I GOT PROMOTED TO AN ASSISTANT EDITOR!!!!!
My cousin Kara Fischer had the fabulous idea of documenting this monumental moment so I made a video to share my excitement with you.
Thanks for watching! =D
Showing posts with label Entertainment Industry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Entertainment Industry. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Digitizer's Job
Happy Easter!
First I want to congratulate all my friends who participated in Campus Movie Fest this year at Indiana University. I've been watching all your films and they always blow me away. I wish I could have been there to see them all on the big screen, as well as seeing my best friend Kathryn Begle host the show! All of you are so creative and talented, I know you will go on to do big things.
I love hearing about people landing internships here in LA for the summer! Congratulations to you all as well. I look forward to seeing more Hoosiers in Hollywood!! =)
As for you students graduating in less than a month, (AHHH! I know right? Crazy.) don't think you need to have everything figured out before that graduation date. YOU DON'T! Yes it is scary. Yes it is stressful, but what makes you think you'll have life figured out by the age of 22? Breath. It'll all work out. I've been talking to people about the transition from graduating to moving out here. I won't say it is easy, because it is not. It is very scary and stressful, but if I can do it...you can too. I promise.
I've also been dealing with my own stresses at work lately. As a digitizer, I work on all the shows of the entire company. If we have 5 shows in production, then I get shipments of XDCAM discs for 5 different shows. Recently I have been the ONLY digitizer for the company, which is a lot of work for only one person. One day my boss sent me home in the morning when I was sick. I think that's when it hit people, that I'm the only person that knows how to do my job, and without me they don't have anything to work on. One co-worker was rushing out of my work room then stopped and said, "You know you are the heart of this company, right? Without you the company stands still." Lots of pressure for one person, but I like it at the same time.
So, in order to stay on top of things I've been working 6 days a week. Let me give you a perspective of what I dealt with this past week. Before Wednesday I got 15 boxes of tapes (XDCAM discs, we still call them tapes). One box of tapes holds around 50 tapes. So after doing the math I got around 750 tapes just this week. I was swimming in tapes, literally.
A received my first compliment recently from an Editor who was being an Assistant Editor for The Real World for a few weeks. He told me, "Ashley, you are good at what you do. Very soon an AE will move up to Editor and then you will be bumped up to being an Assistant Editor. You can quickly see the people you can count on and put the pressure on. So keep up the good work." It made my day. You aren't given many compliments in this industry. Usually silence is golden. If you hear nothing back, you must have done your job right. When I first started being a digitizer I was not good. I made many mistakes and didn't understand how to do many things. So in the past 5 months I've been trying to prove myself. I think I'm finally getting there.
Keep your goals high and your head higher.
First I want to congratulate all my friends who participated in Campus Movie Fest this year at Indiana University. I've been watching all your films and they always blow me away. I wish I could have been there to see them all on the big screen, as well as seeing my best friend Kathryn Begle host the show! All of you are so creative and talented, I know you will go on to do big things.
I love hearing about people landing internships here in LA for the summer! Congratulations to you all as well. I look forward to seeing more Hoosiers in Hollywood!! =)
As for you students graduating in less than a month, (AHHH! I know right? Crazy.) don't think you need to have everything figured out before that graduation date. YOU DON'T! Yes it is scary. Yes it is stressful, but what makes you think you'll have life figured out by the age of 22? Breath. It'll all work out. I've been talking to people about the transition from graduating to moving out here. I won't say it is easy, because it is not. It is very scary and stressful, but if I can do it...you can too. I promise.
So, in order to stay on top of things I've been working 6 days a week. Let me give you a perspective of what I dealt with this past week. Before Wednesday I got 15 boxes of tapes (XDCAM discs, we still call them tapes). One box of tapes holds around 50 tapes. So after doing the math I got around 750 tapes just this week. I was swimming in tapes, literally.
A received my first compliment recently from an Editor who was being an Assistant Editor for The Real World for a few weeks. He told me, "Ashley, you are good at what you do. Very soon an AE will move up to Editor and then you will be bumped up to being an Assistant Editor. You can quickly see the people you can count on and put the pressure on. So keep up the good work." It made my day. You aren't given many compliments in this industry. Usually silence is golden. If you hear nothing back, you must have done your job right. When I first started being a digitizer I was not good. I made many mistakes and didn't understand how to do many things. So in the past 5 months I've been trying to prove myself. I think I'm finally getting there.
Keep your goals high and your head higher.
Saturday, January 14, 2012
From Final Cut to Avid
Hello Kids!
Hope you had a great Holiday Season. I was fortunate enough to fly home Dec 20 until Jan 2nd to visit family and friends for Christmas. Sadly, my sister was sick the entire duration I was home and gave me a cold as well. So I arrived back with a nasty cold... It was snowing as my dad drove me to the airport early in the morning on January 2nd and I arrived in Los Angeles to 85 degree weather. It was incredibly warm. Definitely great to come back to!
When I look back to the year 2011...it was a BIG year for me. I dealt with the most stressful semester of my life, graduated from college, landed my internship, moved to LA, started a new life, got my first real job in the industry AND got promoted once! I say it was a great year. I'm looking forward to 2012!
There are big things happening at Bunim/Murray Productions starting year this year. As most of you know, the professional entertainment industry is pretty upset with Apple for releasing Final Cup Pro X which replaces Final Cut Pro 7. They no longer sell or provide services for FCP 7 which forced my boss, Mark Raudonis, to make a decision on what BMP should do. FCP X is designed for the consumer "amateur" editors which is a MUCH LARGER market. Apple would rather make more money selling to the normal consumer than help lead the way in the professional editing market. SO! Mark has decided to switch to Avid Media Composer 6.
As you can see the editing interface is different. (You can change the interface colors to whatever your heart desires in the AVID interface). The way of editing on these programs are different as well, but easy to adjust. The shortcuts or keystrokes are the main difference between the two. My way of doing my job as a Digitizer will change completely when we switch over to AVID. In the next few weeks I will be re-training and learning how to do everything I do now, but ALL in the AVID. Unlike FCP, I will digitize, and uprez footage in AVID. FCP does not have this ability. I always had to import with XDCAM transfer and then use Compressor to put it in offline format (low rez quality). This all may sound like boring technical stuff for me, but many of us are worried about the switch slowing down Post Production until everyone is adjusted to AVID after a few months.
For those of you film nerds that would be interested in reading some articles about Bunim/Murray Production's switch over to AVID here are 2 links:
We were featured on AVID's website (My boss is quoted): http://www.avid.com/US/press-room/Bunim-Murray-Selects-Avid
My boss did another article (Goofy Pictures included): http://magazine.creativecow.net/article/real-world-editing
Hope you had a great Holiday Season. I was fortunate enough to fly home Dec 20 until Jan 2nd to visit family and friends for Christmas. Sadly, my sister was sick the entire duration I was home and gave me a cold as well. So I arrived back with a nasty cold... It was snowing as my dad drove me to the airport early in the morning on January 2nd and I arrived in Los Angeles to 85 degree weather. It was incredibly warm. Definitely great to come back to!
When I look back to the year 2011...it was a BIG year for me. I dealt with the most stressful semester of my life, graduated from college, landed my internship, moved to LA, started a new life, got my first real job in the industry AND got promoted once! I say it was a great year. I'm looking forward to 2012!
There are big things happening at Bunim/Murray Productions starting year this year. As most of you know, the professional entertainment industry is pretty upset with Apple for releasing Final Cup Pro X which replaces Final Cut Pro 7. They no longer sell or provide services for FCP 7 which forced my boss, Mark Raudonis, to make a decision on what BMP should do. FCP X is designed for the consumer "amateur" editors which is a MUCH LARGER market. Apple would rather make more money selling to the normal consumer than help lead the way in the professional editing market. SO! Mark has decided to switch to Avid Media Composer 6.
As you can see the editing interface is different. (You can change the interface colors to whatever your heart desires in the AVID interface). The way of editing on these programs are different as well, but easy to adjust. The shortcuts or keystrokes are the main difference between the two. My way of doing my job as a Digitizer will change completely when we switch over to AVID. In the next few weeks I will be re-training and learning how to do everything I do now, but ALL in the AVID. Unlike FCP, I will digitize, and uprez footage in AVID. FCP does not have this ability. I always had to import with XDCAM transfer and then use Compressor to put it in offline format (low rez quality). This all may sound like boring technical stuff for me, but many of us are worried about the switch slowing down Post Production until everyone is adjusted to AVID after a few months.For those of you film nerds that would be interested in reading some articles about Bunim/Murray Production's switch over to AVID here are 2 links:
We were featured on AVID's website (My boss is quoted): http://www.avid.com/US/press-room/Bunim-Murray-Selects-Avid
My boss did another article (Goofy Pictures included): http://magazine.creativecow.net/article/real-world-editing
Thursday, November 24, 2011
What is a Digitizer?
Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!
This is my first time ever being away from home during the holidays. It's tough, but makes me look forward to flying home for Christmas! In the meantime...I wanted to keep myself busy today.
Most people heard about my promotion, yes? When I tell them I'm a "Digitizer" they don't really know what that is. So! Let me explain.
I'm pretty sure that most shows/features have their own Digitizer that works specifically on THAT show. This is where I'm different...I work on ALLLLLL the shows (that are in production right now). Keeps me busy.
Now, say hello to my little friend. These XDCam discs have become my best friends since starting my new job. I work with these A LOT. This is the disc the Camera Operators film onto. (They don't have to be Sony, some are Maxwell and Fujifilm).
Okay, so I'm pretty much STEP ONE of Post Production. I have people from Production bring me these discs (sometimes as few as 4 to duffel bags full of them). First I have to label all those disc covers you see above. I have to write the date, the disc number consisting of Camera A, B, C, etc and the number, and the specific show. So, in the end the disc will have a name like 0910B03RW26. Which means, Real World Season 26, filmed on Sep. 10th camera B disc 3. Get it?
Now I have to keep all these in order or everything goes wrong. I have to label the disc correctly, and type in that disc name multiple times into the system when I digitize or proxy. Little mistakes mess up the entire process like accidentally typing an O instead of a 0. I know, you're like, "Huh?" Lets back up.
Next, I digitize, which means I ingest allllllll those tapes into a XDCAM deck. These decks are about $3,700 a piece and I have 13 of them to work with. It makes digitizing the tapes much faster. These decks just read exactly what is filmed onto the discs and puts it onto the computer. They film in HD 1920 x 1080 (which is what you guys watch at home on your TV). Since HD is great quality it is a HUGE file and takes up a lot of space on our servers. So, I have to then, transfer all the High Rez footage onto the render server computer (which can take awhile). Then use Compressor to make them into Lo Rez quality which is 384 x 216. MUCH SMALLER FILE SIZE! We do this because it takes up a lot less space. The Offline Editors edit in low rez quality until the show is Locked and it moves to the Online Editors. Then they (sometimes the digizters) have to digitize JUST the necessary clips from each disc in the locked cut to do all the technical fixes like color correcting, blurring, beeping out stuff, etc. Once it is all compressed I put all the low rez footage onto the appropriate server for that particular show.
Some shows film a TON of footage like The Real World, Bad Girls Club and The Challenge. Those shows have Loggers (see previous blog for explanation of a "Logger") and they watch an EVEN SMALLER file size of the same footage. So I have to make a proxy file of all those same discs, except I can only do it 1 disc at a time. Luckily, since the file size is so tiny that the process goes by pretty fast!
So, pretty much a Digitizer is a Professional Multitaker and Organizer. It can get very confusing (especially at 2am) when I'm digitizing, proxying, and compressing, multiple different shows at the same time. It is a huge responsibility because I'm in charge of organizing and handing over all the footage to the Assistant Editors to begin Post Production.
Hope all that made sense!
I love you for reading this.
Until my next blog....
This is my first time ever being away from home during the holidays. It's tough, but makes me look forward to flying home for Christmas! In the meantime...I wanted to keep myself busy today.
Most people heard about my promotion, yes? When I tell them I'm a "Digitizer" they don't really know what that is. So! Let me explain.
Now, say hello to my little friend. These XDCam discs have become my best friends since starting my new job. I work with these A LOT. This is the disc the Camera Operators film onto. (They don't have to be Sony, some are Maxwell and Fujifilm).
Okay, so I'm pretty much STEP ONE of Post Production. I have people from Production bring me these discs (sometimes as few as 4 to duffel bags full of them). First I have to label all those disc covers you see above. I have to write the date, the disc number consisting of Camera A, B, C, etc and the number, and the specific show. So, in the end the disc will have a name like 0910B03RW26. Which means, Real World Season 26, filmed on Sep. 10th camera B disc 3. Get it?
Now I have to keep all these in order or everything goes wrong. I have to label the disc correctly, and type in that disc name multiple times into the system when I digitize or proxy. Little mistakes mess up the entire process like accidentally typing an O instead of a 0. I know, you're like, "Huh?" Lets back up.
Next, I digitize, which means I ingest allllllll those tapes into a XDCAM deck. These decks are about $3,700 a piece and I have 13 of them to work with. It makes digitizing the tapes much faster. These decks just read exactly what is filmed onto the discs and puts it onto the computer. They film in HD 1920 x 1080 (which is what you guys watch at home on your TV). Since HD is great quality it is a HUGE file and takes up a lot of space on our servers. So, I have to then, transfer all the High Rez footage onto the render server computer (which can take awhile). Then use Compressor to make them into Lo Rez quality which is 384 x 216. MUCH SMALLER FILE SIZE! We do this because it takes up a lot less space. The Offline Editors edit in low rez quality until the show is Locked and it moves to the Online Editors. Then they (sometimes the digizters) have to digitize JUST the necessary clips from each disc in the locked cut to do all the technical fixes like color correcting, blurring, beeping out stuff, etc. Once it is all compressed I put all the low rez footage onto the appropriate server for that particular show.
Some shows film a TON of footage like The Real World, Bad Girls Club and The Challenge. Those shows have Loggers (see previous blog for explanation of a "Logger") and they watch an EVEN SMALLER file size of the same footage. So I have to make a proxy file of all those same discs, except I can only do it 1 disc at a time. Luckily, since the file size is so tiny that the process goes by pretty fast!
So, pretty much a Digitizer is a Professional Multitaker and Organizer. It can get very confusing (especially at 2am) when I'm digitizing, proxying, and compressing, multiple different shows at the same time. It is a huge responsibility because I'm in charge of organizing and handing over all the footage to the Assistant Editors to begin Post Production.
Hope all that made sense!
I love you for reading this.
Until my next blog....
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Best Ink
October 18, 2011
I just got home from work. That's right kids, no need to adjust the clocks on your computer. They are correct. I work 3pm - midnight each day as a Post Production Assistant for a new reality competition show called Best Ink. The show will air on Oxygen sometime this Winter. Unfortunately, I am unable to share many things with you guys, even the logo, because it is considered confidential as of right now.
BUT! I am able to share with you the information that is already online. The best (and most accurate) article I found about my show can be found here:
http://www.cinemablend.com/television/Oxygen-Orders-Up-Tattoo-Competition-Series-Best-Ink-34927.html
There you can read about how many artists are competing for the prize, the show's host and the set judges. So far I must say, the show is very interesting. I do recommend everyone to watch it, even if it is on a woman's station like Oxygen. This is their first show to actually have male characters. Crazy right?!
So, you are wondering..."But Ashley what do YOU do on the show and why the HECK do you work so late?!" Great question. I work 3 - midnight because I take the cuts from the Editors after they are finished and write a breakdown of what happens. Pretty much I type everything that happens in the cut so the Executive Producers at Bunim/Murray can read along while watching and send back their notes. It can take hours to type up a breakdown from scratch and update one after the Editors have made many revisions after each cut. It's great for me, because I want to be an Editor, to see the MANY changes an episode goes through in Post. I see the show from the string out (a very rough timeline of various shots, interview bites, etc to make the story) to the locked episode that the audience will see.
One day while watching the breakdown, I noticed the Editors were only using a font for the lower thirds for the show. What are lower thirds? I'm glad you asked. Let's use Project Runway for example. The blue box that shows Anya's information is placed in the lower third of the screen. (Get it?..."lower thirds") So, the Editors were just using a plain font to put the name of the contestants for our show as a temp lower third. I decided to create lower thirds for my show for fun. My Post Supervisor saw me working on them one day at work and liked them a lot. He wanted me to keep working on them so he could show the Co-Executive Producers. They liked them and agreed to use them as temp lower thirds for our show! This is huge!! I was so excited. Oxygen would see my lower thirds! Well, since then everyone has discovered that I am pretty good with Photoshop and have come to me with many, many Photoshop projects to create things for our show. Since then I have made all NEW lower thirds for our show. (I hope to show you my original ones after the show airs because I put so much work into them, and I know they will not be used). The Co-Executive producers call me into their offices quite often now to create things like, a new logo for our show, a mortise (a border used around the video), different lower thirds, a show screen shot (that would be shown for 3 seconds at the end of each episode), and other things I probably shouldn't mention because I'd give things away!
All in all, I'm pumped to have gone the extra mile to make myself stand out and be noticed by my bosses. It's amazing to be more involved in my show than a regular Post PA would be. I am done working on Best Ink on December 2nd. We'll see what happens next, and I'll keep you updated if anything else cool happens at work!
Thanks for reading. It means the world to me. =)
I just got home from work. That's right kids, no need to adjust the clocks on your computer. They are correct. I work 3pm - midnight each day as a Post Production Assistant for a new reality competition show called Best Ink. The show will air on Oxygen sometime this Winter. Unfortunately, I am unable to share many things with you guys, even the logo, because it is considered confidential as of right now.
BUT! I am able to share with you the information that is already online. The best (and most accurate) article I found about my show can be found here:
http://www.cinemablend.com/television/Oxygen-Orders-Up-Tattoo-Competition-Series-Best-Ink-34927.html
There you can read about how many artists are competing for the prize, the show's host and the set judges. So far I must say, the show is very interesting. I do recommend everyone to watch it, even if it is on a woman's station like Oxygen. This is their first show to actually have male characters. Crazy right?!
So, you are wondering..."But Ashley what do YOU do on the show and why the HECK do you work so late?!" Great question. I work 3 - midnight because I take the cuts from the Editors after they are finished and write a breakdown of what happens. Pretty much I type everything that happens in the cut so the Executive Producers at Bunim/Murray can read along while watching and send back their notes. It can take hours to type up a breakdown from scratch and update one after the Editors have made many revisions after each cut. It's great for me, because I want to be an Editor, to see the MANY changes an episode goes through in Post. I see the show from the string out (a very rough timeline of various shots, interview bites, etc to make the story) to the locked episode that the audience will see.
One day while watching the breakdown, I noticed the Editors were only using a font for the lower thirds for the show. What are lower thirds? I'm glad you asked. Let's use Project Runway for example. The blue box that shows Anya's information is placed in the lower third of the screen. (Get it?..."lower thirds") So, the Editors were just using a plain font to put the name of the contestants for our show as a temp lower third. I decided to create lower thirds for my show for fun. My Post Supervisor saw me working on them one day at work and liked them a lot. He wanted me to keep working on them so he could show the Co-Executive Producers. They liked them and agreed to use them as temp lower thirds for our show! This is huge!! I was so excited. Oxygen would see my lower thirds! Well, since then everyone has discovered that I am pretty good with Photoshop and have come to me with many, many Photoshop projects to create things for our show. Since then I have made all NEW lower thirds for our show. (I hope to show you my original ones after the show airs because I put so much work into them, and I know they will not be used). The Co-Executive producers call me into their offices quite often now to create things like, a new logo for our show, a mortise (a border used around the video), different lower thirds, a show screen shot (that would be shown for 3 seconds at the end of each episode), and other things I probably shouldn't mention because I'd give things away! All in all, I'm pumped to have gone the extra mile to make myself stand out and be noticed by my bosses. It's amazing to be more involved in my show than a regular Post PA would be. I am done working on Best Ink on December 2nd. We'll see what happens next, and I'll keep you updated if anything else cool happens at work!
Thanks for reading. It means the world to me. =)
Monday, August 29, 2011
"B-e-a-utiful."
August 29, 2011
It has been awhile. Sorry about that. I'm going through many more changes in the past few weeks. On Aug 22nd I finished my internship with The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Foundation. I'm so blessed to have gotten such a prestigious internship. I'm even more thankful to have gotten a job at my host company Bunim/Murray Productions as a Post Production Assistant for a new show called Best Ink. I will start my new job on September 19th. This link talks about the new series that will air on Oxygen and will be produced by BMP. So far it is the only information I am able to find that is released to the public.
http://tv.broadwayworld.com/article/Oxygen_Picks_Up_BEST_INK_20101216_page1
Before my internship ended all the Academy interns attended a Mixer at the JW Marriott/Ritz-Carlton Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. It was an incredible experience networking with all the other intern's and their host company mentors. It was great that my mentor, Mark Raudonis, was able to attend. Here is a picture a photographer snapped of us at the mixer. Mark has been an amazing mentor to me all summer. He took a lot of his time to teach me and push me to succeed. One thing I really respected about him is that he did not hand me a job once my internship was over. He made me go out into the company and find it myself. It gave me such a great feeling of accomplishment when I was able to land my first real job within the entertainment industry on my own.
I was able to go to Universal Studios Hollywood with a group of ATAS interns before the returned to college. My favorite part by far was the Studio Tour ride. I was amazed by all the incredible sets they have on their lot. They have everything you can imagine from, old Western sets, to New York City streets, to the original Psycho (1960 Alfred Hitchcock horror film) hotel set [with a psycho killer included].
For those of you that don't know, I have been a huge Jim Carrey fan since I was young. I grew up watching movies like, Ace Ventura, The Mask, Liar Liar, and continuously quote lines from The Grinch and Bruce Almighty. To my excitement, I was able to see the sets used in Bruce Almighty and The Grinch! This is the city hall set that the ending scene of Bruce Almighty was filmed. You may also recognize it from the iconic film, Back to the Future. (IT'S THE SAME CITY HALL USED FOR BOTH FILMS!!! Blew my mind). Ironically, the houses from the set of The Grinch were located right behind the Psycho hotel set.
Currently I am trying to finalize paper work for a new apartment I hope to move into soon in North Hollywood. I will be living with my friend from Indiana University, Mike Nelson. I'm so excited that many more of my friends from school are making their way out to Los Angeles now. About 8 other students from IU have recently moved to L.A. in the past 2 weeks. Let the Indiana Invasion begin!
It has been awhile. Sorry about that. I'm going through many more changes in the past few weeks. On Aug 22nd I finished my internship with The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Foundation. I'm so blessed to have gotten such a prestigious internship. I'm even more thankful to have gotten a job at my host company Bunim/Murray Productions as a Post Production Assistant for a new show called Best Ink. I will start my new job on September 19th. This link talks about the new series that will air on Oxygen and will be produced by BMP. So far it is the only information I am able to find that is released to the public.
http://tv.broadwayworld.com/article/Oxygen_Picks_Up_BEST_INK_20101216_page1
I was able to go to Universal Studios Hollywood with a group of ATAS interns before the returned to college. My favorite part by far was the Studio Tour ride. I was amazed by all the incredible sets they have on their lot. They have everything you can imagine from, old Western sets, to New York City streets, to the original Psycho (1960 Alfred Hitchcock horror film) hotel set [with a psycho killer included].
Currently I am trying to finalize paper work for a new apartment I hope to move into soon in North Hollywood. I will be living with my friend from Indiana University, Mike Nelson. I'm so excited that many more of my friends from school are making their way out to Los Angeles now. About 8 other students from IU have recently moved to L.A. in the past 2 weeks. Let the Indiana Invasion begin!
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Internship to Full Time Job
The commute to the Bunim/Murray office is about the same from when I was staying in Westwood. It actually easier getting to work by taking the I-405. Now, I take the 134, the 170 and then drive down a road for 5 miles to get to work so I can bypass the insanely busy I-101. LA Traffic! (...yay) Actually, I have been very lucky with my commutes because I am always going the opposite direction than the rush hour traffic, so I can't complain.
My internship is done Monday, August 22. My mentor Mark has talked to me about hiring me after my internship is over. (Awesome, yes). As of now, I haven't told many people because I do not know what my position will be or when I will start. I had a meeting with Lisa from HR who emphasized how things work very last minute. People move around, get promoted and they call people to fill in their position. I'm currently talking to a Post Supervisor I've worked with already about being a Post (PA) Production Assistant for a show, if it is in the budget. We'll see. So, I'll jump up and down once I find out my start date and position. Don't worry...I'll keep you updated.
In the meantime, my "Things To Do" list is very long and filled with life changing events, like finding my OWN apartment here in Los Angeles. I will begin looking by using a website MANY people have told me to use called Westsiderentals.com. You have to pay to use the website, which means it has the most postings and reliable sources. Many people that live in Los Angeles have told me they found all of their apartments by this website. Hope it works for me too!
Saturday, July 23, 2011
The Television Academy Internship
This week has been different at my internship because my mentor, Mark Raudonis has been on vacation. So! I've been on my own at work finding things to do and people to talk to awhile he is away. Also, he gave me a homework assignment while he is gone. He wants to emphasis how critical networking is in the industry. He told me that while he is gone he wants me to network with other people from different companies that work in this industry and bring him back 2 business cards. I was curious how I would achieve this knowing I am at work from 9:30-6:30pm each day, but he said I am allowed to skip my internship for a few hours while networking. I first aimed high and wanted to bring back Mark a really impressive business card. I emailed Sue Neagle, President of HBO (a fellow Indiana University alumni). Surprisingly she emailed me back right away and said she was out of town for the 2 weeks. Bummer. Oh well, I tried. So, I went to Andrea's internship with her one morning at Radical Media. They are a global transmedia company that develops, produces, and distributes award winning documentaries, television, features, commercials, etc. I got to sit down and talk to Tita Poe, Producer of their post house. Surprisingly, I got to also sit down with a freelance producer that Andrea was currently with on a Verizon commercial, Tyler Boylan. Both of them were incredibly nice and took their time to talk to me and answer my questions.
While at the workshop this week I was presented with the news at my internship through The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Foundation has been ranked one of the top 10 internships in the country. I had no idea! So I did a little digging and DUDE! Look what I found:
http://www.vault.com/wps/portal/usa/topteninternship
http://www.vault.com/wps/portal/usa/blogs/entry-detail?blog_id=1461&entry_id=11540
http://money.cnn.com/2006/07/27/pf/internships.fortune/index.htm
After talking to the Post Producer of Project Runway, Glenn Morgan for the past 2 weeks I finally discovered what amazing work he has done! DUDE!!!! He is the music video editor of Madonna's music videos "Material Girl," "Borderline," AND "Like a Virgin." Since MTV was still very new at this time, people were still figuring out the new medium of music videos. No editor had established himself/herself as a music video editor. Glenn Morgan worked with director Mary Lambert on "Borderline" which launched Madonna's career. Teens around the country began dressing like her. Next, Glenn edited her music video for "Like a Virgin" and the INCREDIBLY famous music video for "Material Girl." Glenn was explaining how he had gotten the job for Borderline and eventually onto "Like a Virgin." Both of these music videos came out before I was even born, so I was not familiar with them. So I chimmed in the one earlier music video I had seen. I said, "I do know Madonna's music video for "Material Girl." Glenn responded so nonchalant, "Oh I did that one too." DUDE!!! WHAT?!?! I was so amazed. I had watched this video in my Music Video class at IU, and discussed the production and story elements. How cool is that to have your work studied in a classroom!? For those of you have not seen it here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CQHIP-38jA Keep in mind, this is MTV in 1985.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Starting out as an Intern
June 30, 2011
I started my internship on Monday, June 27th at Bunim/Murray Productions. It was a very long day. I met so many people, and took in so much information. My brain was about to explode. I was so exhausted that night I went to bed at 10:00pm. Tuesday and Wednesday I learned how to be a logger for The Real World: San Diego Season 26. Honestly, I had never even heard of a logger or knew what they do. I thought the room full of kids around my age were others interns. My mentor, Mark Raudonis told me they were loggers and are paid employees.
My definition: log·ger [law-ger, log-er] - noun 1. a person who sits at a computer for long periods of time watching thousands of hours of raw footage while typing what happens in 1 minute increments.
Mark wanted me to understand and learn everything that goes into post production for a show from the bottom up. Loggers are at the very bottom of the ladder, but are EXTREMELY important. They are the only people that watch all the raw footage that no one else every sees. (There is about 5,500 hours of footage shot for one season of The Real World). They have to identify, organize, and keep track of each and every new person/character the Roommates interact with in the show. They also much keep track of every single location the Roommates go to. This makes it very difficult to log a tape of the Roommates at a bar or club. They interact with so many people who never give their names and many of them do not sign releases. This makes it tricky for the loggers to keep track of the hundreds of extra persons in the show. After 2 days of logging tapes from The Real World: San Diego I have a great respect for loggers. They are such an important step in the process of editing reality television. From there, the Dailies editor takes the loggers notes, producer and director's notes to roughly cut the footage of important scenes that happened in ONE day of shooting, hence the word "dailies." Next, the story coordinator, director, producers, and editor can find the story from the footage that is gathered. Eventually the show goes into Offline Editing where all the creative and story lines are edited together. Once all the final cuts are made to the story, the show goes into Online Editing. This is where all the footage goes through all the technical changes. It is changed back to high resolution that it was shot in, color corrected, audio sweetening, the graphics are created, etc. In only 3 days I have realized how much time, steps, and people are involved into making one season of The Real World. It blows my mind. Next week I should be hanging out with the Editors from my favorite show of all time, PROJECT RUNWAY!!!! I'm so excited, I will keep you all posted about it.Remember to leave me comments if you want to! =)
My definition: log·ger [law-ger, log-er] - noun 1. a person who sits at a computer for long periods of time watching thousands of hours of raw footage while typing what happens in 1 minute increments.
Mark wanted me to understand and learn everything that goes into post production for a show from the bottom up. Loggers are at the very bottom of the ladder, but are EXTREMELY important. They are the only people that watch all the raw footage that no one else every sees. (There is about 5,500 hours of footage shot for one season of The Real World). They have to identify, organize, and keep track of each and every new person/character the Roommates interact with in the show. They also much keep track of every single location the Roommates go to. This makes it very difficult to log a tape of the Roommates at a bar or club. They interact with so many people who never give their names and many of them do not sign releases. This makes it tricky for the loggers to keep track of the hundreds of extra persons in the show. After 2 days of logging tapes from The Real World: San Diego I have a great respect for loggers. They are such an important step in the process of editing reality television. From there, the Dailies editor takes the loggers notes, producer and director's notes to roughly cut the footage of important scenes that happened in ONE day of shooting, hence the word "dailies." Next, the story coordinator, director, producers, and editor can find the story from the footage that is gathered. Eventually the show goes into Offline Editing where all the creative and story lines are edited together. Once all the final cuts are made to the story, the show goes into Online Editing. This is where all the footage goes through all the technical changes. It is changed back to high resolution that it was shot in, color corrected, audio sweetening, the graphics are created, etc. In only 3 days I have realized how much time, steps, and people are involved into making one season of The Real World. It blows my mind. Next week I should be hanging out with the Editors from my favorite show of all time, PROJECT RUNWAY!!!! I'm so excited, I will keep you all posted about it.Remember to leave me comments if you want to! =)
