the Day 4 entry. Day 5 is just around the corner...
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