Episode 84
FCG084 - Its just a joke. (feat. James Branch)
Timing, trimming, adjusting… that’s editorial, but its also comedy. James Branch, Writer, Director and Editor was also a stand up comic in another life. His views about seeing a cut or a timeline as a whole, and NOT a series of individual shots or even frames is a brilliant observation that comes from many years in the business. Don’t worry, if you want to talk about FCPX we’ll get there eventually, but there is a whole lot of theory in this episode too. who will make the call on changing… Producers? the people that pay.
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Featuring
- Chris Fenwick
- Guest Name - @jbranch
Transcription
00:00.001: It's interesting what you say about even the choice of the words, because every word evokes an image and a thought, and you don't want to you don't want to spoil the joke at the end.
00:00.001: I know, in terms of clients, it's a good question.
00:00.001: So I'd go, Come on, why can't I do this myself?
00:00.001: And this was what this was around about the time that Filecut Studio was released.
00:00.001: If you can find it in your busy schedule, because I'm busy too, go to the iTunes, search for Funnel Cut Grill, leave a comment.
00:00.080: James and I ran into each other on Twitter and got to chatting and talking about work and stuff.
00:00.080: And they'd go and learn their lines and said two hundred pounds a minute because that's what it costs to make, you know, uh uh fifteen minutes, you know, sixteen mil film with a mix and all and so and and you know, the lab costs and all that sort of stuff.
00:00.080: Does he not realize this?
00:00.080: To sort of say, Look, you know, do you realize this, this, this, and it will save time?
00:00.080: Firecut 10 right from the start, so I could follow what was going on and follow the features, but I couldn't really do anything on it because my machine was so extraordinarily slow.
00:00.080: Pro apps altogether, so I don't know whether they just thought they had to be a lot of flair.
00:00.080: Whether this is something that made them go, quick, we need to we need to release it now.
00:00.080: Feature film, they just said we don't have to do this, so let's go and learn how to do it.
00:00.080: But I it sounds terrible.
00:00.160: Hey, good morning, and welcome to another episode of Final Cut Grill.
00:00.160: I did film school.
00:00.160: Super Eight and stuff like that at a local art center.
00:00.160: in Devon in in in in England, so not far from the the beating hub of London where all everything's happening.
00:00.160: And also at the weekend he he did wedding videos.
00:00.160: like doing a wedding video.
00:00.160: Yeah, I'm late!
00:00.160: that works in the film industry.
00:00.160: is some guy that worked on Birth of a Nation or something.
00:00.160: Yeah, well this is this is what happened to me.
00:00.160: He was the first assistant for this really famous editor who I can't remember his name anyway.
00:00.160: So it might have been one of the last shows on that was that was post-produced in that way.
00:00.160: And and the thing what the interesting thing was I came out of film school with a short film and there was nowhere to nowhere to show it.
00:00.160: Yeah.
00:00.160: and express it to an audience in the evening and get feedback.
00:00.160: of a trailer and then I would then make it into a strip of 35 millimeter film and I would then and then I would order up all the sections required to make that trailer and order up all the audio elements required on 35mm mag
00:00.160: trailer editor was um was this break I had because I had a background in writing and so that's how I progressed and I stayed there for you know near the best part of twenty years pretty much.
00:00.160: the word in the middle of the sentence of the punchline because there'll be people will start laughing in the middle of the sentence instead of at the end of the sentence.
00:00.160: and scatter brained and it that's part of what makes them funny.
00:00.160: That's what I meant by that is that it's typical of me to go and sort of.
00:00.160: What were you going to say?
00:00.160: and every day would get some call where someone was literally going you know they were going through the trailer frame by frame scene by scene and not seeing it as a piece and not not realizing that saying
00:00.160: Well, we just take that music out and switch that back to the put that line at the front and not realizing and then you send them that you do that, you do that change make those changes.
00:00.160: some trader editors their their monitor is hooked up to the clients the clients can see what they're doing live and i was like what
00:00.160: Exactly.
00:00.160: Well, I can see the trailer now.
00:00.160: Do a trailer, they can just sit down front, no beginning, middle, and end done.
00:00.160: And that to me is the real beauty of nonlinear because you don't have to commit anything.
00:00.160: I said great, it's this much money and I went to Soho Editors and uh did a course there.
00:00.160: To teach some of them motion and teach them how to do their own, you know, MP4s and DVDs, the ones that wanted to.
00:00.160: it was just extraordinary well these people you know these are these are these people call them the professional editors they're acting like these whiny needy cry babies who are just trying to get apple's attention make apple feel bad and like it's just like
00:00.160: I'm s I'm cutting stuff in Filecut 10 and when I finished it I have to hand the job back to an agency I'm working for.
00:00.160: So there's plenty of people out there even now still using seven and are quite happy.
00:00.160: It was around about the time I was thinking about leaving and working from home.
00:00.160: you know, they're doing this offer for premiere now that you know they're they're jumping on the bandwagon for this whole file cup 10 hatred.
00:00.160: Jump ship completely?
00:00.160: I'm going to just maybe start from scratch with it.
00:00.160: We've never made a feature.
00:00.160: aren't even aware of any changes, new stuff.
00:00.160: When I persuaded people to switch from Avid to File Cut 7, they only realized how good it was until they went back to do an avid job.
00:00.160: 'Cause when I whenever I have to on the rare occasions from go from ten to seven, it's going, Oh, what's this?
00:00.160: the facilities houses because budgets are going down, rents are going we had we had an office in the middle of Soho, which is some of the most expensive property in Western Europe
00:00.160: for an evening and it's and it's this and that and that all adds up and you've got to pay her wages and and you know, that all that all it all cost money.
00:00.160: This was just from workflow improvements and one of the things was the ability just to work at online resolution from the beginning.
00:00.160: Reconforming when we can just do it online from the beginning.
00:00.160: I was cutting I remember I cut T V T V spots for paranormal activity and the cl what the client saw in the offline was the online.
00:00.160: It was the ground was shifting.
00:00.160: and but sometimes we'd have to go out and hire a camera crew and shoot something on film and have to produce it that way.
00:00.160: We've got to have those.
00:00.160: that you could either look at the time code overlay and it would tell you you could just line it up and you go right, all the things would go green, or you'd have a a sync indicator on the clip.
00:00.160: Something like that.
00:00.160: to those faces, because that functionality kind of exists in it it does exist in iPhoto.
00:00.160: That snappiness, it can and you can just really do stuff super quick.
00:00.160: The smart collection to do what you want.
00:00.160: That I used to do in seven, but actually, there's a better way of doing it or a different way of doing it.
00:00.160: And look how it works.
00:00.160: the thumb the thumbnails won't be accurate to that.
00:00.160: Because what oftentimes I'll get when I start a job, I'll get a feature and it's off of a D V D and it's got timecode on it.
00:00.160: And one of the the bugbears is the replace edit, the replace edit at ty the blue replace edit, you know, the one where you could
00:00.160: replace fixed or uh or just it's oh no just do it this way it's easier oh okay fine that's yeah that's right so um yeah learning how to use it properly and getting the
00:00.160: Getting your Larry Jordan and your Ripple training certainly pays off.
00:00.160: Whereas before, if you wanted to do like a really complicated effect in seven, you would just give up because you knew it would take you so long to render it and so long to you'd just end up g getting getting the motion graphics guy to do it.
00:00.160: Whereas now I can I have the confidence I can just try something and if it's crap, I can abandon it.
00:00.160: Us editors are lonely creatures, and it's nice to know there are other people out there that want to talk about this geeky stuff at half past ten on a Saturday night.
00:00.240: You can hear it there.
00:00.240: That's premium beat.
00:00.240: Hey, how's your half-sister doing?
00:00.240: And you can understand why I gave up doing comedy from that.
00:00.240: But we were playing it in the office, and the guy behind me, the producer behind me, is like, who is this guy?
00:00.240: Thank you very much.
00:00.240: a career in film was actually possible, even though no one in my family has ever worked in film.
00:00.240: film school in four hours because it it's it's just I have never in my life experienced pressure
00:00.240: to go to this film school, which which compared to going to on a university sc course was a very expensive course.
00:00.240: in the evenings at the Odeon in Leicester Square as I was watching movies.
00:00.240: that says, Yeah, give give up now because you'll just you know, but because some people do, you know, clearly.
00:00.240: I mean, you could do everything that J.
00:00.240: Okay, so the end so we have this thing in the UK called the knowledge, which is like a phone directory of every single possible person or service.
00:00.240: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:00.240: Acres of footage that were just coming in.
00:00.240: and he was working on a Steambank.
00:00.240: Uh, most of it was like GoPro and DSLR that was still in H.
00:00.240: This is costing me £200 a minute.
00:00.240: but no one would n you could you couldn't get a show a a bi uh a a film, a short film on T V.
00:00.240: I'm um no that was not uh but basically the job I got after the the the T V show was I got a job in a trailer house 'cause I had film skills.
00:00.240: The editors were working on Avid, they just got their Avids, and I sort of said, Well, how did you learn how to use the Avids?
00:00.240: and put it all together on a thirty five mil Steam Beck and we'd mix it old school on these you know the stuff that we now have on a laptop that would take up
00:00.240: I did my wedding speech and someone said, You should do stand-up comedy, that was really funny, and so on.
00:00.240: entered some competitions and did pretty well and I was just playing at the comedy store and and doing well.
00:00.240: two huge rooms in in a in in Soho to mix a trailer.
00:00.240: I don't know.
00:00.240: and do it and it it just to be honest with me it wasn't for me that lifestyle was not for me but I still comedy I'm still every day now I just put jokes on Twitter now I don't I put my jokes on Twitter I don't I don't go and stand in a club and and do them anymore
00:00.240: And not only the writing of the jokes, but also the performance element is very, very similar to editing and pacing and just yes, it's there are there's a lot of crossover.
00:00.240: hyperanalyze things.
00:00.240: I mean, I was having this conversation with somebody the other day, and they asked me, you know, they said, you know, hey, you're really good at telling stories.
00:00.240: A lot of that has to do with the fact that I came from a very large family.
00:00.240: We talk about it a lot at just at lunch around our office.
00:00.240: But the woman who was the mother was always out of town.
00:00.240: But he says, and you know, you're going to have to get condoms.
00:00.240: So he gets in the car and he goes down to the local gas station or pharmacy or whatever.
00:00.240: I don't care yet.
00:00.240: So um it's forever uh it's forever an issue when you're when you're trying to I I I find it one of the to be one of the most frustrating things.
00:00.240: And then I'll give you what you want.
00:00.240: by frame.
00:00.240: on the run all the time.
00:00.240: I can't believe I'm having this conversation.
00:00.240: And then they'd say, Well, why is the back end all different?
00:00.240: not aware of the of the of the implications of the building the building blocks of uh of of these things well it's a brilliant observation and you are right that when you give everybody a remote control to start stop rewind play
00:00.240: But the guy who had produced the internal video was an internal staff guy.
00:00.240: You're crazy.
00:00.240: you know, I'll cut the end, I'll cut the can cut the end first and cut the middle, then I'll just chuck that all away and try something else and and that's it's a really organic and strange it's a creat it's a creative process and uh and so um yeah, it it's
00:00.240: You know, have I've had a producer come in my room and say, Well, you haven't done anything.
00:00.240: I'm always like, what do these two shots look like together?
00:00.240: you know, a producer and a director are at war with each other, or you've got a sales agent and a director who see the movie in a completely different way, and you've got to find a way
00:00.240: criticize Avid because it's not fair 'cause I I never u I never learnt to use Avid properly.
00:00.240: Yeah, and you're yeah, you're a you're a yeah, absolutely.
00:00.240: We couldn't give each other I couldn't say what would happen was we'd get a film on Digibeta and if it was a big movie, they'd say, Right, we need four people, four editors working on this
00:00.240: probably to do with ignorance and lack of training and the IT department not knowing quite know what to do.
00:00.240: And he did this course, and within an hour of being on this tutorial, I was thinking, this is it, this is why we are using Avid.
00:00.240: over the course of the next five or six years, i I got the whole company switched over to File Cut seven.
00:00.240: the whole place switched over and were much more efficient and and and the editors were were happier and uh they could do the ones that wanted to do more themselves could and I could
00:00.240: And yeah, we all know what happened with the launch of Final Cut 10, so I'm not sure I've got much more to add to that whole
00:00.240: traumatic event as it was for some people.
00:00.240: This is insane.
00:00.240: To switch over.
00:00.240: But I couldn't help myself, I bought it anyway, and I double-clicked on the icon, and about five minutes later, it opened up.
00:00.240: I should do that.
00:00.240: The one thing, I mean, this is the good thing coming on this show is I get to ask you questions because I listen to your show all the time and I've been listening to it like a stalker, a weird stalker guy, the last week.
00:00.240: The people that I know at Apple, they're very tight-lipped.
00:00.240: I will say that if you look at the history of what was indeed going on in late 2010
00:00.240: And lowered the purchase price of seven over six because you know, if you're going to bring it, if you're going to bring a bad product to market, don't ask people to pay a premium for it, you know?
00:00.240: And he wanted five different images, and they would drop in on the beat of the music, and then they would I think they flipped over, I can't remember, and then they dropped through the frame.
00:00.240: And then I just open up the subcomps and swap the images around.
00:00.240: It had been too long since an upgrade.
00:00.240: And my iPhone, when it with the first model, the iPhone, if you compare the iPhone now to the first model, it's like, what?
00:00.240: it's going to get better quickly.
00:00.240: And there's two ways you can get the try to get the attention of the best looking girl in school.
00:00.240: a trillion dollars in the bank and and isn't doesn't want a relationship right now.
00:00.240: there were some major, major changes in the way the QuickTime framework was being honored inside of Mavericks.
00:00.240: forty five years old, they're a lawyer at their law firm and they're still driving the same car they were driving in college.
00:00.240: with some of your peers from the past, the ones that are not giving Final Cut 10 a fair shake.
00:00.240: A lot of them a lot of editors aren't interested.
00:00.240: is that then they realize that their workflow has improved.
00:00.240: I had an occasion several years ago, and I may have told this story before, but I was working at a place in San Francisco.
00:00.240: And they wanted somebody who knew it, the system inside and out.
00:00.240: and put some maybe some music, just have a polish to the movie.
00:00.240: I'm on a you know an iMac with some drive and it's just like I'm sitting thinking, my God, I'm doing all everything right through now to even down to the making the DCP, the the entire process to the point where you're giving it
00:00.240: to the projection room.
00:00.240: So James, I'm going to come to our last question.
00:00.240: the automated keyframes.
00:00.240: And then, but then you want to know, then you then you want to go back and put, oh, actually, I do want to put that line back where it was.
00:00.240: editing is cheating and they're and you're right.
00:00.240: that's always spend most of your time recreate or building up something someone hasn't said purely for expeditious reasons to or
00:00.240: for making them, as you said, take say something that took them thirty seconds and swink shinking it down to five seconds.
00:00.240: Yeah, interesting one.
00:00.240: And I really wanted to just proxy the red footage.
00:00.240: Very simply, dialogue music effects.
00:00.240: it would it would recognize dialogue is playing at the same time as music or effects.
00:00.240: Replaced.
00:00.240: And when it senses something coming into that audio that's patched into the side chain, it will do what you have programmed it to do.
00:00.240: Yeah, yeah, sure.
00:00.240: That favourite comes from.
00:00.240: And so in 7 you'd go right in out, subclip, and you could immediately it would immediately go into edit mode.
00:00.240: Whereas in in 10 you have to stop, double click on the favorite to start typing in and then off you go and then when you when you when you say right show me all the favorites you then have to go through every single clip
00:00.240: as you've ended up not talking about FileCut ten very much, I would like to in a rather ham fisted way get in all the things I wanted to say.
00:00.240: Because what I know I'll do later on is I'll add the clean dialogue onto that multicam clip, and I'll add the clean effects onto another angle.
00:00.240: Oh my god, who is this amateur?
00:00.240: So once I've and then what I'll do when I get either the entire feature in ProResHQ, I can then just replace it in the in the main video channel of the multicam clip, and it's immediately conformed.
00:00.240: That's one I really like.
00:00.240: one thing that was a complete mystery to me in seven was all the audio plugins.
00:00.240: trying stuff because you know you won't waste so much time rendering or just the performance of the machine and the software isn't an inhibitor to trying out something and taking a risk.
00:00.240: All right.
00:00.240: One of the hardest conversations is trying to persuade someone else something's funny.
00:00.240: So I'm going to have James back because I just I really enjoyed the con just the editorial conversation.
00:00.240: You have the bitch and paste attributes window now.
00:00.240: I might want to just copy, like, say, the vignette from one to another, from one clip to another.
00:00.240: But it's really great because those comments help other people find the show.
00:00.240: Anyway, thanks for listening.
00:00.240: Individual, it would be great to be able to remove individual audio filters just like I can paste individual audio filters.
00:00.320: And I love comedy.
00:00.320: Yeah, let's go this way.
00:00.320: And a very interesting thing came about that was very serendipitous.
00:00.320: Comedy, and I just I think you'll I think you'll enjoy it.
00:00.320: And I've been trying to find the right cut of music, and I really wanted to cut to this.
00:00.320: Well, you're going to have to give it a shot.
00:00.320: and also um how uh there are all these courses now that people can take and and learn things properly and they take a course in in you know in coding and and in and in and just you know digital imaging and all that sort of stuff.
00:00.320: And then from doing that I ended up from I I I got to edit stuff.
00:00.320: Go to this course, which is a two-year course, which is all practical, all filmmaking, all on film.
00:00.320: is the behind the scenes footage that's on the the Blu-ray for the JJ Abrams
00:00.320: Yeah, and the stories that are portrayed in that about him as a kid and his friends as kids, it's it's like it this is the blueprint for how to possibly
00:00.320: Yeah.
00:00.320: a first and two thir two second assistants.
00:00.320: Yeah, no, so okay, so then you're you're touching on my next question.
00:00.320: And so that kind of the fact I'd done that gave them the confidence to let me cut a trailer and move away from doing post-production of trailers to actually edit them.
00:00.320: Because in writing a joke, oftentimes it's all about chewing out the fat.
00:00.320: you know, there's so many other elements that that come into play.
00:00.320: He was a guardian.
00:00.320: Buying a condom.
00:00.320: And he, um the kid gets out of the car, and as he's getting out of the car, Paul says to him, He goes, Hey
00:00.320: Do you know what size to get?
00:00.320: you know, so much so many people seem to be trying to get into File Cut 10 and aren't bothering to learn how to use it.
00:00.320: You know, cutting a piece.
00:00.320: Get a tutorial.
00:00.320: Don't start cutting something.
00:00.320: And, you know, they're always right, so they're going to get what they want.
00:00.320: Yeah, this is a really good question.
00:00.320: Is back in the day when a client saw a trailer, they saw it in a cinema and they watched it two or three times.
00:00.320: But they don't realize that that shot is part of a a quartet of shots that is a piece like taking the middle brick out of a bridge.
00:00.320: And you can see this guy's got a bit of a strange expression on his face.
00:00.320: Yeah.
00:00.320: How do I do?
00:00.320: to satisfy both of them in a way that they're going to want to work with you again.
00:00.320: Good choice.
00:00.320: And so we'd all have to digitize the film in and so we couldn't just for some reason we had different Advid systems, we couldn't swap them.
00:00.320: And also there was things like I wanted to do more myself.
00:00.320: They r they obviously rushed the release.
00:00.320: So there's been all sorts of wailing and gnashing of teeth about that, but no one's ever said why they did that or what made them decide to launch it in that state at that time.
00:00.320: There's times when I've asked.
00:00.320: at the versioning of Final Cut Classic between four, four point five, which was HD five, six and seven, and you look at the transition between
00:00.320: So why would I put a bunch why would I apply a bunch of keyframes to an actual JPEG image that I'm going to have to swap out?
00:00.320: And that's what they have to do.
00:00.320: or criticize her and be aggressive towards her and hope that she comes running after you and uh and that's what these uh some people seem to do.
00:00.320: Taken the leap and they've dumped Filecat 7 because it's so much old code and they've rewritten it from the ground up.
00:00.320: And I don't know whether is that true or why and why is that?
00:00.320: Yeah.
00:00.320: Backwards compatible.
00:00.320: Does not serve the future well.
00:00.320: Whole divisions were dismantled and pushing people over here.
00:00.320: that you like to show them that you think may actually sway their opinion or change their mind?
00:00.320: kind of just happy to sail along with the status quo.
00:00.320: No, it's interesting.
00:00.320: And you know, and every penny counts.
00:00.320: or you know, it all that time is dead time.
00:00.320: Editing in it, the first client to cut in it is somebody that had worked with me a lot.
00:00.320: Yeah.
00:00.320: And so it was changing rapidly.
00:00.320: And so we very quickly just pull that apart.
00:00.320: analyze and interview and and transcode and translate all the uh the the the text.
00:00.320: Yeah, exactly.
00:00.320: At one point the owner came in and he's like, Boy, your your your system's really lagging and I go, Yeah, you know, it's making a bunch of proxies in the background.
00:00.320: So if there's a piece if there's a clip of media that's got that's playing at the same time as effects and music, then I want the effects and music to be this dB quieter.
00:00.320: raise the dialogue to a certain dB.
00:00.320: I just say, you know, just do it.
00:00.320: accept a side chain file or track.
00:00.320: But no, but yeah, other than that, I think it's just you know, so um it you look for features and then you suddenly realize, hang on, I've fallen into the trap of trying to do something
00:00.320: I'm there's one other thing actually, because if I'm working on a trailer, I've got my I've got in my bin, I've got one clip and it's an hour and forty minutes long.
00:00.320: will be a um that'll be a keyword each actor.
00:00.320: But then if you go and do just show favorites, you know the option where you can just just show favorites, what it does is it shows it doesn't show you the favorite that you've labeled, it doesn't show you the green triangle, it shows you the file
00:00.320: open up the disclosure triangle to show what the favourite is.
00:00.320: Just the favorites, that's all I want to see.
00:00.320: Yeah, sure.
00:00.320: Yeah, but the only way you can turn them off is in the lozenger mode, and the lozenger mode only will not allow you to to allow to adjust the clip the height.
00:00.320: to have all those thumbnails.
00:00.320: or the finished picture.
00:00.320: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
00:00.320: So that's the way I use Modicam clips for when I'm cutting a trailer, which is something I never would have done in 7 and it's a totally new sort of workflow.
00:00.320: and I can I'm now using compressors properly and EQing it properly because I've learnt how to do it and it's a pleasure to do because you're seeing it in
00:00.320: Completely agree.
00:00.400: You know, editing in many ways is like comedy because it's very much based on timing.
00:00.400: the grain with what he initially said they wanted.
00:00.400: But they're not going to let you slip.
00:00.400: And it it was um for a guy who used to be the assistant uh I can't remember the editor's name, he edited um
00:00.400: Let me think, what was the number?
00:00.400: If you wanted to make a short film, you'd write the film, try and get it made, and it would take you a year, whatever, or however long it would take, and it would cost you a lot of money.
00:00.400: Comedy.
00:00.400: For whoever bring them into the conversation, we'll do a surprise guest.
00:00.400: You have a tutorial uh personality about you.
00:00.400: I've sort of helped to sort of train people at my where I used to work in and a lot of people would come in as a runner or work in the machine room and they would end up editing
00:00.400: And I don't know, you sort of say to them, you know, you'd use analogies like, it's a bit like cooking, you know, you've got to get all your ingredients together, then you put it, then you, then you, it's a bit like, you know, get everything prepared and then put it in, then start cutting it.
00:00.400: Oh, I all oh, I do I don't do enough of my own stuff.
00:00.400: And it's sort of one pixel thin, but it only goes halfway across the bottom of the screen.
00:00.400: Right.
00:00.400: Well, there's I mean people I don't think enough people realize that the part of the real art of editing is when you're facing away from the computer, when you're when you've got your back to the computer and you're having to deal with the
00:00.400: The UN, head of the UN, or whatever.
00:00.400: six and seven and the things that were different, very, very little.
00:00.400: it becomes faster when it comes to your changes and iterations.
00:00.400: Right.
00:00.400: The framework, if you will, of the pre-comps, I knew he was going to change it, and he did.
00:00.400: more flexible and more programmable, more extensible eventually when they opened up that stuff.
00:00.400: to if they felt like they were rushing out, they already pissed everybody off.
00:00.400: You know, I don't see the guys at Apple making very many dumb mistakes.
00:00.400: And the other thing, the other question that I've always wanted to get clarification on, I think I've heard you say it, is people say that people have said, okay, Filecut Apple have
00:00.400: when you look at how when you export a a time line from Premiere, you're basically going through the Adobe Media Encoder engine.
00:00.400: Right.
00:00.400: To doing what they did, they said, Well, Avid and Premier will have to do the same thing.
00:00.400: I've heard people say this, is that and it is my estimation that Apple is the largest little startup in the world
00:00.400: acts and put them all together, that ends up to be a lot of money.
00:00.400: G three, G four Max, I think they were.
00:00.400: Wow.
00:00.400: functions, but I would just love a little bit of smoother performance, just a bit of you know just snappy.
00:00.400: Here's my compressor, which also has a gain element to it.
00:00.400: So I have to go through that and put in favorites and keywords and all that sort of thing.
00:00.400: put it into resolve and put it into 10 and then I went through a whole extraordinary post-production
00:00.400: it's easier to find great awesome sponsors that want to support what we're doing so we can keep doing this.
00:00.480: And I tell you, I've been working on this piece for a big car company, and I want to tell you about a feature of Premium Beats.
00:00.480: And I want I'm I'm asking you, just friend to friend, go check it out.
00:00.480: Hello, hello.
00:00.480: So but uh she has no legs.
00:00.480: Yeah, well, it's interesting for me listening to many of your guests because a lot of them, you know, A, it makes me feel, sort of, makes me realize how old I am.
00:00.480: You learn to look for the shot before the you need to go and look for the shot as opposed to just let the shot happen and just you learn so much.
00:00.480: I wrote my student film in the back of the stalls with a torch.
00:00.480: and I got three I got lots of replies, lots of thanks but no thanks.
00:00.480: And some of the people that were still in the knowledge book were actually deceived.
00:00.480: So, um, okay, interesting question now, and uh I alluded to this in the intro of the show.
00:00.480: Yeah, exactly.
00:00.480: He has people in the palm of his hands when he tells this one story about a kid that he was he had been gi when he was
00:00.480: I think I'm gonna have sex with my girlfriend.
00:00.480: But no sequences.
00:00.480: And so I looked in, I said, look, yeah, I want to look into this software.
00:00.480: So but this I mean, I've heard you say two things on the show.
00:00.480: in early 2011.
00:00.480: That there's various ways that you can work, and like a good animator, and I can speak of this from experience about how I create something, say, in After Effects.
00:00.480: there was a transition in it where he wanted five frames to drop down in a sixteen by nine aspect ratios those long skinny panels actually.
00:00.480: And if you go back, I don't know how much you've I know you said you've been stalking me recently, freaking me out.
00:00.480: You know, they pissed us all off.
00:00.480: you know, account for any sort of major change, but I will say that I know that programmers hate it when Apple changes
00:00.480: You probably need a new car.
00:00.480: They won't look online, they won't read online.
00:00.480: if anything tedious, they've got some assistant that will do it for them and they'll work till eleven.
00:00.480: if they've if people want to take an interest, then um then yeah, I've they've I mean basically what happened was when I switch people when I switch people
00:00.480: Really?
00:00.480: And they had five um avid rooms on on old, like, you know
00:00.480: There was no online process.
00:00.480: And they liked the trailer and they said, Oh, can you have a look at the film for me?
00:00.480: The online process then was getting their eggs out and it's just mind-boggling about the time it would take.
00:00.480: The role that is dialogue and feed that into my game control.
00:00.480: Then you have that's that's that is essentially programming.
00:00.480: a grasp of logic, which unfortunately is sadly lacking in some people.
00:00.480: And I can also scroll down.
00:00.560: was to a pre we'll call it a previous career of his where he was a stand up comedian
00:00.560: many times is that this business is not for the fainted heart of heart.
00:00.560: I think one of the best looks at what it takes to be a filmmaker that I've seen in recent history
00:00.560: Yeah, I mean, it's definitely a tough career.
00:00.560: You're a diplomat most of the time, I think.
00:00.560: And got and got farka ten mine, and I work on that and have done ever since.
00:00.560: Upgrade and enhance quickly.
00:00.560: That you put the image inside of.
00:00.560: Powerful editor that was going to grow and change.
00:00.560: a broadcast capable device on that month of in that July of twenty eleven.
00:00.560: People have said that whether that's accurate, whether Avid and Premier will have to do a similar thing, whether they'll have to do it quite so radically, I don't know, but whether they'll have to sus they're all they're both delaying the inevitable of having to
00:00.560: And in a lot of ways, Apple internally kind of runs like a startup.
00:00.560: is not going to bother you because it's all going to be done by your assistant.
00:00.560: I just looked at him, I go, Really?
00:00.560: Your own feature.
00:00.560: everyone's face and say, right, these people are in this shot and they're not in that shot.
00:00.560: To use the proxy workflow.
00:00.560: If there's no dialogue, then bring the effects up.
00:00.560: It's a totally different experience than putting it in front of old guys like us.
00:00.560: keyword, that would be a keyword, whereas the favorites would be key lines of dialogue.
00:00.560: Oh god, on the timeline, when you've got a picture on the timeline, a little uh what are they called?
00:00.560: The little weekly podcast they do, the what they call the MacBreak Studio.
00:00.560: when I see the show rise up in the in the list of other nameless podcasts that I really don't care about.
00:00.640: What was it?
00:00.640: Was kind of like the heyday of your stand-up career?
00:00.640: In your own experience, how did editing affect your stand up routines?
00:00.640: In the conversation around the dinner table, you had to grab people's attention.
00:00.640: What you would say about writing or what was the original question?
00:00.640: I don't think they money think in those terms.
00:00.640: We had it was kind of a weird thing.
00:00.640: being an editor and sitting in a suite with a client.
00:00.640: I don't want them to think I'm trying to figure out when you know the iPhone X is coming out or whatever.
00:00.640: And I think that there may have been some pressure from Final Cut Premiere Pro CS5
00:00.640: from one chip to another chip and then from you know, I know that I've spoken with programmers about Mavericks and now, of course, Yosemite.
00:00.640: In icon mode, what's that?
00:00.640: Of the thing.
00:00.720: And then and then so I my first so I did I did that and I I did I did well, I got a gr I did good radu good graduation film and that got put around to festivals and stuff.
00:00.720: We'd get into the situation where I'd get because I would be the editor and I'd be separated from the client by the producer.
00:00.720: It didn't happen over nine months or 12 months.
00:00.720: Oh wait, put the image in number two over in number five and bring put it number five and put in number three and put number three back where number two is.
00:00.720: They don't they talk to mere humans.
00:00.720: I sold my Apple stock.
00:00.720: And I said, Oh, you're right.
00:00.720: And so they built their first Final Cut Suite.
00:00.720: And they somebody comes in from accounting and they said, so how much of this time was online and how much of it was offline?
00:00.720: And they left.
00:00.720: But if you could sneak into the back door at Apple and talk to the programmers and get them to make the, you know, the
00:00.720: Okay.
00:00.720: You would put those all in an audition, so you've got all those shots in one place and go and you can choose different ones.
00:00.720: And what you'll have is you'll have multiple clips, multiple icons that have the same file name because it comes from the same file, it's just a different region of it.
00:00.720: And that way you save all your framing, all your keyframes, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
00:00.720: Just you know, don't worry about it.
00:00.720: Great keeping it.
00:00.800: You know, oh, you got it.
00:00.800: No arms, no legs?
00:00.800: Oh, the car's broken!
00:00.800: Was as an assistant to the first assistant.
00:00.800: a quad quad quadruple it or whatever of shots, it's telling one story.
00:00.800: And then some I think some people some people want to know how they want an update on the trailer on a day-by-day basis.
00:00.800: library and you say generate proxies and basically you've just done a giant batch process.
00:00.800: Michael Matzdorf, which came out, it will come out tomorrow.
00:00.800: Oh, Jesus, what's it called?
00:00.800: Adventure Finnetina Watoff and hauling my iMac around London and stuff and definitely want to hear that at another point.
00:00.880: But anyway, I'm convinced you're going to like this.
00:00.880: People like me don't do stand-up comedy.
00:00.880: You're going to have to know.
00:00.880: For an externally facing project for a manufacturer.
00:00.880: The manuals that came with it were impenetrable.
00:00.880: And but I didn't.
00:00.880: I just wonder whether they thought something was happening with their rivals, that they thought if we don't launch it now, we're not going to get anyone back.
00:00.880: File Cut 7.
00:00.880: Yeah, and they should work.
00:00.880: they'd use online and they'd say use like anamorphic.
00:00.880: And he talked a lot about that, that a lot of times people sit down in Fan of Chaten and they go, Where is the button that is exactly the same button that was in my abs yesterday?
00:00.880: Right.
00:00.880: That's another way of looking at it.
00:00.880: You know, like you hover over and you go, come on, come on, come on, pop up.
00:00.880: In the plug-in.
00:00.960: Do, do, do, do, do.
00:00.960: It's an honor to be here.
00:00.960: Midnight Cowboy.
00:00.960: People are just chucking stuff up and it's not you know, it's not quite ready or it's not quite there.
00:00.960: But the deal that the producer had made was that we can use shots from the piece.
00:00.960: might be completely useless because it is packaged with the shots previous and after it, and those the sum of those three or four, you called it a a
00:00.960: An entirely new framework that would give them the opportunity to
00:00.960: You know?
00:00.960: In in every literally the entire workplace, something that will cost tens of thousands of pounds five or six years ago.
00:00.960: That's got to be coming, obviously.
00:00.960: Yeah, you do it quick and then you sit back and have a cup of tea and then go back and have a sleep and then oh it's rendered in the next morning.
00:00.960: That would not be a so that would almost be like a it would do a rough mix for you as you did it.
00:00.960: Yeah, sure.
00:01.040: I'm not going to dra bother playing it for you here, but um, because I want you to go to the website.
00:01.040: I'm not a s student of it, although I think some people may think that I am, just because I tend to
00:01.040: He was the guardian for this kid.
00:01.040: I don't think so.
00:01.040: And they'll go, Well, you just just do it, just do it.
00:01.040: What do I do?
00:01.040: I think that in their mind they were bringing out a 1.
00:01.040: So Premiere's kind of done it, and Premiere is built on this framework.
00:01.040: So, do you just avoid the topic then?
00:01.040: I mean, one of the things we do a lot is you'll get a sixty second T V spot with split audio, and you have to cut that down into a thirty or a twenty.
00:01.040: I remember Bill doing that when they first sat down in front of Firecut 7 and compared it to Avan.
00:01.120: Highly likely is even too nice of a way of saying it, but you're probably not going to achieve the dream that you thought you had.
00:01.120: Yeah, surprise guest.
00:01.120: And actually, I was still talking about in general editing, but what kind of advice do you give people that you draw upon from the standup world?
00:01.120: But no, most of the stuff I do is client-based, but I'm sort of lucky that most of it comes back and they don't seem to have a great deal of comments.
00:01.120: Well, back to when I was at the agency, we were all avid.
00:01.120: But it's going to play.
00:01.120: So they went out and they bought every single book they could find about writing a screenplay.
00:01.120: Yeah, but I don't know whether this other idea I had was whether this exists in audio software.
00:01.120: It's an interesting point, actually, because I think some of the features in Filecut as it is are you have to have a kind of a programmer's mindset.
00:01.120: I use that all the time in 7 for reconforming I use it all the time, but I find it to be sluggish.
00:01.120: Which copies the clip and all of its attributes.
00:01.200: 8mm film?
00:01.200: Okay, well, you're going to have to delay the decision then.
00:01.200: Or are they going to miss the boat?
00:01.200: And so all that stuff is very intrinsically tied together.
00:01.280: How did you get to where you are today?
00:01.280: And so there was shooting on an oil rig in Scotland, and then they would come back to London and do the studio stuff.
00:01.280: You're spoiling the lead you know, you're burying the lead, whatever.
00:01.280: Yeah, there's an Apple announcement today.
00:01.280: So there's two ways to do that.
00:01.280: I mean, there's again like uh s a wor sound recognition, like a sound bytes type um functionality.
00:01.280: Okay.
00:01.280: Chris, thank you so much for having me on and absolutely.
00:01.280: All right, James.
00:01.360: And it was just, we were overwhelmed with footage.
00:01.360: So he goes to the next gas.
00:01.360: So, so my put my, I went and some people just go on stage and just try some jokes.
00:01.360: When you're trying to craft something and set up for that payoff, and people are like, Yeah, I need to get to that sooner.
00:01.360: And the trouble is they're not looking at it as a piece.
00:01.360: I mean it it does it doesn't matter, it's just interesting.
00:01.360: That's what I heard.
00:01.360: That's the deal breaker, is it?
00:01.360: copy some of the things your previous guests have said, things like an audio mixing, the wonderful audio mixing facility you have in Seven, where you can just slide up the thing and you get the
00:01.360: The data was from all over the place.
00:01.360: And so with some processing devices, you can insert a side chain.
00:01.360: Oh, right, okay, off you go.
00:01.440: They can now stop it and look at it frame by frame.
00:01.440: Right, I'm going to do it.
00:01.440: Everyone just calmed down.
00:01.440: And they you know, they said you know, they brought me in to work with this client.
00:01.440: So whether they I don't know, they don't seem they seem to be digging their heels on that.
00:01.520: Now then you wake up again and go!
00:01.520: I'm going to do this briefly.
00:01.520: So the kid comes to him one night and he goes, Hey, um, you know, I think I'm gonna
00:01.520: And it's not always for laughs.
00:01.520: There's a smart way to work and there's a fast way to work.
00:01.520: That's right.
00:01.520: And also at some point in the future, but not when I start editing, I'll get this clean audio.
00:01.600: But that's like, you know, that's sort of gag gag-based writing, but there are so many other people like there's so many different styles and so many different element character comes into it and
00:01.600: Yeah, they will do that.
00:01.600: And about an hour later, somebody came in and they're like, What the hell?
00:01.680: I was syncing up rushes on a PickSync and it was all you know, that was this was this was this was around this was 93, 94, so Lightworks and Avids were just coming around
00:01.680: But I'm always looking at a routine and looking at the callbacks and the references and how the pacing and the timing and the setup.
00:01.680: In the end, just carried on, just carry just carried on using seven.
00:01.680: And that's probably why they are tight lipped, because if you spend all your time having to answer queer people's questions and people people are constantly bothering, why did you do this?
00:01.680: Fuck you, Apple.
00:01.680: Because in 7, the mode I always used was when you just had a shot and you had one thumbnail to show you what the shot was, and then you'd have the text next to it.
00:01.680: So hey, James, uh I gotta run.
00:01.760: The upper circle at the Odeon Leicester Square.
00:01.760: J.
00:01.760: I think it was like 79 gigabytes of media.
00:01.760: So the kid goes in and he could see the conversation between the guy behind the counter and he's like holding up his hands.
00:01.760: It was all the whole process.
00:01.760: Now I suppose that's one way of doing it.
00:01.760: But I don't know, coming back from my brings me to the topic of what are they called?
00:01.840: At this point, I want to go to our interview with Jane Branch from.
00:01.840: I d I went to a um well, way, way, way back, before even before then, I was uh I did courses in you know VHS at my local art center when I I suddenly realized that
00:01.840: When you're explaining them like either you're explaining somebody to somebody else how to edit or you have those conversations with clients.
00:01.840: Don't fine-cut.
00:01.840: I can't think of the last.
00:01.840: It would almost add a compressor itself.
00:01.840: And in order to reveal what the favourite is, you have to click the disclosure triangle, and then you get the green star with the thing that you've done.
00:01.840: I don't want to see which file the favorite is in.
00:01.840: I've got to do that.
00:01.840: And also, it's one of the things that it's actually made me more creative because it's so fast, and you can do things really easily with the effects, is now
00:01.920: Can I just share something with you?
00:01.920: Is that what it was?
00:01.920: Abrams did, and you, you know, you're in the wrong coffee shop on the wrong day, or not in the right coffee shop on that day.
00:01.920: It's just I can't think with client conversations, it's usually they usually don't ask those sort of questions, they also have sort of bizarre things and sort of they're not
00:01.920: And that's what it did.
00:01.920: It was done.
00:01.920: And it's like sitting back thinking and from someone that comes from, you know, working on 16 mil and knowing that the
00:01.920: I love it.
00:01.920: Take care.
00:01.920: Do go to the iTunes, and we'll be back on Monday with another episode of The Grill.
00:02.000: The guys that do it all the time, they need a good pat on the back because it is hard.
00:02.000: So I got a copy of the knowledge and I wrote a letter to every single editor in that book.
00:02.000: Yeah, subtlety.
00:02.000: In fact, sometimes when I walked into an edit suite and there'd be a new guy, I'd judge him on whether he had thumbnail view opened in his browser.
00:02.080: I love the world of comedy.
00:02.080: I will apologize that this episode, yeah, we talk about Final Caten a little bit, but we talk a lot about the science of editing and we talk a lot about
00:02.080: I did finish film school.
00:02.080: Boom, da-da-doom, done, finished.
00:02.080: And so it was a bit like Pixar, wasn't it?
00:02.080: She said, Yeah.
00:02.080: But I'd like us very simply, I'd like remove attributes.
00:02.080: Well in seven it was a lot of Larry Jordan stuff, Larry Jordan, the Obi Wan Kenobi of File Cut.
00:02.160: He's like, what?
00:02.160: What the fuck, Willy Wonka?
00:02.160: They just don't not interested.
00:02.160: I said, I can't label, I can't make the tracks the colours that I like.
00:02.160: Again, it's all down to making sure people are trained up and know what they're talking about because I'd work with people who just didn't know the words.
00:02.160: Don't be so lazy.
00:02.160: So I just like it.
00:02.240: Well, it's an artifact of QuickTime encoding.
00:02.240: Here's the trailer on this piece of paper.
00:02.240: And I think that Apple is realizing that that sort of legacy, you know, respecting of the legacy like that
00:02.240: But I think a lot of them here's an example.
00:02.320: You know, this is a favorite, and I'm going to and I want to use this kind of music.
00:02.320: She's fine.
00:02.320: Because you wanted that line at the front, and now that whole bit doesn't make sense, so we have to redo that and just not.
00:02.320: And then it just comes and then bang and you've done it.
00:02.320: So it was a bad move.
00:02.320: You could open up and I think even today, you could open up a QuickTime One file that was made in the early nineties.
00:02.320: They might hear stuff occasionally from other editors or that's how they'll get their information.
00:02.320: If this is that and that is that, do this.
00:02.400: So, anyway, I had saved this song in the premium beat favorites section.
00:02.400: Is that what it's called?
00:02.400: He's like, oh, really?
00:02.400: You're really flooring me with these questions of yours.
00:02.400: Yeah, that's a good one, too.
00:02.400: They released it.
00:02.400: Well, to be fair, Premiere already did it.
00:02.400: If you could sneak in the back door at Apple and talk to the programmers.
00:02.400: And the other one is: I don't know whether it would be useful or not, would be face recognition, whether you could it would go through and say, right, this person's in that scene, this but these two people are in that scene, and you could assign character names.
00:02.480: No, no.
00:02.480: James, it might be a good idea if you remember the first guy who gave you a job.
00:02.480: I just cut a two and a half minute piece for a client and they brought me um
00:02.480: I mean, the whole sort of creative process was much quicker and leaner with stand-up because it was so you know, there wasn't so much less involved.
00:02.480: I look I I end up doing a course in st my typically tutorial based attitude to life.
00:02.480: But now you've got to go through it's it's important.
00:02.480: Oh, Ko-fi 09?
00:02.480: No, but if you go back to like the summer of twenty ten, I was a huge fan of Premiere at the time, telling people we should go to Premiere, people.
00:02.480: I mean, you and me and many people that listen to the show and are editing geeks and we know what's going on, we know when new products come out, but a lot of editors that I work with know
00:02.480: So, did you have to work late last night?
00:02.480: So if you can get a bit of software or improve your workflow to an extent where you so hang on a minute, to make this MPEG for a client, it's gonna it's cost you fifty quid to keep this girl in the building.
00:02.480: You're always that well maybe some people at Apple think that every single piece of dialogue is in sync and why would you want to take it out of sync and why would you want to
00:02.480: It's gone out of my brain.
00:02.560: Oh god!
00:02.560: I just got a massive right arm from spinning the pit sink, yeah, ferocious paste and rubber numbering and all that sort of stuff.
00:02.560: Whereas if you're just a gagman, like do you do one liners, then that's more that that's more 140 characters at a time.
00:02.560: I think they just they have something that bothers them they're bringing with them into the meeting that it's got nothing to do with what you've done.
00:02.560: I don't know why they decided to launch it at that time, which was obviously a rushed launch.
00:02.560: Oh my god, what have we done?
00:02.560: I've got to get off the mouse.
00:02.640: On this second series, they had an editor, a first and me.
00:02.640: Don't begin.
00:02.640: You have to spend I'd have to spend I'd finish my cut at 11 a.
00:02.640: Has FileCut 7 stopped working?
00:02.640: So I go in and I and I do the edit.
00:02.640: And now we're at the situation where, you know, in my room, I am recently I did a trailer for a film.
00:02.640: All the best.
00:02.640: Bring back remove attributes.
00:02.720: But there are some people that that do comedy and they gabble and they yabber on and they and that's part of the what makes them funny.
00:02.720: What do you want to do?
00:02.720: You're crazy.
00:02.720: Yeah.
00:02.720: I think they were G fours.
00:02.720: Let's say I've got a shot and it's got a line of dialogue from the rough mix.
00:02.800: This is episode 084 with James Branch.
00:02.800: Subtlety tends to go out the window when you're doing these things.
00:02.800: All the graphics were done.
00:02.800: All the effects are put somewhere else, the dialogues recut and put onto someone else's thing.
00:02.800: But it's been great, and thank you for doing the the show.
00:02.880: No, but it's one of those things where you're literally having nightmares the night before you're having like nightmares or you double night double nightmares, like American Werewolf in London nightmares, where it's like you wake up and you're like, I'm.
00:02.880: No, he's not so he's not working anymore.
00:02.880: Right.
00:02.880: I was just getting frustrated.
00:02.880: No, no, I know, I know.
00:02.880: I think some people just don't get that.
00:02.880: But yeah, I mean, I don't I mean I don't have that man.
00:02.880: And if I can put all those you know, the shots you have with when you put a cast name on, sort of the the shots they turn and look at the camera.
00:02.960: I actually I actually produced my student film from the phone in the lobby of the
00:02.960: So that was a big thing.
00:02.960: So I went, Yeah, okay.
00:02.960: And I was a little disappointed by it because this was the piece I told you about.
00:03.040: No, it's like uh I have a half sister.
00:03.040: And then from being at the Arts Centre I did some short films and then I found out about a guy this is it this is in the West Country
00:03.040: Oh, no, further.
00:03.040: Well, what percentage of the work that you do is for clients and what percentage is your own creation?
00:03.040: Yeah.
00:03.040: And it's just it's just that's one of the reasons why I got so interested in persuading people to switch over to seven.
00:03.040: Do your damn job.
00:03.040: You know what I mean?
00:03.040: I just like that all those thumbnails must be taking up time, taking up performance.
00:03.120: Oh, here it is.
00:03.120: Oh, Ryven.
00:03.120: I'm going to spoil it for everybody.
00:03.120: Don't start by fine-cutting.
00:03.120: I can't believe it.
00:03.120: And they won't get into an argument over our Premier's better or Avit's better.
00:03.120: Is it not a conversation?
00:03.120: And you and they say you don't really know what these things actually mean, but they knew they had to say them and they had to budget for them.
00:03.120: And whether, whereas with 10, you've got all this ambition.
00:03.120: There was some Red Epic stuff.
00:03.120: And that's the other thing is it's not a file.
00:03.120: Bye-bye.
00:03.200: Hello.
00:03.200: Okay, fine.
00:03.200: Okay.
00:03.200: I'll go and find a tutorial on that and figure out how to do it and learn how to do it properly.
00:03.200: And I was working on a piece just this last week where
00:03.200: I'm not doing any work today.
00:03.200: And I was a film guy, so it's all this, suddenly it was all this other stuff.
00:03.200: Someone said we got to release it now.
00:03.200: And the seven upgrade was crap, you know, from from six.
00:03.200: And it's like, okay, well, back to work, everyone, on seven, and here we go.
00:03.200: That's the way they get their job done.
00:03.200: They're going to sync it up and sort it out and label it all and put it in a bin with scene seven and you're going to open up that folder saying scene seven, all the shots you need for scene seven, you're going to cut them together.
00:03.280: I was exhausted.
00:03.280: Do you have a fitting room?
00:03.280: It's sometimes it's for emotion.
00:03.280: I've got stuff I've shot that's a two years old.
00:03.280: I said, Well, can we not bring them up and get clarification?
00:03.280: Okay?
00:03.280: Yeah.
00:03.280: They're just quite happy to go in their little dark room and work with what they're working.
00:03.280: It's like, oh God.
00:03.280: He's using thumbnail view in the browser?
00:03.360: And he goes, Yeah, sure, what's that?
00:03.360: But, you know, I always tell people: I go, first, I'm going to give you my opinion
00:03.360: It's it's you know that's the fun bit.
00:03.360: It was probably three to four years in the making, is my guess.
00:03.360: I've never heard that.
00:03.360: But she was she was hype, she was fine, she got paid overtime.
00:03.360: It's difficult to answer this one without making without betraying your own ignorance.
00:03.360: I'd like to have it as text though, that's the only thing rather than the whole.
00:03.440: Well, I understand it's mainly to do with old code, but I don't know whether.
00:03.440: And it wasn't long before I got the guy, Martin Baker, who I did the course with, to come in and give me some one-on-one tuition about how to online in Final Cut 7.
00:03.440: And I hope I didn't I hope I didn't bore you talking about comedy too much.
00:03.440: Yes, it is funny.
00:03.440: Thanks, Chris.
00:03.520: He lived in the guest house of her house.
00:03.520: But I was I the thing that amazed me most about the whole launch of File Cut Ten was just the reaction on social media.
00:03.520: You can either animate the images in, or you animate in precomps
00:03.600: And then, yeah, because it's all, but you learn everything, do you?
00:03.600: So if you don't remember a raptor, don't screw it up.
00:03.600: Oh, right.
00:03.600: And he was only like 21 years old, and the kid was like 15 or 16.
00:03.600: Well, you know, what you should do is you should, you know, fix a nice dinner.
00:03.600: I remember doing a trailer for one client who just literally would ring up and say, there's one frame
00:03.600: Screw you, Willy Wonka.
00:03.600: No, that actually came up a lot in the interview that you have not heard yet, but it was with um uh
00:03.600: I'd like to be able to just have all the favourites, just the green, just not just the green stars.
00:03.600: Mind you, I don't get carpal tunnel syndrome hardly at all now.
00:03.680: She still she still looks no, she has she she knows I do that joke, but she still looks up to me.
00:03.680: So that's what I did and that's where I stayed because I had a creative background I'd written.
00:03.680: I'm about to put it together.
00:03.680: Yeah.
00:03.680: And so it is so much of it has got nothing whatsoever to do with timelines or plugins or you're a politician or a diplomat.
00:03.680: And it's fantastic.
00:03.680: No, it's interesting.
00:03.760: So I did I still maintain that doing a wedding video, shooting a wedding is like
00:03.760: So, you know, Universal Soldier would be playing, and I'd be up there dialing Devon and organizing my shoot.
00:03.760: I've not watched it.
00:03.760: It was a TV show about all set on oil rigs.
00:03.760: No, we got to go.
00:03.760: So I I think that Final Cut 10 was primed, I believe and again, I'm not a programmer, but I think that Final Cut 10 was primed to be
00:03.760: She said, Yeah, I was here at 11.
00:03.760: So you're doing you're in.
00:03.840: No, no.
00:03.840: Well, how long have we got with this show?
00:03.840: So, in what years did you do and uh
00:03.840: So he was given the responsibility of taking care of this kid.
00:03.840: So yes, I have, here's a piece of paper with some writing on it.
00:03.840: I wanted to do more of myself.
00:03.840: And here's the thing about Apple, in my opinion, and yeah, I'm a bit of a fanboy, and yeah, I own a little bit of Apple stock, but
00:03.840: And before I knew it, I had an entire 4K film in my system and I ended up doing the DCP for it
00:03.840: I wonder if there's some way where you could do it would mix as you went, as you edit.
00:03.840: If there's no effects, bring the music up.
00:03.840: But now I got the I got the Ripple Training audio editing in Filecut.
00:03.920: I ended up just like sleepwalking through a year of working at the Odeon in the box office.
00:03.920: I'm still doing it.
00:03.920: We had negotiated the use of some corporate some internally produced corporate footage
00:03.920: Yeah, you know, it is a fascinating business because there are people that can there are no guys who can
00:03.920: The other thing that's really important is to realize that there is a difference between
00:03.920: And and there's times when I've tried to get some information out of them and I just real it's stupid, it's a waste of time.
00:03.920: I just don't believe it.
00:03.920: You know, and you know, it's like somebody who's still, you know, their
00:03.920: We're still doing that game?
00:03.920: I will give dialogue preference.
00:04.000: But I but I cut I cut about eight or ten shots to it and I said, Can you see it now?
00:04.000: James, you're right on top of that thing.
00:04.000: Yeah, I was the yeah, I was the it was um this was the second series of a T V show.
00:04.000: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:04.000: And I didn't know whether that was actually the case or not.
00:04.000: I was using like bad TV effects for the end card and for the copy.
00:04.000: They go, what?
00:04.000: And people just say, What?
00:04.080: He's really good.
00:04.080: It's early yet.
00:04.080: And I'm like, ah, that's it's very much like what you're talking about.
00:04.080: And some of that means, you know, because I know one of the things that I'll do, you know, you say, you know, you might sit around for a couple of hours and think, I'll noodle.
00:04.080: And the guy doing the course is a guy called Martin Baker, who does a really good web uh website called Digital Heaven, which does a lot of fantastic Filecut 7 and does some Filecut 10 plug-ins.
00:04.080: I can help you now if you want.
00:04.080: They're just quite happy to go in, do their job, and not really take too much of an interest in the wider industry.
00:04.080: We're recording this on Sunday, is this?
00:04.080: I want to see the name of the favorite.
00:04.080: No, it's not funny.
00:04.080: And those peop and when more people find the show, it's easier.
00:04.160: So he got this was his first job as an editor on a TV show, BBC TV show, all shot on 16mm.
00:04.160: And I had a lot of older brothers.
00:04.160: He said, Oh, yeah.
00:04.160: And whereas people assume it's a linear, pure linear process where you go, you cut, cut, cut, and you just comes out perfect.
00:04.160: And I was looking at that and I went to see it at the Apple store being being demonstrated.
00:04.160: And it takes longer to do the pre-comps, but I know this guy, and I know he was going to change it a dozen times between now and when it was done.
00:04.160: Go market the phone.
00:04.160: But it wouldn't be, it wouldn't be a final mix of people saying that it's done.
00:04.160: I would really like to be able to do that also, to be able to paste attributes of content or at least you know, because the workaround now is you copy the clip
00:04.160: It's very useful, especially when you look at being able to remove
00:04.240: I love the science of comedy.
00:04.240: As a matter of fact, I would you sent me a clip on Vimeo.
00:04.240: Super 8.
00:04.240: You know, do when you paint a picture, you don't do the final colour, or you just do a sketch, and that sort of that's general advice for editors, but
00:04.240: I can't honestly think of the last time I'm going to be able to do that.
00:04.240: And then I waited and waited and waited for the new IMAX to come out.
00:04.240: Okay, and if you've ever spoken with programmers, you'll understand.
00:04.240: And I don't know how much how much of your time have you had wasted by sitting watching a render bar or waiting something to play out?
00:04.240: So it would almost almost do a rough mix as you're editing.
00:04.240: Then you bring in the new shot and then you select it and you paste attributes at that onto the new shot.
00:04.320: Yeah, a lot of people have, and if they were trying to do that, I don't believe that Apple thought that they were rushing.
00:04.320: 0 release on an entirely new platform.
00:04.320: No, absolutely.
00:04.320: It's either praise her to the skies and try to get her attention, or
00:04.320: Yeah.
00:04.320: Apple's fault, yeah.
00:04.320: That's a good point.
00:04.320: Thumbnails.
00:04.320: Whereas in seven, it was just a key, go bang, replace.
00:04.400: Now are you speaking of VHS as in the tape format?
00:04.400: I edited edited a little music video and I ended up finding out about the London International Film School in London, in Soho.
00:04.400: Yeah, they did, yeah, that's what they did.
00:04.400: It's kind of hard to.
00:04.400: So let me ask them just going on Twitter going, What the fuck, Apple?
00:04.480: And I said, just listen to this.
00:04.480: And he said, I said, There's a cut of music I've really been wanting to use.
00:04.480: And it's very difficult.
00:04.480: They said, We didn't have time to learn them, we just had to pick it up as we went along.
00:04.480: This is a lot of people.
00:04.480: And so, I can't do it like that.
00:04.480: Even though I say to them, do you realize that I can do this fifteen times quicker?
00:04.480: So they took over that whole user meet and got rid of everyone else that was presenting and took over that user.
00:04.480: Is it the same made by the same people?
00:04.480: Thank you very much.
00:04.480: You have to go okay, you have to use logic to get
00:04.480: Uh will you come back?
00:04.560: Anyway, but so um I got I think I got three interviews and I got one job.
00:04.560: 264 format.
00:04.560: Yeah, exactly.
00:04.560: And then I'm going to find it.
00:04.560: No, it's still working.
00:04.560: So I'd end up with loads of favorites that come from one file
00:04.640: She's my sister.
00:04.640: It was all post-produced on 16 Mil.
00:04.640: It was very difficult.
00:04.640: Can I really fix the color on this?
00:04.640: So my company said, right, look, you can go on a course.
00:04.640: And I've also heard someone say on your show, I would sacrifice no additional
00:04.640: Right.
00:04.720: And I said, hey, why don't you just come be on the show?
00:04.720: So, anyway, the cut of music is called Red Sky.
00:04.720: And good chance you'll end up buying some music.
00:04.720: It came to the point where it's like, right, you've got to quit your job and go out on the road five, six nights a week.
00:04.720: He goes, Oh, no, not here.
00:04.720: I mean, does it help you in terms of persuading people into a better position?
00:04.720: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:04.720: And the smart way is not necessarily the fastest in the beginning.
00:04.720: No, I think what it is, it's leadership, and leadership is about taking people out of their comfort zone.
00:04.720: How well it works, I don't know, but that whether that would be useful, I don't know.
00:04.720: Oh, sorry, yes, in icon, yes, I know.
00:04.800: They just end up looking at it shot for shot.
00:04.800: I can't believe I'm having this conversation.
00:04.800: It was not his job.
00:04.800: Inside the factory are a bunch of oompa loompas.
00:04.800: So, what were you doing?
00:04.800: It's also very interesting when you put this this program in front of somebody who's under thirty.
00:04.880: And if you don't, by all means, you know, let me know, tweet me or whatever, and say, hey, stop doing that.
00:04.880: And so it's gone completely the other way.
00:04.880: Sometimes it's for joy, glee, a tear.
00:04.880: You have to know that making Final Cut 10 didn't happen over a three-day weekend.
00:04.960: Oh, okay.
00:04.960: And that's how they learned a bit like a tutorial.
00:04.960: I mean, we would obviously, sometimes we would do shoots, we would do, because mainly we would do trailers and we'd be working with the labs.
00:04.960: Where oh, where is it?
00:04.960: But you can't do that.
00:04.960: I knew you were going to ask me that question about what are the features you want.
00:05.040: I think it's called Super 8 or 8 Millimeter.
00:05.040: Thanks.
00:05.040: I know I've heard you say one thing on the show, but there's another thing I don't realize.
00:05.040: It was like, what?
00:05.120: And James sent me some things, and he goes, Hey, you might want to take a look at some of my stuff.
00:05.120: But um it was I did it for about five or six years and then uh children started coming along and I kind of lost interest in it and I never gave up the day job and it was awesome.
00:05.120: The guy I work for Paul, he is a master, master storyteller.
00:05.120: And so he goes like three towns down on the main drag.
00:05.120: Yeah, yeah, yeah, got it.
00:05.120: Wh uh one day I went into my old job and I met the girl who worked in the machine room
00:05.120: So that kind of thing, it would be great.
00:05.120: I will automatically put in a dip in the music and the effects to make the dialogue or I'll automatically automatically
00:05.120: You could type in what the subclip you wanted it to be and you could carry on.
00:05.120: Well, I gotta say, I felt bad there.
00:05.200: I'm only just getting around to cutting it this week so I've got a had a slight sort of breather in the work.
00:05.200: Yeah, Kofi was a while ago.
00:05.200: So, you know, so that's you're up against people who are just
00:05.200: What are you talking about?
00:05.200: And just again, taking risks and just getting persuading people to, you do a cut and you think, I can't show that to the client.
00:05.200: It's brilliant and it's good to know that you know
00:05.280: So James, tell me a little bit about your background.
00:05.280: And if you want to write a good gag, you've got to put the words in the right order to have the impact at the right point.
00:05.280: Could you do that for me?
00:05.280: But anyway, so but no, File Cut 10 came out, and I
00:05.280: I don't know.
00:05.280: They did it nearly fifteen years ago when they got rid of old Premiere and came out with Premiere Pro, which was a PC-only application for a few years.
00:05.280: I don't know enough about Avid to be able to
00:05.280: So that's one little niggle that I have.
00:05.360: Before we get going, before we get to the interview with James, I want to thank Premium Beat.
00:05.360: It's my sister's favorite joke.
00:05.360: No, no, no, no.
00:05.360: Yeah, so and then yeah, wh and then once you've got sometimes just I go back and my the best editing software I've had is a is a pencil and a paper.
00:05.360: So um I started looking around at um at Final Cut.
00:05.360: I said, Go, nothing.
00:05.360: And to put this in time, this would be about two thousand five.
00:05.360: You lazy bastard.
00:05.360: And you should you could be able to patch the dialogue into the compr into the compressor or the EQ or the gain control.
00:05.360: So basically my close-ups of all my actors will be
00:05.360: Thumbnails.
00:05.440: And if you reveal a shot the wrong way or you do it too early, I mean, you spoil the whole story.
00:05.440: She has no legs.
00:05.440: To be able to sit in a suite with a client, you are part editor, part technician, part Maitre D.
00:05.440: That was my reaction when I got it.
00:05.440: I thought you really just started.
00:05.440: Well, you could do it quick, you could do it quick, but it also might have to render.
00:05.440: There was GoPros and HDSLRs and whatnot.
00:05.440: No, so uh but but that would be the feature you'd be looking for, and off the top of my head, I don't know that any of the plug-ins actually
00:05.440: Yeah.
00:05.520: Yeah, no, no, no, this I know this the guy was Brian Oates.
00:05.520: So he goes, yeah, I mean, you know
00:05.520: Just do it.
00:05.520: If you're following my Twitter feed today, it's blue.
00:05.520: I didn't want to rely on more people to get the job done.
00:05.520: And see if you can add some jokes and add some
00:05.520: I don't know whether that's possible, but that's kind of a lot of in the audio world.
00:05.600: It's an hour, isn't it?
00:05.600: You should know that.
00:05.600: So that's a good idea.
00:05.600: It just gets better and better and better.
00:05.600: I think I've heard you say it, and other people say it.
00:05.600: You know, it's a five-day edit.
00:05.600: And we did that maybe once a year, every six months.
00:05.600: Clip icon?
00:05.680: When you learn shot composition, you learn editing.
00:05.680: So that's a lot of media, you know?
00:05.680: And if you wanted to participate.
00:05.680: Yeah, come around the back.
00:05.680: What is this?
00:05.680: Okay?
00:05.680: They don't care.
00:05.680: It's oh God, this is awful But and that's and that's the only real real way you can really get people to understand is once they've tried it and they get good at it.
00:05.680: I do the same thing.
00:05.760: The cinemas weren't showing them anymore.
00:05.760: He had been given the opportunity to.
00:05.760: It's like, well, can't you just, you know, can't you do we have to really spell it out that much?
00:05.760: So I've cut trailers and I've sat and I've done nothing for days.
00:05.760: I don't do it that way at all.
00:05.760: But that's interesting, yeah.
00:05.760: I don't know anything about cell phones.
00:05.760: Oh, then change it and then render it again.
00:05.760: I I'd love to have you come back sometime.
00:05.840: Keep driving.
00:05.840: And it's like, you know, and these were, I think it was people that was probably one of the company that they were doing their first ever trailer.
00:05.840: At the time I had a really old iMac and officially Filecut 10 wouldn't run on this iMac.
00:05.840: Yeah, she doesn't really need anybody.
00:05.840: One the one thing I notice when I go back to seven is it's just
00:05.840: So it does require some of it, sort of, an enthusiastic
00:05.920: I'm absolutely nailing it so far.
00:05.920: You don't know that.
00:05.920: And you're going to
00:05.920: I like the other editors, I was like, I have to pick it up off them.
00:05.920: I have to turn it into a Filecut 7 project so they can do final tweaks.
00:05.920: So I had access to File Cut right
00:05.920: And I don't even try and get information from them.
00:05.920: There may have been some pressure from Premier, but you know, in hindsight.
00:05.920: They said, Well, how do there's a big gym jump between 10 minutes and 90 minutes?
00:05.920: So have you heard about this new Carcotte thing?
00:05.920: You're saying, you know, give me the sum total of
00:05.920: Yeah.
00:06.000: You get one crack at it.
00:06.000: But nevertheless, I got I got a I got funding to go to London and
00:06.000: You know, I've said this all the time
00:06.000: And also, you know, as you say, style and pace and you have to, you know, comedy is timing.
00:06.000: I've written.
00:06.000: You know, except for a handful of people.
00:06.000: They went, oh, this is taking eight.
00:06.000: But okay, we've got roles, okay, so we can uh assign dialogue
00:06.000: And all the all my lines of dialogue that I like, and all my sort of establishing shots of New York would be in one
00:06.000: So I know that at some point I'll have to replace that with the finished clip.
00:06.080: And this was in 1991.
00:06.080: He's like, No, I'm not going to do that for you.
00:06.080: And pulling one of them out separately, you kind of break that story.
00:06.080: I want to see it.
00:06.080: I had to wait until the editor had finished his TV spot so I could make him an MPEG.
00:06.080: The proxy is like an all or nothing.
00:06.080: I see what you mean, yes, icon mode.
00:06.080: Or if it oh, this is working, this is good, it's it's really good.
00:06.160: That was it.
00:06.160: So you get so you've got to have this thing where you're not afraid to educate your client or to
00:06.160: m.
00:06.160: So like I'll give you one example.
00:06.160: How do I put it?
00:06.160: No, hang on.
00:06.240: And and like, for example, you know, you talk about film school.
00:06.240: And then we go, oh, okay.
00:06.240: You would go around to ad agencies and show it to people on VHS.
00:06.240: And then they rang up and said, There's a half a line of pixels at the bottom of the QuickTime.
00:06.240: On a computer?
00:06.240: I should I should probably look into it.
00:06.240: Because Pixar started up and they said, we've only made short films.
00:06.240: One of the first things when I first showed people some editors in the place I worked
00:06.240: And they decided to bring me in, even though I didn't normally work there because they had Avids up until this particular week.
00:06.240: You have to think given all of the technology that they do have that yes.
00:06.320: Now, I sat down with the producer and he told me what he wanted and what they were doing.
00:06.320: I can't remember the latest guy.
00:06.320: The fun bit is where you get to put all the stuff down and everything else is a war going on behind you and you've got to try and be what's his name?
00:06.320: So, and then from a natural progression was when File Cut 10 came out.
00:06.320: Yeah, sure.
00:06.320: And the editor's not interested in learning about how to make an MPEG because he can't be bothered 'cause he knows someone will do it in the machine room.
00:06.320: And it's just gets we rip those things apart.
00:06.320: I see what you're saying.
00:06.320: Yeah.
00:06.400: We'll do this whole thing.
00:06.400: Anyway, I dig Premium Beat.
00:06.400: It's an hour.
00:06.400: They're just going on to Twitter going, What the fuck, Apple?
00:06.400: And one of the things I was sort of wanting to talk about in this is this uh is doing you use uh finding and using tutorials when because so much
00:06.400: He was just one of these HDSLR guys who are like, Oh, look at me, I'm making a movie And he did a good job.
00:06.400: Or you can say, I'm just going to work on the end.
00:06.400: I need to be using Filecat 7.
00:06.400: And I know most, I know
00:06.400: Can you imagine what it must be like being someone working at Apple?
00:06.400: I don't know whether you've heard you.
00:06.400: When the phone came out
00:06.400: I just heard in the early days of people trying to defend Apple's decision.
00:06.400: And I go, You know, it's all online quality.
00:06.400: You're saying have it in just lots of shots, just the actual the shot there.
00:06.400: I don't need all those thumbnails.
00:06.400: I judge people by keyboard shortcuts.
00:06.400: You line up your two paste adjustments of content.
00:06.480: And I love just the timing of comedy.
00:06.480: And we just had
00:06.480: And although some of it was red.
00:06.480: I think one of the things, I know I was going to say, one of the things that's tricky
00:06.480: I've got so much more to talk about.
00:06.480: No, it's Saturday.
00:06.480: And if you listen to that interview, you could tell when I first said to James, I said, hey, we should wrap this up.
00:06.560: I'm like, well.
00:06.560: So yes, that's that's kind of but I just felt that I didn't know
00:06.560: They just don't really haven't know enough to relate to compare the two.
00:06.560: So if you move that piece of dialogue further down the timeline, it would bring the dialogue and effects up at that point where it was and dip it where the new where the dialogue had been
00:06.560: And I'm a lot older than you.
00:06.560: And I got to admit, I completely agree.
00:06.640: So, anyway, welcome.
00:06.640: Oh wow.
00:06.640: But anyway, so the the the the art of telling a good story and I don't think I told that one well, but you did laugh.
00:06.640: And so I'd get feedback from the client via the producer.
00:06.640: and then I wouldn't get my graphics from the from the from the design department until six.
00:06.640: I don't know.
00:06.640: The other thing to keep in mind, and
00:06.640: And that was the biggest deal for me.
00:06.640: And when somebody starts to talk, you know, you'd want it to dip.
00:06.720: Right.
00:06.720: Um and then I um got a job with this guy who did a had a local production company who did uh corporate video on Pneumatic.
00:06.720: Whereas, with, and so, but with stand-up comedy, you could have an idea at lunchtime.
00:06.720: And he was embarrassed to possibly be seen by any of his friends.
00:06.720: Just do it.
00:06.720: And that's I sort of, okay, it's it's an editing iPhone.
00:06.720: Where is it again?
00:06.800: And it was a very much against.
00:06.800: Whereas, no, I went and did a course.
00:06.800: They're tutorial-based guys.
00:06.800: First of all, a lot of them don't care.
00:06.800: I said it was I don't know, it was all online.
00:06.800: So I just don't think there's a need to
00:06.800: I used to get it all the time on seven, but on ten, not so much.
00:06.800: So now what I start doing is when I as soon as I get the film and I want to start selecting and putting favorites and keywords, I'll make it a multicam clip.
00:06.880: Now, I found James
00:06.880: They were desperately cutting trailers and TV spots on the Avid.
00:06.880: And again, it was like
00:06.880: So, in your own learning process of Final Cut 10 now, oh, that's right, that's what we're talking about.
00:06.880: So they will say, I don't like that shot.
00:06.880: A lot of the some p senior editors left, they didn't want to do it.
00:06.880: Whereas this particular good-looking girl in school has got
00:06.880: What are the things
00:06.880: It seems to work.
00:06.880: I'm done in four.
00:06.880: I'm now doing it in my spare bedroom on an iMac.
00:06.880: Is that possible?
00:06.880: MacBreak Studio, all that stuff, yeah.
00:06.960: There's sixty three of them.
00:06.960: Some of them were dead.
00:06.960: Right.
00:06.960: And it was just maddening that we couldn't do it properly.
00:06.960: I thought, okay, well, it's not perfect, but here's my iPhone.
00:06.960: And if you're a feature editor, most of the stuff in ten
00:06.960: But leave the comments, give it little stars.
00:07.040: I'd trim it down to about fifty eight minutes.
00:07.040: Super 8, yeah.
00:07.040: In fact, one of the reasons I got into stand-up comedy was it was
00:07.040: I'll say it like that.
00:07.040: Oh, God, how do I?
00:07.040: So I got when the new thin IMAX, I got one of those.
00:07.040: We can already do that.
00:07.040: Later, later.
00:07.120: You're going to realize he talks a little funny because he's from England.
00:07.120: Um I I'm a huge fan of
00:07.120: Now you're sending them QuickTime movies.
00:07.120: Well, the other thing, and again, eventually we'll talk about Final Cut 10.
00:07.120: And I might only have three shots in a timeline, and then I'll just play with one.
00:07.120: I mean, it's
00:07.120: But if you go but if you go back to this, I'm actually in your loft.
00:07.120: It's the Willy Wonka theory that I've talked about so many times.
00:07.120: But hang on a sec, so it's not really the editors that should be looking at this stuff, it should be the people that own
00:07.120: The other thing, I don't know whether this ha
00:07.120: Yeah.
00:07.120: Take an hour.
00:07.120: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:07.120: No, no, when you have um the little little picture of the shot in the timeline.
00:07.120: And while we're at it, let me do the color correction in layers.
00:07.200: Yeah, yeah, sure.
00:07.200: I also got a short film written and put on T V by Channel 4.
00:07.200: So th th th that's kind of a loaded question.
00:07.200: Everyone's going to leave seven.
00:07.200: Okay.
00:07.200: So it'll come out this coming Monday.
00:07.200: And I can just scroll down and choose a different audio angle, and it'll be the audio angle I've added that's got the clean dialogue on it.
00:07.280: And you know what?
00:07.280: So they actually trimmed back.
00:07.280: And I'm going to try really hard not to
00:07.280: Oh, then it got no, whereas on the old systems, you could either look at the
00:07.280: But you know, I've developed workflows for myself that are totally different.
00:07.280: It's one interesting way I use multicam clips
00:07.280: No, not at all.
00:07.280: Anyway, that's it for this episode.
00:07.360: But she still looks up to me
00:07.360: It's like, you know, you had Peter Wiggins on.
00:07.360: Actually, they shouldn't be in there.
00:07.360: I'm dropping things here.
00:07.440: So to be clear, the job you got.
00:07.440: Whereas now it's the exact opposite.
00:07.440: Or how did your stand up writing for stand up affect your editorial process?
00:07.440: Yeah, yeah, sure.
00:07.440: I think you might have heard this on a someone said this, but Apple is like the best-looking girl in school.
00:07.440: And basically, I'm the guy who's you know, it's their first HD edit in a Final Cut suite.
00:07.440: And now it's just a click of a mouse.
00:07.440: You're stuck with that height.
00:07.440: But yeah, a lot of the things that I, the reservations I had when I first looked at it, thinking, what about this?
00:07.440: So it's just whereas before I would have had to go in and
00:07.520: They've got the
00:07.520: Where you could just say, right, okay, it would analyze
00:07.520: Mm-hmm.
00:07.520: But if you ask it to show it to you in icon mode, it will show you a separate icon for each one of those favorites.
00:07.600: Go to premiumbeat.
00:07.600: Yeah, yeah, alright.
00:07.600: On the first series, they had two editors.
00:07.600: Sure, yeah, yeah.
00:07.600: And um hold on one second, I'm getting uh chimes here.
00:07.600: Exactly.
00:07.600: It's my guess.
00:07.600: Well, I'm sure there's a book figured out.
00:07.600: I heard shit and that's it.
00:07.600: Like as if you if you set up a smart collection
00:07.600: No, I'm kidding.
00:07.680: And I gotta be honest with you, it's been there for at least six months, maybe a year.
00:07.680: So they don't quite get that.
00:07.680: I said, why are we having to spend all this time?
00:07.680: And I keep saying green triangles, it should be green stars.
00:07.759: These
00:07.760: I um did a course in stand-up and ended up doing doing pretty well and I did some
00:07.760: His mom was out of town.
00:07.760: I should or I should buy I should probably buy have it.
00:07.760: They make the chocolate, but they're not spokesmen.
00:07.760: But every time we did it, the workflow had changed.
00:07.760: Obviously they've got Siri, so they must they must be working on something that will
00:07.760: So it would almost ripple, it would almost say, right, okay.
00:07.840: I can't remember.
00:07.840: So, from that point on.
00:07.840: So I was aware of what was going on.
00:07.840: Yeah, so yeah, whatever.
00:07.840: It's two and a half minutes long with 80 gigs of data.
00:07.840: So James, what what where did you get your training?
00:07.920: Yeah.
00:07.920: And he changed it almost on a whim, like sometimes four times in an hour.
00:07.920: I think they said that people said Avid and Premiere will have to do the same thing at some point.
00:07.920: Yeah, I had a foray just yesterday into my first attempt.
00:08.000: They've been very generous in supporting what we're doing here.
00:08.000: Editing VHS and VHS tape and Pneumatic and learning how to use that and little courses in
00:08.000: It almost it's just that they're worrying about something odd.
00:08.000: They just went out and they read all these books about character and story structure.
00:08.000: And because all those thumbnails aren't accurate anyway, if you go zoom in and you skim down to a point where the edit is.
00:08.000: No, any time you like.
00:08.080: And you have a very enthusiastic audience.
00:08.080: It's highly likely you are not go no.
00:08.080: I was very formal and very organized about it all.
00:08.080: We'll do another one sometime.
00:08.080: Again, someone you spoke to recently, I think it was the Avid guy was talking about sync indicators.
00:08.080: So some I think I don't think whether Apple or all these but these are like little things where and no, no, someone said it on one of your podcasts recently, it's like we're
00:08.080: Yeah.
00:08.080: Turn them off.
00:08.160: I get emails and tweets from people all the time going, Yep, Fenwick, I did it, and you're right.
00:08.160: It's called Roughnecks, and Roughnecks are the guys.
00:08.160: It must be it's horrible.
00:08.160: Yeah, it's actually great to know that people are actually out there listening.
00:08.160: There's some really good stuff out there.
00:08.240: If you don't mind, I'll put it on the in the show notes, whatever.
00:08.240: And that's how I got my start as a
00:08.240: And I think there are some, I've heard, I don't know whether they still do it, but in the in the in the States that
00:08.240: And they go, Yeah, well, you know, they don't want to take the risk and take the time out to
00:08.240: Yeah.
00:08.240: And they keep putting money into fixing it up.
00:08.320: I don't want to go into all the details.
00:08.320: I've done plenty.
00:08.320: I want to make sure those last ten shots are right.
00:08.320: And this again, it was pre-internet when I was using it, so you couldn't go online and get a tutorial and find out and then and the the the
00:08.400: You know, and it's an interesting thing.
00:08.400: Doesn't matter.
00:08.400: So, anyway, so we went through a phase where we just couldn't swap projects with each other.
00:08.400: It was like a and it was sort of an apology, like, yeah, yeah.
00:08.400: So I don't know that they thought it was rushing.
00:08.400: And one of the things that you could always say about QuickTime is that it was always
00:08.400: Why have I got to press all these buttons and do what this is like?
00:08.480: So I wrote a letter to all of them saying, can I get a job as an assistant?
00:08.480: Well, when I did my student film, the only thing I said to my actors as a director, I would say,
00:08.480: Oh wow.
00:08.480: And a lot of again, I start because I because
00:08.560: The guy was called Brian Oates.
00:08.560: And he's like, Oh, will you give me a ride?
00:08.560: I know you know people from Apple.
00:08.560: I know from casual conversations I've had with people that
00:08.560: And they won't
00:08.560: Oh, no.
00:08.560: And that thing churned all day long.
00:08.560: In the audio world, what you're talking about, that's called a side chain.
00:08.560: And yeah, and a lot of Ripple training, all the
00:08.560: Yeah, I can do it myself.
00:08.560: And it doesn't matter what country you're in, I do go and check those.
00:08.640: Now, excuse me, I've already referenced your stand-up career.
00:08.640: They're kind of, you know, they're verbose and
00:08.640: And that's the problem they don't because they're not looking at it at
00:08.640: So basically what you would say is
00:08.640: Please, Apple, you bring back remove attributes.
00:08.720: And the client that was
00:08.720: That went onto a TV.
00:08.720: So let's say you say, right, dialogue takes preference over everything.
00:08.800: Yeah, exactly.
00:08.800: What have you done?
00:08.800: But by building it with
00:08.880: And he's like
00:08.880: I'm doing well.
00:08.880: It was like all these sort of hysterical ninnies going, Oh, what's going on, Apple?
00:08.880: And because if you look at, and again, now we're just speculating, but if you look at the.
00:08.880: It's mind-boggling.
00:08.880: Yep.
00:08.960: Welcome to the grill, and thanks for doing my little show.
00:08.960: And they go, yeah, we have to.
00:08.960: Okay.
00:08.960: I just uh yes, um and then editing comedy is always is always good when you cut a trailer and you that's
00:08.960: Another week of Final Click Grill.
00:09.040: And I think that.
00:09.040: I go, oh, God, he had Peter Wiggins on.
00:09.040: It's almost too easy to get a film scene.
00:09.040: So um but I didn't get into stand up until my my cliche was
00:09.040: You know, he's a great guardian.
00:09.040: I don't wanna I don't wanna be that guy, you know.
00:09.040: The rumor mill is that they're going to dump.
00:09.120: And then while I was working at the um because I was trying to live in London, which is an expensive town, I was working
00:09.120: You know, and it's interesting.
00:09.120: Interesting.
00:09.120: So, James, what made you pick Final Cut 10 as your platform of choice?
00:09.120: I don't know whether it was a problem with Avid at the time, I don't know whether it was a problem of you know
00:09.120: I did this animation for a producer a few years ago and
00:09.120: You won't get any work done.
00:09.120: I can't make the I like to have the audio tracks this shade of blue.
00:09.120: I'm not doing it, I don't have a Mac Pro.
00:09.120: This guy's using thumbnail
00:09.280: And so a lot of the newer guys coming in, they want they already knew how to use it.
00:09.280: We better learn how to do it properly.
00:09.280: But yeah, I think there's a few things I'd like without wishing to
00:09.360: Okay.
00:09.440: And one of the clips that he sent me, it was a Vimeo link.
00:09.440: No, you can't do that yet.
00:09.440: Right.
00:09.520: I was thinking as I was having this sort of
00:09.520: But you know, they're doing pretty they're doing pretty well off the back of it.
00:09.600: So they have a thing called favorites, and you can mark things as like
00:09.600: com, go into the little search box, search for the phrase Red Sky.
00:09.680: I'm trying to see if I can find it here real quick, because I can't remember the name of it.
00:09.680: Have you actually tried to use to actually get some interesting
00:09.680: And some of them will go through it frame by frame.
00:09.760: I'm ahead of the game already.
00:09.760: And then I said, I've got to get out of here.
00:09.760: And you know, they're really good at deflecting that kind of those kind of conversations.
00:09.760: I think that's the case with quite a few editors, I'd say.
00:09.760: It's so encouraging when you see
00:09.840: But it was my job to get a VHS out of the Avid.
00:09.840: It's like, you probably don't want to.
00:09.840: But you know, there was a lot of uncertainty.
00:09.920: I just want to talk about buttons and knobs and timelines.
00:09.920: He was the um
00:09.920: You probably the same word in the US, I think, guys that work on oil rigs.
00:09.920: Stuff now that you look back and think, My God.
00:09.920: It's a shot alone.
00:09.920: I'm always working on the finish.
00:09.920: Yeah, it really is amazing.
00:09.920: You know, so like you select your
00:10.000: And it's so the two things, writing jokes, writing gags and
00:10.000: Just stared at things.
00:10.000: It's still going to play.
00:10.000: Yeah, the shot.
00:10.080: Wow, yeah, I'm gonna get it detailed.
00:10.080: That didn't go into an online suite.
00:10.080: They didn't actually know what they meant.
00:10.080: If they reach for their mouse too many times, I'm done.
00:10.080: So it ends up you end up
00:10.160: I never know why
00:10.160: I can't remember the exact details, but I'm sure you know what I mean.
00:10.160: Oh, God, it's horrible.
00:10.240: They were releasing a
00:10.240: Go sell these phones.
00:10.320: You don't want to have the
00:10.320: And Paul goes, Well, how about this gas station?
00:10.320: So in or some people see that some people see them as this sort of monolithic, you know
00:10.400: And you know, we
00:10.400: So, but
00:10.400: But I will preface by saying the people
00:10.480: How am I going to follow that?
00:10.480: So I it's an interesting question.
00:10.480: Yeah.
00:10.480: Thank you so much for listening.
00:10.560: He's like, you know, helping defile this kid, whatever.
00:10.560: Oh, sh.
00:10.560: But the thing I noticed
00:10.640: I hate to be the old guy in the room.
00:10.640: It's not a very good database, is it?
00:10.640: And he's like, Okay, I'll give you a ride.
00:10.640: I don't think that their intention was to release
00:10.640: Because that's what you're going to see.
00:10.640: So thank you.
00:10.720: He's like, Yep, this is what we got.
00:10.720: Yeah.
00:10.720: So, James, if you have the ability to sit down with
00:10.720: Okay.
00:10.720: But yeah, I mean, because I now do
00:10.800: Yeah, you can.
00:10.880: And it's fascinating.
00:10.880: And the equivalent of doing that in 7 was doing a subclip.
00:10.960: I don't understand what you're asking me.
00:10.960: I mean, the way I use a multicam clip, because when I start a trailer,
00:11.040: And I actually wrote.
00:11.040: That's not fair.
00:11.040: It's going to be very, very tiny.
00:11.040: What did you use?
00:11.120: Bottle Cut Seven's dead.
00:11.200: I'll go, okay, yeah, all right, that's gonna look good.
00:11.200: I was thinking, God, I thought I should buy Premiere.
00:11.280: Can only go downhill from here, Chris.
00:11.280: So, what?
00:11.280: And the same thing happened to me.
00:11.360: So, um
00:11.360: I don't want them to stop taking my calls just because I want to have lunch.
00:11.360: So a lot of it is just um you know, people that just want to
00:11.440: And then so this is all pre-internet.
00:11.520: So, what advice now?
00:11.520: And I'd say, well, what does he mean by this?
00:11.520: Oh, okay.
00:11.520: They would, you know.
00:11.600: The art of telling a good story is very much like
00:11.600: But I think I don't know, it's a good question because I don't really
00:11.600: I'm not I'm I don't want to slight his work at all.
00:11.600: What was their thinking?
00:11.600: Dude, doesn't matter how clean it is, it's still a piece of crap.
00:11.680: Don't start cutting.
00:11.680: Two thousand six.
00:11.760: No, no, let's forget that.
00:11.840: He's like, what?
00:12.000: And because I didn't go to university, I was able to get a grant.
00:12.000: What's up?
00:12.000: And that's how they made their first.
00:12.000: That was finished.
00:12.080: And and I think they even lowered the upgrade price.
00:12.080: So yeah.
00:12.080: What about that?
00:12.160: We're going to do something like this.
00:12.240: So anyway, um
00:12.240: The music was great.
00:12.240: It's a very good point because they're very, very similar.
00:12.240: So eventually we got
00:12.240: Take a risk.
00:12.320: What did what
00:12.400: It's a small audience.
00:12.400: No, not really.
00:12.400: What were they thinking that people were just going to
00:12.400: Chill.
00:12.400: Then what if you if you take all those micro
00:12.480: You know, you're an entertainer.
00:12.480: I'm out.
00:12.480: And where's the anamorphic flag?
00:12.480: Oh, no.
00:12.560: And 'cause I started at the
00:12.640: How does
00:12.640: And they ru and they put it out and it obviously wasn't ready.
00:12.720: Oh, okay, okay.
00:12.720: We'll move on to that later.
00:12.720: Why have you done this to me?
00:12.880: And that was what it was.
00:12.880: Trust me, you know.
00:13.040: I've just written it down and
00:13.120: He has he's got a very good Filecut 7 book.
00:13.280: So anyway.
00:13.360: And I was like, you know.
00:13.520: And this is again
00:13.600: Okay, let's move on.
00:13.600: I got a lot more.
00:13.680: No, it's just um.
00:13.680: And oh my
00:13.680: All that sort of been.
00:13.760: You also said.
00:13.840: I should.