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advice, camera, development, editor, film, filmmaker, folder, footage, format, graduate, harddrive, ideas, intro, movie, movie maker, necessity, organization, Post, process, Production, report, SCAD, school, shoot, student, teach
Welcome back readers. Now, I know what you’re thinking: Alex – didn’t you say we were going to move on this week to Post-production? Well, sort of. I said if I couldn’t think of another post for Production, we would move on. As it turns out, I thought of one. And, since I don’t think it will be a long post and because it serves as a nice transition to Post, it is my 15th and a half post for Production. So let’s see what that’s all about.
Organization is key to filmmaking. It may seem like a no brainer, but you’d be surprised how many people spend countless hours sifting through footage before finally being able to work on a project. A friend of mine (who was also one of my roommates once upon a time) had to sift through two full 1TB drives full of footage to find and put stuff together. One, you don’t want to be that guy/girl who has to go through hours of footage for a single scene. And you don’t want to be that girl/guy who gives it to that person. You don’t want to come off like an asshole. Or maybe you do. I dunno.
Two main things need to remain organized before moving on to Post-production: Your shoot and your footage. During the shoot, it’s handy to have a camera report on hand. This is very similar to a shot list, but instead of listing all your shots and setups, a camera report is set up as a log. Basically, you write down the pertinent information of what you’re shooting, then you list the takes that you do. Right next to them, you write how you liked them or what went wrong with any. This keeps you organized and allows your editor to know which shots worked out the best.
After the shoot is complete, you must transfer what footage you shot somewhere. The footage is kept on a drive somewhere – usually in the hands of your editor. Personally, I like to organize my footage in a main folder (usually the name of my movie) and divide it by either the scene we are shooting or by what day we shot on…or both. In each of those folder is where I put my footage, both audio and visual. This keeps me organized and I can easily find what I liked best, review it and move on.
There’s not much more to say about staying organized. In the end, if this is your project and you’re doing the editing yourself, it’s a good idea to stick with what works best for you. If you have an editor, it’s a good idea to work with them from the beginning, maybe giving them the footage as soon as you are finished for the day. Either way, organization will help immensely.
Well, that, I think, is officially it for Production. Any questions? If so, feel free to ask. I’m entirely open to questions, concerns or comments. Especially on anything we’ve discussed so far. Stick around as we talk about teamwork on Wednesday and look for the intro to Post on Monday. See you next time!