Avid World East

The Conference Featured More Than 70 Seminars &
Workshops on a Wide Variety of Subjects

by Peter Frank

Avid World East — three-and-a-half days of technical sessions, seminars and workshops for users of Avid products — opened in New York on December 10, at the New Yorker Hotel. Delayed from its original dates in October due to the events of September 11, it was co-produced for Avid by Future Media Concepts and Mindshare Ventures. Eight hundred participants came from 27 states and many countries. They seemed to vary from college students to seasoned professionals, but because it was so expensive ($1450, or $1,145 if you registered early), working editors with a subsidy from their employers seemed the most likely attendees. Some participants thought it was worth the price, while others saw it as little more than an expensive marketing event. I found it to be a bit of both.



Avid World keynote speakers included president and CEO of Avid, David Krall, A.C.E. president Tina Hirsch and editor and former A.C.E. president Mark Goldblatt. (Photos by Carole Edington.)

It certainly gave a glimpse into Avid’s philosophy about the future of digital editing. David Krall, President and CEO, spoke about new directions in the industry and made it clear that Avid is focusing on very large installations for broadcast stations, as well as networked digitizing, editing, graphics, and finishing stations that share media throughout a facility using Unity. One company he cited had at least 50 workstations handling video post production from camera to air. I was left wondering where the individual creative editor’s concerns stood in this larger-scale vision. However, many of the seminars at the conference seemed to be directed towards individuals working on one or two Media Composers or Pro Tools systems.

The conference featured more than 70 seminars and workshops on subjects including Media

Composer advanced editing, finishing techniques for the Media Composer and Symphony, MIDI, OMFI, After Effects and Photoshop. Most sessions were well presented with the help of large projection screens. Lecturers were knowledgeable and, with only a few exceptions, entertaining and interesting. Most of the sessions I attended had quiet, attentive audiences who asked relevant questions and were vocal in their approval.

I attended a seminar by Jeff Greenberg that gave an overview of Avid Xpress DV. Many editors, myself included, have been watching the development of Apple’s Final Cut Pro, and I was eager to hear what Avid is doing in the DV world.

An Express DV system can be put together for very little money — the base price is around $1700, not including monitors or a deck. Xpress DV uses OMFI to share material with higher-end Avids, but because it doesn’t have 24 fps capabilities, this won’t work with a Film Composer. The interface is similar to that of the Media Composer, and though not as complete, the basic editing features are the same.

I also attended “Media Composer Advanced Editing,” which was taught by Greg Staten, principal instructor at Avid. As a long-time Avid user, I wasn’t surprised by the techniques he demonstrated, but I thought the presentation was clear, to the point and useful. Staten seemed to assume that his audience of about 60 had a thorough knowledge of the Media Composer interface, and beginners would have had a hard time keeping up with the rapid pace.

Two especially good seminars were given by Wes Plate (“After Effects for Avid Editors”) and Avid Principal Product Designer Steve Bayes (“Media Composer: Advanced Effects Tips

and Tricks”). Both have pushed the effects process quite far on the Media Composer, although Plate recommends using After Effects for complex work. He has helped create a program called Automatic Duck, which greatly facilitates the import and export of After Effects compositions to and from the Media Composer.

I always enjoy hearing accomplished editors speak about their work, and Avid World East offered many opportunities to learn about the experiences of others. Monday’s keynote address was given by Mark Goldblatt, who discussed his career, the aesthetics of editing, and the transition from film to digital. He showed examples from Battleship Potemkin and from work he did on The Terminator, and stressed that the tools used are less important than the skills and experience of the editor.

Later, he participated in a roundtable discussion with picture editors Tina Hirsch and Tim Squyres and sound editor and re-recording mixer Larry Blake. Topics ranged from filling out sound effects and adding temp music to a first cut to various aspects of laptop editing (good for second unit work, but not realistic for long-term editing). The panelists also discussed the difficulty of cutting some sequences without music, and the concomitant danger of adding music that won’t be in the final cut. In Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Squyres had to contend with fight sequences that were shot MOS (traditional for martial arts movies) and dialog in Mandarin. Blake discussed the way automation data from Protools temp mixes on Ocean’s 11 was preserved for the final dub.

Tina Hirsch presented a talk entitled “How Re-editing Can Make a Good Show Better.” She showed a cable pilot, cut by another editor, and then her re-edited version. The audience was very vocal in their appreciation of the improvement. Hirsch then explained the process she and a producer for the show went through to arrive at the result.

Michael Berenbaum and Wendy Stanzler, editors of Sex in the City, gave the keynote on Tuesday. They described the process of editing their series and how they work with their creative producer. The series is shot two episodes at a time and at any given moment, they’ll have episodes in many different stages of completion. The editors work with temp music, much of which is actually used in the final show. They presented one scene that had been shot with a knife in a character’s hand, but the producers asked that the knife be removed. The two editors then screened the resulting scene, which they completed using outtakes and alternates. Magic — no more knife!

Wednesday began with a fine keynote presentation by Andy Mondshein, who spoke about cutting The Shipping News and the increasing pressure to cut faster and faster. He had just worked 31 days with only one day off. He said films are suffering from the speed of digital editing, even as we all embrace the creative and technical freedom it brings. Mondshein also feels that sound training is enormously important for film editors.

In addition to all the seminars and speeches, the conference had an exhibit hall, with booths

from major equipment suppliers and third-party vendors, but it was small compared to established industry trade shows. One evening offered the “Next Gig Soiree” and “Next Gig Panel,” which were essentially chances to network and get suggestions on how to look for jobs.

The conference provided some hints into the changes that we may see from Avid. After describing the recently released Media Composer 10.6, Steve Bayes spoke about what’s in store for the future (see sidebar). He indicated that Xpress DV will appear on the Mac platform in the first half of 2002. OSX support for other Meridien Mac products will appear in the third quarter.

Bayes also hosted a “Stump the Product Designer” session, in which he asked the audience to tell him what features they would like to see in the future. Some of the many ideas were: more sophisticated dupe detection, “splice in the film” indicators for work print conforming, a grease pencil tool, sample-based sound editing, source-based track coloring, color correction data that can carry over to output machines, locators that can be moved in the timeline and the ability to see more than one wire frame at a time. Steve encouraged people to send him suggestions via email