Where to Start

So the Editing begins. Usually the first step is to organize the footage into some manageable system. On the first couple of movies, I created large folders that contained Scenes 1 through 20, then 21 through 50 and so on. This meant combing through the days footage and moving the clips to the appropriate folder.

And on those films, I was bound by the 20 minute rule-- in film, usually the largest working reel is a 2000 foot reel. That's about 22 minutes. So the film was edited by reel. Maybe they were five or six reel movies. And yes, that means you could not continue music or such across the reel breaks. You had to place your reel breaks very strategically.

The funny thing was on Imposter, my first total HD, non-film, film, I still had to do "reels" because the coloring software has a limit in the number of clips you can send over. And it just so happens to be about the number of clips you'd have in about 20 minutes of movie.

So now the current project. The data management people have not yet finished syncing everything, so I'm left with just viewing and note taking for the moment. All the footage looks great so far. I find it hard because I want to start clicking and dragging.

On the last few movies, I ended up editing some particular scenes first. Maybe I had questions about the scene and wanted to make sure it worked. Or maybe I just couldn't wait to see how the scene played... giddy with excitement to watch it. On Imposter, I also enjoyed the music segments and spent time early on those.

And on Striking Range and Bloodlines, we needed trailers asap, so I found myself cutting a trailer before the film was edited. So not sure yet exactly where I'll begin. I'm waiting on the guys to tell me what I can do at this point.