HD’S Technical Versatility Cuts Costs
When Polish director Edward Porembny visited his roots to shoot a bittersweet examination of middle-age, little did he know he would be recording the demise of his beloved Poland Or that he would blaze a technical trail with his use of High Definition.
Edward says: “I use all formats, from DV Cam up. But for Inheritance we wanted to avoid the well-lit ‘plastic’ look of film. We compared the cost of shooting on Super 16 and then blowing it up to 35mm with shooting it on HD and transferring it onto 35mm. The quotes were very close. Looking for the best deals (including hiring the equipment from VMI) we opted for HD. And lucky we did , because immediately we could generate the digital masters and copies for presentation to the broadcasters and sales agents, without an expensive transfer to 35mm”.
“With HD, while you are moving from one location to another, you can see what you are getting straight away - a big advantage over film.”
“If your camera assistant is intelligent, while you shoot on HD you record your footage simultaneously on time-coded mini-DV tapes . So you have a cheap digital recording which is immediately ready for editing for film, avoiding a costly transfer from HD to DigiBeta for editing.”
‘Using a home-editing system like HD FINAL CUT PRO, you then edit your whole film in your bedroom for approximately £3,000. First you edit off-line off the DV tapes and then conform this edit back to HD using an HD-enabled system.Then you record this onto an HD tape. Correctly done, it saves a fortune, avoiding rent, transfer and expensive post-production facilities.”
“You still have to colour-correct, sound edit, and mix or dub. Then you make a final master copy in HD, and one in DigiBeta for the international market. Once you sell your film, you can transfer it to 35mm”
“No-one teaches you how to save money, but VMI were really helpful with their advice and quality equipment. HD makes huge savings : tape costs about £25/hr, as opposed to £6-700/hr for 16 mm film, plus the processing. But you need people who know how to use HD,or you end up paying the same as if you had shot on super 16mm and blown it up to 35mm. Correcting HD mistakes in post can be very expensive.”
“Shoot as near as possible to what you want, and get the best possible monitor . Shoot the same scene several times, to avoid post-production changes. And shop around: not all Facilities Houses do everything.”
