NEWS
FUTURE OF DI, FILM DISCUSSED AT HD Expo
by Bill Stetz
photo by Wm. Stetz
 Members of Avid's "Technology Wish List" seminar, from left; Tod Mesirow, Chuck Haifley, Rob Englehardt, Christopher Coppola and Tim Cox. Photo by Wm. Stetz |
As one might expect, the one-day HD Expo symposium at the LA Center Studios in March presented a series of auditorium panel presentations/discussions, as well as static displays by industry exhibitors/vendors, all pertaining to the high definition format.
I attended two panel discussions. First was “The Art and Evolving Science of Hybrid Filmmaking,” a collection of prominent cinematographers discussing aspects and experiences with digital intermediates (DI), the next avenue and foremost influential area of filmmaking’s post-production process to affect filmmakers today.
Through the DI process, once a production’s principal photography is complete, dailies or edited material are digitally scanned at 2K or 4K resolutions. They are thereby made accessible for any of the digital alterations that a director, compositor or colorist might want to perform––including adding effects, timing scenes or improving certain physical dimensions of the image before striking film prints from the digital file.
Aside from personal desires to have and work with higher resolution DIs in the future, all cinematographers present generally felt that setting industry standards for color timing in the DI was foremost in the area of desired development. Daryn Akada, ASC, stated this plainly when he implored, “[Industry] people must demand digital timing, light and calibration from the labs, post houses and providers of their services.”
Lou Levinson, ASC, further added, “Technology surrounding the DI is changing so rapidly that the SMPTE [Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers] can’t keep up with the establishment of standards. The users are becoming the implementers of the standard.” Richard Cruda, ASC, commented, “Hazeltine printer lights were standard in the past [for color timing of scenes], but now digital [timing] becomes the interpretation of whoever does it.”
Regarding the quality of 2K versus 4K resolution scans for DIs, Allen Daviau, ASC, surmised that while shooting a film in 65mm and going to DI, the original material quality made the scan resolution less significant than the quality of the original footage. He added that his 65mm footage looked luscious in either 2K or 4K scan resolution tests.
At the “The Technology Wish List” postproduction seminar sponsored by Avid Technology, the panel members’ mean age appeared to be around 27 years old––a striking difference from the audience members, whose average age seemed to float between 40 and 50. This seminar was outlined into five areas of discussion: 1) Acquisition, 2) Editing, 3) Ingest & Storage, 4) Post-production and 5) Filmout.
Interestingly and somewhat ironically, although the seminar sponsor was Avid, most of the discussion centered around the use of––and support from––Apple’s Final Cut Pro as the editing tool of choice.
During the editing section of the talks, Tod Mesirow, co-executive producer of Monster Garage Original Productions, suggested, “The editor of the future needs to be an artist and technician to accommodate all the tools and requirements asked of them by filmmakers in the editing process.”
Contrary to the earlier session of cinematographers, who made a case for continuing viability of film as a medium for work, Christopher Coppola, president of EARS XXI flatly stated, “Film is dead. Who can afford film?” He followed with this prediction: “Because kids are raised on video games, [future] shows are going to have to be cut in the likeness of games. That’s all the audience is going to understand.”
Michael Cioni, post-production supervisor for PlasterCITY Digital Post, discussed emerging workflow schemes which incorporate post-production teams working within nodes of three or more computers comprising a network. The networks are connected to a central, high-speed storage center of files, all of which are worked on simultaneously by an editor, compositor and sound designer or some such variation.
HD Expo, currently on tour across the US, offers some keen insights into HD content- making endeavors. In many cases, it would appear that the interests and dream products of filmmakers are way ahead of the actual product arrivals and standardizations. As with any new technology, only time will tell if what finally gets delivered to the industry users makes the previous products and practices irrelevant. The panel discussions made the tour of products in the vendor booths a great starting point for learning what’s worth pursuing.
Bill Stetz is the art director of Editors Guild Magazine. He is also a producer and director and in March completed editing Threshold, a dramatic, live-action production shot in high definition. He may be contacted at director@americanprairie. net.
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