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Wednesday, November 30, 2005

Editing the Documentaries

For anyone who has ever wondered how things are edited these days, most programs are done on the computer with a timeline and digital captured clips from source tapes. For the "Changing Perceptions" and "STRONGHOLD" documentaries, I've had to purchase (4) 300 Gig drives (that's 1.2 terabytes) to hold most of the transferred footage. It's an endless task of shuffling around clips, exporting the best of people's interviews into separate files to make room for more footage, etc. Like they say, you can never have too much storage.

The picture on the right of the screen is the editing screen zoomed out for the "Changing Perceptions" film. Click on the link below to see it bigger. I am using three video tracks and four audio tracks. You overlap video clips and apply transitions (dissolves, etc) and use rubberband controls to fade up and out audio when appropriate. It's much faster than tape-to-tape editing, and everything remains master quality. It can be a pain, though, shuffling around the windows. Every time I edit something, I get up and walk across the room to look at the TV it's connected to like I am just a viewer watching it. So, that's what I do most nights. I drink wine (well, not every night) and pace the room to see if it looks ok. Tell me, what's it like to be with real people and wrestle? I'm beginning to forget. Here's a bigger version of the image above.

http://www.3dwebs.com/gayprowrestler/simonedits.jpg

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