Brian Emery

In this seminar, we will focus on the tools of digital editing and how they can be used to achieve the filmmaker’s desired artistic results. Weekly assignments will range from editing a simple narrative scene with limited “coverage” to more complicated work editing scenes from feature films, television, and short films. Class discussion will navigate between the ever-changing technical landscape of postproduction to more aesthetic interests that emerge from various readings, including books such as Walter Murch’s In the Blink of an Eye, Bobbie O’Steen’s The Invisible Cut, and Christopher Bowen’s Grammar of the Edit. Technical instruction will focus on media management, import and organization, utilization of keywords and smart collections, basic editing, split editing, sound editing, color correction and color grading, export, and delivery. The class will balance time between step-by-step technical demonstrations and discussion of postproduction topics and techniques, screening, and critique of student work. This is not a “conference” course and has no conference work or individual conference meeting time outside of class. There will be opportunities during class time for individual attention during some class sessions. This course requires no previous editing experience. All footage will be provided.

This course aims to guide students in editing a rough cut of a film that they intend to picture lock, color grade, and sound mix as the core of their work for the semester. We will begin with a few short, simple editing exercises to get up and running, and then dive into editing a complete five- to 10-minute short film. A rough cut is an opportunity for a new jumping-off point. Dailies will be re-examined for “hidden gems"—little moments that may have been filmed unexpectedly or captured between takes. A deep review of this material can help the editor fully flesh out a moment that the director may have wanted but was not fully achieved on set. Is this shot too long? Is this scene necessary? Is this emotional beat realized? The work of the editor is not just to cut, but to choose when to cut and when to hold a shot. As editor Walter Murch says, “The editor is actually making 24 decisions a second: No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No... Yes!” The aim of this course will be to do a deep-dive into an existing student project and make it as good as it can be. Students will polish a rough cut to picture lock by the midpoint of the semester so that color grading and sound mix can be the focus of the second half of the course and completed in time for the final-class screening. This is not a class that will tolerate the bulk of a student’s work to be completed at the end of the semester; rather, your work must be completed in stages over the course of the semester. Collaboration with students in other filmmaking courses will be encouraged and fostered. The course will use both Adobe Premiere and DaVinci Resolve: Premiere to edit; Resolve for color. Adobe Creative Cloud subscriptions will be provided to students, and the software will be available for use in the Ziskin Digital Media Lab. Students will need a solid state drive. The software is cross-platform and available for both Mac and PC.