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Burbank, CA—It takes more than just having the latest up-to-date equipment to deliver a quality project. Effective communication in post-production is more important now than it’s ever been. With the wide variety of media and codecs being in a constant state of change, it’s crucial to not just stay educated on the latest technology, but to practice good communication skills with clients from the beginning to end of each project.
Los Angeles based Whirled Creative turned to AlphaDogs once again to complete color and audio on the 30 second pre-roll for Fireside Hangouts With The President. “We already had a great experience with AlphaDogs colorist Sean Stack, and positive results in the delivery of Google’s Zeigeist 2012 Year-In-Review, so it was really a no-brainer that AlphaDogs was our facility of choice to complete the finish for Fireside Chats.” said Executive Producer, Jenna Cedicci. The first presidential hangout was held in January of 2012 where five people were selected to ask the president a question during a live Google hangout. Brett Fallentine, Commercial Director at Whirled Creative, likened the event to FDR’s Fireside Chats, thus coining the term “Fireside Hangouts.”
Cedicci and AlphaDogs colorist Sean Stack teamed up once again to decide the best approach for completing the finish on the picture. “Sean is a pleasure to work with. His knowledge and experience help us in achieving the best possible results,” said Cedicci. Fireside Hangouts required Stack to work with footage from a variety of locations throughout the United States. The clips included an urban street setting, a University campus, workers building a housing subdivision, the view from inside a hotel room, and finally a typical office. “This project was a great example on how important it is to communicate with the client,” said Stack. “My first instinct was to have the shots flow together with consistent color tone from scene to scene. But that was the opposite of Director Fallentine’s idea, who chose those shots with the intention to have the viewer jump around from place to place all over America.” To create the desired look and offer appeal to a variety of audiences, Stack added different tones and contrasts to give each setting its own personality and feel. Stack comments, “I may have gone down the wrong road without the consultation and discussion that took place with the director.”
AlphaDogs Audio Mixer Curtis Fritsch was in charge of fixing some tricky audio clips that included various sound bytes from the original FDR Fireside Chats that spanned a little over a decade. Less than stellar quality of the radio recordings, changes in FDR’s voice as he aged, and evolving technology of the time period, made fixing the audio particularly challenging. Executive Producer Cedecci was quick to recognize the audio mix could be a potentially time-consuming process. “ We alerted Curtis of the issue ahead of time, and when we came in to start on the mix, he had already smoothed it out considerably,” said Cedicci. “He was very passionate about working on the project, and we appreciated his attention to detail. The final result was clean, concise audio, and a beautiful picture. We’ve had two solid experiences with AlphaDogs and look forward to using their services beyond audio and color for future projects.”
Fireside Hangouts With The President is produced by Los Angeles based creative agency, Whirled. To view the chat in its entirety please visit: getwhirled.com/work/fireside-hangouts/ More of Whirled Creative’s work can be seen at www.getwhirled.com/
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About AlphaDogs: Founded in 2002 by acclaimed editor and colorist Terence Curren, AlphaDogs is an independently owned post-production facility located in the center of Burbank's Media District. AlphaDogs' skilled team brings a dynamic combination of creative talent and technical expertise to clients' projects. Paying extra attention to detail, AlphaDogs prides itself on delivering the quality of a large post-production facility with the personal attention of a small boutique. State-of-the-art editing bays, color correction, audio mixing, motion graphics, visual effects, production offices and equipment rentals are available. Since 2003, AlphaDogs has been giving back to the post-production community through its Editors' Lounge series of discussion panels and product demonstrations. To learn more visit www.alphadogs.tv and www.editorslounge.com.
Burbank, CA—AlphaDogs Post is excited to announce the premiere of the new film by Director Junya Sakino at SXSW South by Southwest beginning on Friday, March 8, 2013. Sake-Bomb is the comedic story of a sarcastic and self-deprecating Asian American who takes his naive Japanese cousin on a road trip along the California coast to find his ex-girlfriend, while meeting colorful groups of characters along the way. sakebombmovie.com
Director Sakino’s decision to use AlphaDogs services to complete the audio mix came after consulting with Audio Mixer, Curtis Fritsch. “When I talked to Curtis about the film, he was very supportive and confident he could fix the problem areas within the tight deadline we had finish the mix. Though it was my first time in working with AlphaDogs, I felt very comfortable in bringing my project to the facility.” Sakino and Fritsch worked collaboratively from the beginning to figure out the most efficient approach in completing the job in a speedy manner, without compromising the audio quality. “Director Sakino pointed out some problem areas, as well as details on how the film was shot on days where they had problems with location sound. This really helped speed the process along and helped me determine the workflow ahead of time,” said Fritsch.
Using Pro Tools HD Fritsch imported the audio from the picture and identified where the most troublesome areas were. Director Sakino had specific concerns about a scene that was shot outdoors in windy conditions. Combinations of Izotope RX plugins combined with the Cedar DNS One were used on the best takes to remove wind noise. Sakino comments, “I originally thought we would need to ADR the entire scene because you could not hear what the characters were saying due to the wind. Curtis was able to remove all wind interference, and saved us the cost of having to do ADR.”
New music from the composer was also added near the end of the mix. Waves Renaissance Compressor and EQ were used in fixing the timing and audio levels allowing the higher quality music from the composer to really shine with the other elements in the film. “Curtis was very enthusiastic and we worked together well. Before I came in, he had done a couple of passes so it was easier for me to get to the part where I wanted to spend time fixing,” said Sakino. Pro Tools HD ability to record multiple audio stems at the same time allowed Fritsch to record the different elements all at once instead of one at a time. Delivery of the film was completed on time and within budget. “Paul DeCham, General Manager of AlphaDogs really cared about the project, and was very accommodating in providing a good pipeline between Curtis and I,” said Sakino. “They did not treat this as just another job, everyone at the facility took pride in their work and I was very happy with the final delivery.”
For a full list of screening dates at SXSW South by Southwest visit: sakebombmovie.com/screenings/
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About AlphaDogs: Founded in 2002 by acclaimed editor and colorist Terence Curren, AlphaDogs is an independently owned post-production facility located in the center of Burbank's Media District. AlphaDogs' skilled team brings a dynamic combination of creative talent and technical expertise to clients' projects. Paying extra attention to detail, AlphaDogs prides itself on delivering the quality of a large post-production facility with the personal attention of a small boutique. State-of-the- art editing bays, color correction, audio mixing, motion graphics, visual effects, production offices and equipment rentals are available. Since 2003, AlphaDogs has been giving back to the post-production community through its Editors' Lounge series of discussion panels and product demonstrations. To learn more visit www.alphadogs.tv and www.editorslounge.com.
Burbank, CA—AlphaDogs Post Production is pleased to announce they have completed work on the AFI Thesis Film, The Trestle At Pope Lick Creek. Based on the play by Naomi Wallace, the film is a coming-of-age story with a wicked twist that reaches into the depths of a nation and asks, "what lies beneath?" The film premieres at the American Film Institute on Saturday, March 9th with two screenings at 8:00pm and 9:30pm. www.trestlethemovie.com
AFI directing graduate and Director of the film Vuk Mitrovic, came to AlphaDogs upon recommendation of a friend’s client who had used the facility for their project. “Other companies I contacted didn’t seem to care much about the film,” said Mitrovic “At AlphaDogs they worked on finding the best solution first, and then we easily found common ground on everything else, including budget. It became my second home and I could go there anytime of the day without an appointment to work on the film.”
Sean Williams, VP of Design at AlphaDogs, worked on a number of visual effects for the film. Plans to shoot interior scenes on a location set involving a window looking outdoors, were scrapped for a stage set with the use of a jury-rigged green screen that didn’t have optimal lighting. This presented a unique challenge during post-production, as the cinematographer had also used several close, medium, and wide set ups with dramatic depth of field. Using After effects, Williams was able to key and rotoscope background exterior plates into the interior scenes carefully matching focal blur, scale and camera movement while preserving details in the scene, as well as the characters’ hair and clothing. “Working with Director Mitrovic was a breeze. Initial discussions and ongoing communication went very smoothly,” said Williams. Another particularly challenging scene required Williams to match two locked-off shots where a character is stepping off the tracks, just as a train roars by. Unintended camera drifts in one of the plates made the compositing quite complicated. Williams comments, “Once again, I used After Effects and a great deal of rotoscoping and tracking, matching the main character of the film into the train plate. I was able to complete about 31 shots and meet the client's high expectations, while staying within the budget and time constraints.”
The project was lensed with the RED camera and offlined in Avid Media Composer 6.0 . Then founder and lead colorist at AlphaDogs, Terence Curren, worked collaboratively with Director Mitrovic and Director of Photography Yong Jin Kim, to achieve the desired look for the film. “The Director and DP had a very specific vision of the look they wanted, and it took some work to really dial in each scene,” said Curren. “One major issue we dealt with was a series of pickup shots that were done months later when all the green vegetation had died off. This took a combination of tricks to hide, but in the end it isn't noticeable.” With Avid now offering native support of Avid RAW files, Curren chose to complete all the color correction in Avid Symphony. Curren comments, “We did a lot of work affecting each part of the frame using the "Spot Color Effect" which allows you to color correct isolated sections of the frame without affecting the rest. This is great for focusing attention to specific areas, or fixing uneven exposure in the frame.”
AlphaDogs Audio Mixer, Curtis Fritsch, was in charge of the audio mix. Inconsistent background noises were a hurdle with some scenes being shot at different times of the year. A good part of the film was also recorded next to a river with airplanes passing over on occasion. To fix the drop out in the audio, and keep the scene transitions smooth, Fritsch used Pro Tools HD and AlphaDogs extensive sound library. Mitrovic comments, “The project was always the most important thing. The quality of the product was never compromised, which is great, and rare these days.”
Since the train was essentially a character in the film, it had to have it’s own unique voice. Making the train sound loud and menacing without distracting from the characters dialogue and film scoring proved challenging. “In the final 5.1 mix we achieved the desired result giving the film a rich sound that would not have been possible without Director Mitrovic’s help and collaboration during the post-production process” Fritsch said.
To see more of Director Mitrovic’s work visit www.vuk.la
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About AlphaDogs: Founded in 2002 by acclaimed editor and colorist Terence Curren, AlphaDogs is an independently owned post-production facility located in the center of Burbank's Media District. AlphaDogs' skilled team brings a dynamic combination of creative talent and technical expertise to clients' projects. Paying extra attention to detail, AlphaDogs prides itself on delivering the quality of a large post-production facility with the personal attention of a small boutique. State-of-the- art editing bays, color correction, audio mixing, motion graphics, visual effects, production offices and equipment rentals are available. Since 2003, AlphaDogs has been giving back to the post-production community through its Editors' Lounge series of discussion panels and product demonstrations. To learn more visit www.alphadogs.tv and www.editorslounge.com.
