The Post Production Stage

Moving forward into the rough cut for the summer session of the shooting, we will be looking to make sure we have everything we have shot in a rough assembly for the following two reasons.

a: We'll be able to see the pace and quality of the shots and thus learn from experience should anything need changing for the second half of shooting.

b: Find out if any re-shoots will be needed before it gets to late.

As you will know we have already followed through with the odd re-shoot on the models and then again back at the Chichester shoot location, scanning through the ruhes when cutting the trailer helped us find these problems and make the decision before the light became to dark (if you get me).

As we have been shooting in HDV which is DV in a high resolution (1440x1080 Pixels) compared to (720x576) the computer theoretically needs to be four times faster to get the same speed. Luckily however theory isn't always real life, and the recording mode of the HDV cameras means that the same bit rate of data is recorded as Standard DV and therefore although the pictures is four times better the computer won't struggle so much. Normal DV is normally imported into PC's as .avi files or onto Macs as .mov (depending on your editing program). We have decided to use a PC to edit Roanoke due to my preference of the new Premiere Pro 2.0 over Final Cut Pro.

Although I adore macs and how they work sadly I have never been fond of Final Cut Pro and as I grew using the basic Adobe editing systems to now the more professional standard I'm able work around 4 or 5 times as fast.

The new system is a dual core 3.4 processor, 2GB of Ram (that we'll eventually upgrade), and 800GB of disk space (that depending on the level of CGI into the production may need to be upgraded as well). If your looking to buy yourself some new equipment then these stats would be ideal, although not necessary. For anyone with a PC wanting to edit HDV then it is possible on computers with processors of 2.4 but you will need to purchase (or at least try) the Cineform codec Aspect HD that compresses the video files into a format the computer can handle (without loosing any of the quality). We simple acquired the product to edit the rough cut and rushes of Roanoke The Lost Colony from PC World UK, however you can buy custom PC's etc...

In this day and age you could go to an edit house and pay in excess of £100 an hour to use their facilities, or just sit at your own computer and make your own...we choose the later.

If you want any more questions in regards to this process, or if your thinking about buying your own system and want to know what you can get away with, I know the odd thing, so drop me a line...or if your just interested about how it all works. E-mail me Here