An article about the cutting the new Farrelly Brothers film "The Three Stooges" was refreshing. The workflow I employ is essentially the same. They shoot on 35mm film, transfer to 4:4:4 HDCAM SR and edit offline in Avid DNxHD 36. DNxHD 36 offers a very nice picture with very compressed small files. This format saves a tremendous amount of space. With about 83 hours of footage, they will have to use a Unity Isis setup. With the roughly 40:1 shooting ratio, they have a ton of information to go through. Once this offline is done, they online it and correct it. The color timing is done with Davinci.
Another thing that stuck out about the interview was the talk about editing comedy. It’s very difficult to edit comedy due to the pacing. Pacing is vital to editing this genre. Not only does the editor need time all the humor properly for the sake of the picture, the editor must also consider the audience reaction. The timing must be done with enough room for the audience to stop laughing to move on to the next shot or scene. This is not at all easy. It’s an art unto itself.
The other part I noticed is how the editor, Sam Seig, edits. He stands up as he works. He mentioned has was raised on a Moviola (KEMs too) and that he feels very comfortable cutting this way. Another big editor does the same. He is Walter Murch of course. He feels his rhythm is proper when editing this way. Of course, they don’t mention the physical benefits from doing this as well.
I’m not sure how long this process will continue. With Kodak on the brink of going out of business, the film part could be dead in a few years time. When this happens, the few remaining film shooters will likely start shooting digital. The process doesn’t change very much, other than a film transfer will not be needed and the editor can get the shots immediately, if that’s what they want.
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