Week Six - Avid (07/03/13)

In today's session, we began speaking about any problems people were having with the Rock Climbing documentary. One of the problems that was brought up that was on the rough cut that we've been provided with, most of the sound is missing. This is because part of the brief is to create our own sound design. Somebody else also asked if we had to use the rough cut that we had been given. We don't have to use the rough cut but it is advised because there is already a structure there.

After that, we were shown a book that we should read called How to get into and survive Film, Advertising and TV post-production - The Alternative Guide.

We were then told about two questions that we should research into. These questions were:

• The Career of Anne V Coates
• The Difference Between Apple Pro Res 422 + 4444

We were also told about some films that we should watch and look at the editing on these films. These films were:

• Bad Timing
• Don't Look Now
• Out of Sight

After that, we looked at a scene from Out of Sight and we spoke about the music and the use of freeze frames in the scene. 

We then moved onto our first lesson looking at Avid. We opened up the program and before even getting to the main screen, I had to create a project. This is different to Final Cut Pro 7 because that automatically opens up a new project for you. I prefer having to create a project rather than one automatically being opened because this makes sure that you set it up correctly before you jump into the editing. The three images below show the opening screen, the setting I used to create my test project and also the start up screen of Avid.

One of the first things that I noticed when the project loaded up was that the screen was very similar to the screen on Final Cut Pro 7, the only main difference being that there isn't an infinite timeline. Also, I learnt that when importing footage, you have to put it into a bin, it isn't possible to place it outside of a bin like on Final Cut Pro 7. I then imported my first piece of footage. I learnt that importing footage takes a lot longer on Avid. This is because when you import the footage, Avid turns it into the correct resolution and makes sure that all of the settings match up to the project settings. This is very time consuming, however, rendering in Avid doesn't need to be done very enough, even when adding effects and transitions, it plays in realtime with the need to be rendered. The image below shows the footage being imported.

I then was shown various buttons used on Avid, such as settings the in and out points, which I can use the same shortcuts for as I do on Final Cut Pro 7 and also was shown how to correctly get the footage onto the timeline, using the overwrite button. I was then shown about the different modes used in Avid. On Final Cut Pro 7, everything is possible to do done under one mode using different tabs, however, on  Avid, the mode needs to be changed, for example, when you want to trim a clip, you need to use trim mode and when you need to edit an effect, you need to be on effect mode.

I then was shown how to easily add a transition between two clips. To do this I had to place the timeline cursor where I wanted the transition to be and then I clicked the Quick Transition button on the right hand side of the screen. After that, I learnt how to add new video and audio tracks to the timeline, by going to Clip - New Video Track / New Audio Track. This would come in very useful when it comes to layering projects. Following that, I learnt how to access the effect palette and use effect mode correctly.

After learning everything I have mentioned above, I had a go at putting a short sequence together to get to know how to use Avid better. I used a lot of cross fades using the Quick Transition button and also inserted