In this third “CUT AND TALK” series, I sat down with Mark to learn more about his succesful career, how he got involved in film industry and talk about Gravity´s editorial team a…
Source: CUT AND TALK: MARK SANGER «MAKE YOURSELF INVALUABLE, BUT NEVER AT THE EXPENSE OF OTHERS»
After 18 years in the industry Eddie has cut over 20 feature films (both indies and studio movies) in a wide variety of genres as well as TV dramas, documentaries and award-winning shorts. His enthusiasm for big screen storytelling is matched only by his total dedication to the craft of film editing, his world-class technical expertise and his undisputed love of chocolate.
Eddie has tutored students in film editing theory and practice at The London Film Academy, The London International Film School and The Metropolitan Film School. He has given main stage presentations both at IBC 2011 and NAB 2012 for Avid about feature film editing on Avid Media Composer. He’s a member of the BAFTA editing chapter, a member of American Cinema Editors, and has been interviewed about editing for Televisual, CinemaEditor magazine, The Guerilla Film Makers Handbook and The Guerilla Film Makers Pocketbook. He was on the feature film panel at…
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After 18 years in the industry Eddie has cut over 20 feature films (both indies and studio movies) in a wide variety of genres as well as TV dramas, documentaries and award-winning shorts. His enthusiasm for big screen storytelling is matched only by his total dedication to the craft of film editing, his world-class technical expertise and his undisputed love of chocolate.
Eddie has tutored students in film editing theory and practice at The London Film Academy, The London International Film School and The Metropolitan Film School. He has given main stage presentations both at IBC 2011 and NAB 2012 for Avid about feature film editing on Avid Media Composer. He’s a member of the BAFTA editing chapter, a member of American Cinema Editors, and has been interviewed about editing for Televisual, CinemaEditor magazine, The Guerilla Film Makers Handbook and The Guerilla Film Makers Pocketbook. He was on the feature film panel at EditFest London 2013. See full bio here
That’s very very kind of you to say… I don’t believe I’m really in that category just yet. If you ask me…How did I get here in my career, just 20 years of hard work!! Started off making tea. And getting lunch and teaching myself how to edit and then slowly working my way up the ladder.
Good question. Again very kind words. I´m glad you like mission impossible it was a big challenge because we had very little time in post-production we had about ten weeks to edit the film from the end of the shoot to when we launched the picture.
So that is certainly one of the tightest schedules I had and easily the biggest film I have done and the most successful. I’m very proud of it certain sequences like the opera and set up to the underwater heist. All of that stuff turn out really well so I´m very pleased – Kingsman and mission impossible are definitely the two best films I have been involved in I would say.
Very methodically. I will watch all the footage and if it’s an action sequence I would make a large selects role of everything I think is good from every camera and then I slowly refine it and refine it and refine it and…until it’s absolutely the greatest hit of all the footage and it tells the best story.
And the dialogue scene I get my assistant to break down every line of dialogue by camera angle so all the whites, all the mediums, all the overs and all the close ups for each line so I can easily listen to all the different lines of dialogue and build the scene like that and then the director can do the same and listen to different lines and that’s how we do that.
Basically when you got lots of footage there’s no
shortcuts you just have to go through it all and it takes a long time.
There was twelve hours of footage for the motorcycle chase in mission impossible and that was 2 mins. 40 seconds and there was 15 hours of footage for all the skydiving in Kingsman and that scene was about 4 mins so there’s quite a lot there.
And the skydiving took me about probably about 2 weeks. Maybe 3 weeks to get a first assembly. To get a (secualum time).
Well on a big film you tell all the producers a soon as possible the stuff missing so they can go in with the actors and shoot it. On the set before they strike the set or before the actors have left the film that’s very important. Sometimes you’ll get a story board artist to draw what you want sometimes you preview what you want sometimes you’ll get an iPhone and go and shoot what we want. If it’s a close up of something well go and shoot a rough version of the shot and just cut it in the main thing is the main thing it is to let people know as soon as possible so they can do something about it.
Yes, because like I’ve been playing that musical instrument as it were for 20 years.
So I’m very fast at it. I did edit a couple of films on Final Cut Pro 7. I didn’t like it that much. Media management wasn’t good and the way that the project was stored was not good. Storing the project in one file is very inefficient compared to having separate bins. I have not tried premier although, I’ve seen premier used on big films and very complex sequences take quite a long time to open you can be waiting five minutes to work on a sequence. I didn’t really want to wait around that long. Haven’t used final Cut X, I’m not sure. I mean I would give it a go I’m always in to give it a go .
Well is very difficult watching your own films. It’s never the same film twice so it’s always a different film because you always make changes to it. So I enjoy that specially watching it with an audience. Then when the film is finished you end up watching a lot of times. To check the sound, and the visual effects and the gray and do quality control. So you end up seeing the film hundreds of times by the time it’s in the cinema. And you have done so much work on the edit for months before hand that usually what ends up in the film.
Very rarely do I look and I think oh maybe «we should have put that scene back in». It takes about 5 years from when you finish a film and then you don’t watch it for you to be able sit back and just watch it as an audience member…I would say about 5 years.
Well, it varies on Kingsman we had about 8 months of editing on kick ass we had a year in a half of editing on mission impossible I had 10 weeks of editing off to the end of the shoot. on the Kingsman sequel which I’ve started now we will have yeah probably 8 months of editing so normally it’s about a year on average including the shoot so that’s roughly how long it takes. The director’s guild of America estipulate the director should have about ten weeks off to the end of the shoot, deliberate directors cut and then normally it’s about another 10 weeks to finish it about 20 weeks it’s about average I would say.
That is a very difficult question to answer quickly but what I do is. Throw something together as quickly as possible. If it’s a dialogue scene don’t worry too much about choosing the exact perfect delivery of a line. Put the scene together quickly, put it away for couple of days, then watch it and refine it. If it’s an action scene, I always work with no sound. I imagine the sound and I imagine the music. For an action scene and then I build up the sound of to it and have the music up to the end and then refine the edit based of discoveries that I make with the sound effects and the music but that’s basically what I do.
I think it helps if you are friends with the director because it means that you will have a pleasurable experience in the cutting room and usually you do become very close with the directors that you work with.
Sometimes it’s more of a business relationship, it depends on how busy the director is if they are spending a lot of time in the cutting room you usually become friends with them. If not and if maybe more just you know just a working relationship. I’m quite good friends with most of the director that I work with sometimes I have dinner with them outside of work. But usually we are all very busy people so we only see each other when we work but it is important to be friendly with the director so they feel comfortable and able to have a good creative experience when they are working with you.
I’ve kind of explain that so for two mins scene if it it’s the most cycle chase about 12 hours of footage. It’s just a very very long process of going through building a selects role of the best bits and slowly slowly slowly going through and removing the bits that aren’t as good until you are left with the best of that tells the best story and It just takes a long time.
I would say understanding story telling is the most important thing understanding what effect your edit decisions have on the audience. So how long do you hold a shot? Then exactly when do you cut to the next shot and what is the purpose of that cut. In terms of storytelling informing the story or creating an emotional response in the audience, and I would say experience, creativity and technical skills are all important. The main thing it’s just when you are starting out its just to do it as much as you can because you only get better by doing something.
Well I will work mute if it’s an action scene like I’ve said and then build up the sound gradually, with dialogue scenes I work with the dialogue and then I do a dialogue edit which is very polished so I audition all the tracks that have been provided by the sound recordist and I would choose the best recording of each line for a scene I would sort of mix the dialogue as best as I can, adding backgrounds for every scene to fill up the background and try to make it as theatrically polished as possible so that when you press play sounds like a movie that’s very important.
I have not worked with a Latino director but I would love to. Clearly two of the best director in the world Alfonso Cuaron and Alejandro Iñarrtu are from latin America and they are very very fine story teller and filmmakers. I will be very happy to work with a latino director if I was lucky enough to be invited to do so.
Good luck everyone. Nice talking to you Christian and good luck with everyone projects. All right bye bye.
Thank you Eddie was a very pleasant interview. Thank you so much.
Anita Brandt Burgoyne ha estado editando durante 26 años, sus créditos editoriales: udging Amy, Recovery Road, Good Burger y Legally blonde la película que le dió muchos reconocimientos, ahora está en un nuevo proyecto «The Bachelors» estrellas como J. K. Simmons de la película “Whiplash” y la actriz francés Julie Delpy son parte del equipo. Anita Brandt Burgoyne es un miembro activo del Comité de Socios American Cinema Editors. Anita ha sido nominada dos veces para un American Cinema Editors «Eddie» y una vez para un A.T.A.S. premio «Emmy» por su trabajo.
He estado editando por cerca de unos 26 años. En ese lapso, yo he editado películas de televisión, películas, series de televisión, y algunos comerciales y cortometrajes. Mi padre era un editor, por lo que decidí que quería convertirme en un editor como él cuando tenía unos 14 años de edad. Esto fue principalmente porque yo idolatraba a mi padre y quería ser como él, sino también porque pasé mucho tiempo en sus salas de montaje y pensé que era muy interesante. Empecé mi carrera en el cine, usando una Moviola, porque esa es la forma en que mi padre editaba. Los sistemas no lineales tales como Avid no se habían inventado todavía, aunque hubo algunas versiones muy tempranas de otros Sistemas de Montaje, Ediflex, Editdroid, – pero continuamos editando en la película debido a que funcionó muy bien para nosotros.»Una vez que empecé en la edición en Avid, en una película de Disney llamada «Voy a estar en casa para Navidad,» Nunca regresé de a editar en Lightworks «.
La primera película que fue editada digitalmente fue una película llamada «A Very Brady Sequel» y editada en que Lightworks. Elegí para aprender Lightworks en primer lugar, porque parecía más fácil. También he editado mi segunda película, «Good Burger» en Lightworks, pero entonces era evidente que Avid se estaba apoderando como el sistema de edición más profesional que la gente estaba usando, así que sabía que tenía que aprenderlo. Una vez que empecé en la edición de Avid, en una película de Disney llamada “I’ll be Home for Christmas,” Nunca fui de nuevo a Lightworks. Sólo dos veces ha pedido que cortar una película en Final Cut Pro, pero realmente odiaba ese sistema y, finalmente, comencé a decir no a proyectos que usaban ese sistema.
La parte más difícil de la edición para mí no tiene nada que ver con que cuenta la historia o el corte de escenas juntos ni nada. La parte más difícil para mí es la comprensión de las personalidades de todos los diferentes personajes en el proyecto. Soy por naturaleza una «buena» persona y entro en cada proyecto pensando que todos en la película pueden llevarse bien con todos los demás, pero a menudo, las personas tienen sus propias agendas. He visto a directores y productores en proyectos que, literalmente, se odian. Cuando eso ocurre, el editor se ve atrapado en el medio y es muy incómodo. Me esfuerzo para permanecer neutral, porque mi único objetivo es ayudar a todos a construir la mejor película, pero a veces es muy difícil. Por ejemplo: En una película, yo estaba de acuerdo 100% con el director (y el productor era una persona terrible,) así que cuando el productor despedía al director, me despidieron, al mismo tiempo, porque yo estaba aliado con el director. Esas situaciones son terribles y complicadas y después de eso decidí que no volvería nunca tomar un trabajo si sabía de antemano que iba a ser un choque entre las personas involucradas. Mi objetivo es siempre para ayudar a todas las partes para que la película, sea lo más agradable.
Creo que la creatividad es la cosa más importante que. No soy una persona muy tecnológica y hay muchas cosas como efectos visuales que no sé cómo hacerlo en Avid. Pero si puedo explicar a mi asistente, lo que tengo en mi cabeza, yo sé que ella/él tiene las habilidades técnicas para crear realmente esas cosas. Me considero un narrador en primer lugar y para ser honesto, no siento que la adición de efectos visuales me ayudan a contar la historia. Pueden mejorar el disfrute de ver la historia, pero los efectos visuales por sí solos no están contando una historia en la mayoría de los casos. Obviamente, hay algunos casos en que el VFX son en realidad la historia (si hay un personaje CGI, o algo así), pero todavía voy a dejar que la gente VFX crean esos elementos y que se adhiera al material que fue grabado. Sigo buscando las mejores actuaciones y tratar de contar la historia de la manera más interesante posible. Pero entonces lo entrego a otra persona (ya sea mi asistente, o un editor de efectos visuales) para hacer los fondos. Una vez que el corte de edición «gruesa», vuelvo atrás y modifico la misma. Pero para mí, la tecnología es sólo una herramienta para mejorar una historia. Creativamente contar la historia es siempre más importante para mí.
El camino para convertirse en un miembro de la ACE es sobre todo acerca de la calidad en edición, durante al menos cinco años. Eso significa cinco años de tiempo de trabajo real; que no incluye los meses en entre proyectos. Por lo que toma un tiempo. Además, ACE está buscando que el trabajo cumpla con un determinado nivel de calidad muy alto. Si alguien está editando sus propios vídeos de YouTube, o vídeos de instrucción para pequeñas empresas, no creo que ACE consideraría que ese sea el material adecuado. A menudo decimos a los posibles miembros que no han hecho el trabajo a la altura de la ACE, pueden volver a aplicar para ser CONSIDERADO como miembro cuando han hecho un poco más de trabajo. Por lo general, la gente no vuelva a aplicar y, a menudo entran en el segundo (o tercer) intento.
No estoy segura de cuál es la mejor película que he editado. Tengo mis favoritas. Obviamente «Legalmente Rubia» es una de las favoritas, ya que fue la película más grande que edité. Fue divertido estar en una película que yo sabía que iba a ser buena. Pero también me encantó la edición de “Good Burger-“ – Me encantó el humor de la película, además de que me encantaron todas las personas involucradas en ella. Fue muy divertido.
Tengo una nominación al Emmy y fui nominada para un Emmy a la mejor serie de televisión.
Hice una serie para televisión hace muchos años llamada Recovery Road, yo sabía que era una buena película, pero creo que tengo mucho más reconocimiento de lo que jamás soñé. No ganamos, pero no tenía ni idea de que alguna vez incluso fuese nominada. Fue muy divertido porque era toda una sorpresa.
Acabo de editar una nueva serie de televisión que comenzó a transmitirse aquí llamada camino de recuperación. Fue mucho trabajo, pero fue muy divertido trabajar en ella también. Después de todos estos años, mi objetivo es trabajar con gente agradable, con talento, que respetan el trabajo que hago y la creatividad y la habilidad que aportan al proyecto.
El flujo de trabajo en cada proyecto cambia, pero todo parece estar yendo en la misma dirección. Ya no es un laboratorio de procesamiento entre la producción y la sala de montaje. Ahora, hay un DIT (técnico de imagen digital) en la mayoría de los sets. Esa persona trabaja con el director de fotografía para asegurarse de que los ajustes digitales de la cámara están recibiendo la mejor calidad posible de la cámara. Una vez que se ha filmado el material suficiente para llenar un disco duro portátil, la unidad viene directamente a mi asistente en la sala de montaje. Mi asistente transcodifica las imágenes en bruto en Avid y organiza los bins con las escenas para mí, entonces comienzo a editar las escenas y tratar en lo posible de editar tan pronto como la van filmando. Pero se está volviendo más difícil editar, porque nos traen mucha horas de tomas que probablemente no sirvan, ahora se graba mucho más material que antes!. Apenas puedo mirar todo ese material ,Pero así es como va el proceso.
Recovery Road fue el último proyecto que hice y el flujo de trabajo era como lo he descrito anteriormente. Mi próximo proyecto comenzará a rodarse en marzo. Se llama The Bachelors” y las estrellas J. K. Simmons de la película “Whiplash” y la actriz francés Julie estrán en los papeles principales. Debido a que mi asistente no ha sido contratado oficialmente todavía, no sé cuál será el flujo de trabajo, pero puedo suponer que será similar a la de la Recovery Road. Creo que los drives vendrán directamente desde el set a la sala de montaje. Están grabando aquí en Los Ángeles, lo que hace que todo sea más fácil y más rápido.
Yo estaba trabajando en una serie de televisión llamada “Judging Amy” cuando me entrevisté para Legally Blonde sucedió que uno de los productores de “Judging Amy” fue mi mentor y uno de los productores de Legally Blonde Por eso, tenía una conexión, fui a hablar con al productor de “Judging Amy” y le dije: «Joe, estoy triste, quiero dejar la serie. Además, voy a pedir que me ayudes a ello. «Nunca olvidaré lo bonito que era. Llamó al productor de “Judging Amy” que me había tutelado y dijo un montón de cosas buenas de mí y cuando me ofrecieron el trabajo, me deseó suerte y me dijo que fuera a hacerlo. «Fue muy emocionante. Me pareció que había conseguido la película cuando mi agente me llamó para decirme yo estaba tan feliz; Fui al partido de voleibol de la escuela de mi hija esa tarde y llevé el guión de Legally Blonde conmigo. Cuando volví a mirar por encima, levanté el guión y sonreí, sabía que me dieron el trabajo.
Siempre estoy en busca de los pequeños momentos que me hacen sentir algo. A veces, algo muy sutil, como una expresión de los ojos de un actor, o una buena reacción hace una gran diferencia. Me encanta cuando encuentro una línea que me hace reír, o una gran reacción que creo que es hilarante. Aprendí acerca de la comedia cuando hice La secuela tribu de los Brady. Nunca había editado comedia antes y lo aprendí bastante del actor Shelley Long. He aprendido que a menudo la mejor risa no es de la persona que dice la línea, sino de la persona reaccionando a lo que se dice.
Lo mismo va para el drama. Busco el ritmo interno que vive en cada escena y trato de editar a ese ritmo. O, trato de ayudar a crear el ritmo que quiero. Tenía un compositor que me dijo una vez que parecía un editor musical» . Mi ritmo de edición simplemente parecía caer en su lugar con el ritmo musical que creó en sus señales de puntuación. Tal vez sea porque yo tocaba el piano durante 13 años y cantaba en el coro de la escuela a través de toda mi educación. No me gusta cuando las escenas se sienten «desigual» o fuera de ritmo. Me gusta que se sientan cómodos y sencillos.
Yo diría que deben tratar de editar tanto como sea posible. Hacer las cosas de forma gratuita; editar películas de estudiantes filmar tus propias películas en un Go Pro o algo y practicar el corte al mismo tiempo que van contando una buena historia. Jueguen con ediciones para ver lo que funciona y lo que no. Usted encontrará que un corte que pensó que nunca trabajaría da algo grande de energía o crea una cierta sensación. No tenga miedo de experimentar y probar cosas locas. Esa es la belleza de la edición digital; puede deshacer cualquier cosa!
Siempre le digo a la gente que si tienen el dinero para comprar un sistema de edición Avid háganlo, Avid hace que los sistemas sean poco más asequibles para los estudiantes y Avid tiene grandes foros. No tenga miedo de hacer preguntas también. Los editores son un grupo muy útil. Editores exitosos rara vez se olvidan de cómo se obtuvo su primer empleo y suelen estar bastante dispuestos a pagar el favor a los demás que vienen a lo largo del camino.
También, mire películas! decidida cual podría ser el estilo de edición. Uno de mis ejemplos favoritos es la escena de apertura en Malditos bastardos. Son el agricultor y Christoph Waltz sentados en una mesa en la casa. Lo único que hacen es sentarse y hablar, pero debido a la edición brillante (por Sally Menke,) yo estaba riendo y aterrorizado al mismo tiempo. Esa es una increíble edición.
Así que … vaya y edite!!
Gracias a Anita Brandt-Burgoyne para la entrevista realmente lo apreciamos, deseémosle una carrera muy exitosa para el futuro inmediato. Este es el primer blog de la serie «Cut & Talk» en ambos idiomas español e inglés. Esperamos que hayan disfrutado.
Anita Brandt Burgoyne has been editing for about 26 years, editorial credits are for: Judging Amy, Recovery Road, Good Burger and Legally blonde the biggest film she edited, she was asking for a new project «The Bachelors» stars like J.K. Simmons from the film «Whiplash» and the French actor Julie Delpy will shape the cast. Anita Brandt Burgoyne is an active member of the AMERICAN CINEMA EDITORS Membership Committee. Anita has been nominated twice for a American Cinema Editors «Eddie» Award and once for an A.T.A.S. «Emmy» award for her work.
I have been editing for about 26 years. In that time, I’ve edited TV movies, feature films, TV series, and some commercials and short films. My father was an editor, so I decided I wanted to become an editor like him when I was about 14 years old. This was mostly because I idolized my dad and wanted to be just like him, but also because I spent time in his editing rooms all through my growing up years and I thought it was very interesting. I began my career editing on film, using a Moviola, because that’s the way my father edited. Non-Linear systems such as Avid hadn’t been invented yet, although there were some very early versions of other systems– the Montage, Ediflex, Editdroid,– but we continued to cut on film because that worked very well for us.
«Once I started editing on Avid, on a Disney movie called
«I’ll be Home for Christmas,» I never went back to Lightworks».
The first film I edited digitally was a feature called «A Very Brady Sequel» and I edited that on Lightworks. I chose to learn Lightworks first, because it looked easier to me– more like editing on film. I also edited my second film,»Good Burger» on Lightworks, but then it was becoming clear that Avid was taking over, as the system most professional editors were using, so I knew I needed to learn it. Once I started editing on Avid, on a Disney movie called «I’ll be Home for Christmas,» I never went back to Lightworks. I have only twice been asked to cut a film on Final Cut Pro, but I really hated that system and finally started to say no to projects that were using it.
The most difficult part of editing for me has nothing to do with telling the story or cutting scenes together or anything. The most difficult part for me is understanding the politics and personalities of all the different people on the project. I’m by nature a «nice» person and I go into every project thinking everyone on the film wants to get along with everyone else. But often, people have their own agendas. I’ve seen directors and producers on projects that literally hate each other. When that occurs, the editor is caught in the middle and it’s very uncomfortable. I try my best to stay neutral, because my only goal is to help everyone make the best film possible, but sometimes it’s very difficult. On one film, I agreed 100% with the director (and the producer was a terrible person,) so when the producer fired the director, I got fired at the same time because I was allied with the director. Those situations are terrible and complicated and after that particular one, I decided I wouldn’t ever take a job if I knew ahead of time that there was going to be a clash in personalities, or if one person had a different agenda than someone else. My goal is always to help all parties make the best, most enjoyable film possible.
I believe creativity is the most important thing I bring. I’m not a very technological person and there are many visual effect things I don’t know how to do on the Avid. But if I can explain to my assistant, what I see in my head, I know she has the technical skills to actually create those things. I consider myself a storyteller first and to be honest, I don’t feel that adding visual effects help me tell the story. They may enhance the enjoyment of watching the story, but visual effects alone are not telling a story in most cases. There are obviously some cases where the VFX actually are the story (if there’s a CGI character, or something) but I will still let VFX people create those elements and I will stick to the footage that was shot. I often cut whole scenes that were shot against green screen, which is fine. I still look for the best performances and try to tell the story in the most interesting way possible. But then I hand it over to someone else (either my assistant, or a VFX editor) to do the backgrounds. Once the complete shot is roughed together, I go back and tweak it. But to me, technology is only an enhancement tool for the most part. Creatively telling the story is always most important to me.
The path to becoming a member of ACE is mostly about editing good quality things for at least five years. That means five years of actual work time; it doesn’t include the months in between projects. So it takes a while. Plus, ACE is looking for work that meets a certain high standard. If someone is cutting their own YouTube videos, or cutting instructional videos for small companies, I don’t think ACE would consider that material suitable. We often tell prospective members who haven’t done work that’s up to the ACE standard, to reapply for membership when they have done a little more work. Usually people do reapply and often get in on the second (or third) try.
I’m not sure what is the best film I’ve edited. I have my favorites. Obviously «Legally Blonde» is a favorite because it was the biggest film I edited. It was fun to be on a film that I knew was going to be good, all the way through the whole process. But I also loved editing «Good Burger-«- I loved the humor of that movie, plus I loved all the people involved in it. It was a lot of fun.
I got an Emmy nomination and the film got nominated for an Emmy for best TV film.
I did a TV movie many years ago called «Homeless to Harvard.» It was for Lifetime Channel. I knew it was a good movie, but it got much more recognition than I ever dreamed it would get. I got an Emmy nomination and the film got nominated for an Emmy for best TV film. We didn’t win, but I had no clue I would ever even be nominated. It was fun because it was all such a surprise.
I just edited a new TV series that started airing here called Recovery Road. It was a lot of work, but it was really fun to work on as well. After all these years, my goal is to work with nice, talented people, who respect the work I do and the creativity and skill I bring to the project.
The workflow on every project changes, but it all seems to be heading in the same direction. There is no longer a processing lab between production and the editing room. Now, there is a DIT (Digital imaging technician) on most sets. That person works with the cinematographer to make sure the digital camera settings are getting the best possible image out of the camera. Once they’ve shot enough material to fill a portable drive, the drive comes directly to my assistant in the editing room. My assistant then transcodes the raw footage into Avid media and organizes scene bins for me. I then begin to edit the scenes and try as much as possible to edit as quickly as they shoot. But it’s becoming more difficult to stay caught up to camera, because digital footage is inexpensive to shoot, so they shoot so much more footage than they used to! On Recovery Road, most days I would have four or five hours of footage everyday. I can barely look at all that footage and make notes, let alone get the scenes cut everyday. But that is how the process is going, so editors manage as well as they can and ask for more time to finish an editor’s cut if they need it.
Recovery Road was the last project I did and the workflow was as I described it above. My next project is a feature that begins shooting in March. It’s called «The Bachelors» and stars J.K. Simmons from the film «Whiplash» and the French actor Julie Delpy. Because my assistant hasn’t been hired officially yet, I don’t know what the workflow will be, but I can guess it will be similar to the one on Recovery Road. I believe drives will come directly from the set to the editing room. They’re shooting here in Los Angeles, which makes everything easier and faster.
I was working on a TV series called «Judging Amy» when I interviewed for «Legally Blonde.» It happened that one of the producers on «Judging Amy» was a mentor to one of the producers on «Legally Blonde.» So when I interviewed and found out those two people had a connection, I went to the «Judging Amy» producer and told him, «Joe, I’m sad to tell you I want to leave the show. Plus, I’m going to ask you to help me do it.» I will never forget how nice he was. He called the «Legally Blonde» producer who he had mentored and said lots of nice things about me and when they offered me the job, he wished me luck and told me to go do it.» It was very exciting. I found out I got the movie when my agent called to tell me. I was so happy; I went to my daughter’s school volleyball game that afternoon and brought the «Legally Blonde» script with me. When she looked over, I held up the script and smiled really big, so she knew I got the job.
I am always looking for the tiny moments that make me feel something. Sometimes, something very subtle, such as a look in an actor’s eye, or a subtle delivery of a line, or a good reaction makes a huge difference. I love to find the hidden gems that would otherwise be missed. I love when I find a line reading that makes me laugh, or a great reaction that I think is hilarious. I learned about comedy when I did The Brady Bunch sequel. I had never cut comedy before and I learned quite a bit from the actor Shelly Long. I learned that often the best laugh is not on the person saying the line, but on the person reacting to what’s being said. Shelly Long was a brilliant reactor and I always knew I could cut to her and find something wonderful.
The same goes for drama. I look for the internal rhythm that lives in each scene and I try to edit to that rhythm. Or, I try to help create the rhythm I want. I had a composer tell me once that I’m the most «musical editor» she had worked with. My editing rhythm just seemed to fall in place with the musical rhythm she created in her score cues. Maybe it’s because I played the piano for 13 years and sang in the school choir through my entire education, but I feel a sense of music and rhythm in scenes. I don’t like it when scenes feel «herky jerky» or out of rhythm. I like them to feel smooth and effortless.
I would say you should try to edit as much as possible. Do things for free; edit student films; shoot your own films on a Go Pro or something and practice cutting them together to tell a good story. Play with edits to see what works and what doesn’t. You’ll find that a cut you thought would never work, gives something great energy or creates a certain feeling. Don’t be afraid to experiment and try crazy things. That’s the beauty of digital editing; you can undo anything that sucks!
Successful editors rarely forget how they got their
start and are usually quite willing to pay back the favor to others coming along now.
I encourage people if they have the money to buy an editing system like Avid for their computers. Avid makes systems somewhat affordable for students and Avid has great forums to answer questions. Don’t be afraid to ask questions too. Editors are a very helpful bunch. We rose up through the ranks only because people helped us along. Successful editors rarely forget how they got their start and are usually quite willing to pay back the favor to others coming along now.
Also, watch movies! Watch movies for their editing. Decide what are your favorite editing styles. It’s easy to watch big action movies and think the editing is amazing, but there is also wonderful editing in slower paced movies. Sometimes those movies are an even bigger challenge. One of my favorite examples is the opening scene in Inglourious Basterds. It’s the farmer and the Christophe Waltz character sitting at a table in the house. All they do is sit and talk. But because of the brilliant editing (by Sally Menke,) I was both laughing and terrified at the same time. That’s amazing editing. Action editing is flashy and fun (and really fun to do) but quiet dialogue, or funny dialogue scenes are equally challenging and rewarding.
So… go edit and go watch movies!!
Thanks to Anita Brandt-Burgoyne for the interview we really appreciate, let’s wish a very successful career for the immediate future. This is the first blog for the «CUT & TALK» series in both spanish and English languages. We hope you enjoyed.
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