This week we begin the Avid Edit Lab module, continuing to learn how to
use Avid as we cut a movie from footage we shot a month ago. I'm
finding it very difficult to get this. I'm looking forward to actually
digging into a project where I have to cut it from capture to export.
Be forewarned, if you've already got experience with FCP, it's going to
complicate your brain learning Avid.
The film we shot for the Huntington Theatre demonstrated to me how awkward the color correction tools in FCP 5 are. I know, they're way better in the next upgrade of the Suite.
Apple's Color app is a great deal, amazing deal, but I don't have it
yet. I asked Howard, our instructor to show Laura and I how to use the
color tools in Avid. Cool, powerful
and intuitive, at least to someone who's been color correcting digital
photographs for years. You use curves, not levels, not unlike Photoshop, only different. Of course I'm used to thinking in CMYK, from years of prepress work, so I'm sure it will be bumpy ride to the top.
Scouring the web for new podcasts I discovered one on wood fired pottery. Oten Maxwell's podcast, The Firing Log about using a woodfired Anagama
kiln, was very entertaining for the long drives home from school and it
got me to thinking about the divided lives professional crafts people
create for themselves due to their livelihood. They produce one of a
kind objects in a mass production world, they use 15th century tools in
the 21st century and they work outside the mainstream workplace. How do
you live when your focus is high touch in a high tech world. I got to
wondering how it looks from their perspective.
Our final project
is a 10 minute film, give or take, narrative or documentary, subject of
our choosing. It's still early, but I'm going to investigate this a
little further, so don't be surprised if you read some comments about frits, fluxes and fettling knives.
