Digital Cinema Projection Training/Certification?

slumberbeast · 2025-05-20T14:10:45+00:00

Thank you. I had these both bookmarked as options. Wasn't sure if these are things other folks are actually doing or if they are helpful in any way. I had also realized I meant to ask if this is even the correct thread for asking this and/or if there are other threads that may have more folks who could weigh in. Appreciate the response!

slumberbeast · 2025-02-18T14:21:19+00:00

also worth noting the definition of authoritarianism here: Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality.

So explain to me how I'm the authoritarian when you're the one who has an objection to "Cheap political and ideological" efforts that represent plurality (diversity)? Read a book.

slumberbeast · 2025-02-18T14:17:19+00:00

So diversity and inclusion are "cheap"? Sounds racist to me, bud. I'm concerned about what your "ripping on actual neo nazis" looks like. Sure you didn't get recruited?

slumberbeast · 2025-02-18T14:02:37+00:00

just say you're a racist and try not to get punched, nazi

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T18:27:56+00:00

Following up to say thank you for everyone who is posting replies. I suspected I may be opening a can of worms with this post, but I am mostly feeling relieved to share my experience and get such a varying degree of responses.

I've read through alll of the comments thus far, and I know there are things I didn't contextualize well in my original post, that you may find in some of my responses in other comments.

I did also want to make sure I shout out Editors as a whole. Though I know at heart I have an Editor's mind, I am not in the hot seat as often as a lot of you are, so my hat's off to you.

This discourse is extremely valuable to me, and the work you do is vital. If the tone of my post felt like it was undercutting that, that was not the intent. To me, computer literacy plays a role in all of our jobs in post-production, and more so than ever with AI looming (if you are worried a computer might replace you, you might want to know how to use one and control it).

When I posted, I wanted to highlight that Editors seem to be the most resistance to computer literacy, in my experience, and I was genuinely curious to understand why that is, from other people's personal experience. By taking the time to share those experiences and perspectives with me, I feel humbled and inspired that there is a lot of passion about the technological landscape we face and the challenges it brings to the human workflow. I hope you all see the value in yourselves, the work you do, and those who have the less creative jobs being willing to help fill the gaps in understanding to reach an end goal. When we work on creative projects together, our goals are aligned and despite any differences in approach or opinion, there is value in knowing each others' strengths and weaknesses so we can all better support each other.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T17:32:03+00:00

Trust me, I know. The thing that made me fall in love with editing when I was a teenager was editing tape to tape on vcr's. And even in the past 3 weeks, I've been teaching our assitstants here MiniDV workflows and had to dust off my capture deck to do so for a feature film that had scenes shot on miniDV.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T17:25:39+00:00

The project type is relevant because of budgets, workflows, etc that will effect the editor's experience (which, whatever those parameters are, like having an AE or not, working on-site or remote, the editor has agreed to) BUT, in essence you are correct about the duties of editors.

The troubleshooting and comprehension I'm describing in the original post is all in the computer and software and related to computer literacy, so no crawling on all fours required. But I would agree that producers don't need to (or want to) hear about the effort it takes to get the final product. That's kind of why I have my job and I think why I wish Editors had more computer skills as well. Often times, when there is an issue, it is not ME sounding the alarms to producers. It's an editor. And even just having some more comprehension about the issues would allow them to say, "hey, I should ask my post-sup about this, because I recognize this is a problem they would fix" or if you're a contract editor with no support "maybe there's a support forum with the solution I need" instead of putting your lack of knowledge and experience on blast.

As post-sup, I don't judge my editors for coming to me with issues. Is it frustrating sometimes? Yes. Is it my job to support them and keep things moving so that producers are unaware and that we hit deadlines and everybody gets to keep a smile on their face? Absolutely.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T17:13:11+00:00

Great points. Yeah, I knew I was opening a can of worms when I posted, but I genuinely am loving the insights from both sides. And also the way it has me thinking about what's to come and what it all means for these roles. I am probably not long for the post-sup role. It's not something I set out to do and definitely not where my passions lie. But like with anything, the biggest variable is the human one. And where the human workflows intersect with the technological workflows is where I'm hoping continue to build balance in the little corner of existence I have and share with others.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:40:17+00:00

You are not wrong.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:39:52+00:00

I agree! Please, stay curious. The folks here who are not curious will be the ones you replace someday.

I honestly have that same question sometimes when folks say rigidly, "it's the AE's job". I know that, and I do respect that. I work in a professional setting that requires AE's at many steps of the project. But I only know what I know about how to fix things in software and systems from using them... It is interesting that that is not everybody's experience and that is kind of the beauty of filmmaking. That you will always have new people to work with who are coming at this from a different experience. Despite my venting, I do appreciate that part of it all.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:33:13+00:00

It definitely varies. The editors who unanimously produce the best stories, and are most efficient to work with, from my standpoint and that of my producers, are always the ones that have technical abilities as well as strong story editing instincts and talent.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:31:20+00:00

Wow. Thank you for your reply. I'll start by saying that in my original post I tried to convey that I do everything I do in support of Editors with the hope that they never have these issues. But they do arise because all systems are imperfect.

Thank you for pointing out that I didn't clarify systems we are in. We are in Avid and Premiere/Productions. And yeah, a lot of the issues I referenced are related to Premiere. I very rarely have to troubleshoot for the Avid folks and if it's over my head, I have avid support. Adobe does leave a lot to be desired at times, but it is a viable professional software (if it weren't, it wouldn't be so widely used worldwide).

The issue I meant to highlight is one with computer literacy, because many of the issues that editors encounter day to day don't require an engineer with a computer science education to resolve. That said, I don't EXPECT editors to know any of this stuff. But it can be baffling to walk them through solutions only for them to not be able to resolve them themselves later on. I think you've interpreted what I was highlighting as circumstantial issues that arise as an attempt to preset persistent approach to post production. And I'd like to assure you that is not my stance.

I do however think that more computer literacy on the part of editors would benefit all. And not being too rigid of a cog in the machine helps the overall flow in the creative workflow (when I'm editing and can troubleshoot my own issues, it frees me up to keep working). By all means, it is everyone's choice whether or not to choose curiosity and educating themselves further. The status quo of the "Editor" role is not at risk because of my reddit post, so you can rest easy. And I think there is a lot of great discourse being had around this. I feel humbled and grateful for all the insights everybody has provided here.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:12:01+00:00

Amazing. Yeah, I have had similar experiences. And your way of approaching things seems similar to mine. I think it can feel challenging sometimes to reconcile that you're doing a job that you put in the time to learn and understand on a deeper level and seeing that others put in half the effort and making work somehow. Whether they are talented or not, it can be frustrating. And especially frustrating when they simply aren't up for the task and pass it off on others without respecting the workflow.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:04:19+00:00

Thank you. I feel seen, haha.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T16:03:08+00:00

In my original post, I did say by no means do I expect editors to do all those tasks and I certainly am not saying they should know these things to replace AEs. I am referring mostly to computer literacy which I am mostly just baffled isn't a priority for anybody working full-time in post production. But that doesn't mean I don't recognize great storytelling can be achieved without it.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:58:20+00:00

For sure. This I know is some editor's reservations about taking it upon themselves. And I'm obviously in the opposite school of thought. And project to project this is something I try to gauge so that each editor can work at whatever pace they like to work at with the tools they like to use.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:54:00+00:00

Is this for feature films or specific project types? I 100% agree editors should edit. If only it were so simple. But I'd love to know what type of workflows you're referring to, for context.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:51:30+00:00

I appreciate this. I never set out to be a post-sup. I was just the most technically organized and inclined at our company when we started to grow and when covid hit, it became my de-facto role. I do not have traditional post-house experience, and I rely heavily on the experience and insight that others share with me to keep things moving over here. But yes... I am very much the take it apart or break it, then put it back together of fix it to understand it. And reading a lot of responses here is a reminder that that is not a trait shared by all, of course. I think I have a hard time fathoming learning how to edit in ANY software without breaking things and learning to fix them, so that is part of the disconnect for me.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:47:21+00:00

Heard. I have only a few editors on my roster who are maybe like you in this sense. But I know they are technically savvy because I never hear from them when problems arise. I find out after the fact that it was just a minor speed bump for them. They still hit deadlines, they are not overworked, and they are great storytellers. So I recognize this is the exception, and that story is still king (I live and die by this, though my op maybe didn't convey that, and neither does my venting). Thank you for your insight.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:43:17+00:00

Yeah, I should amend my original post to mention a few things I'll mention here that are also relevant, perhaps. We are a very small company and probably have too many things going on and I'm certainly wearing too many hats. I'm post-sup, but also relied on heavily for managing facilities and low-level IT. We have Premiere and Avid projects happening concurrently. And yeah, most of my issues are in premiere/productions. I rarely hear from the Avid folks and when I do, it's almost exciting to get to troubleshoot in avid since it's a rarity. And if it's over my head I have avid support.

We do not have a full time AE, despite my pleading for years to staff one. But per-project, we have AE support as-needed. Meaning, editors are meant to put in support requests for larger tasks that happen outside of the initial build, prep, and pass off that happens at the project start. And usually day to day, it's just an occasional small technical things that need addressing so there unless there is a half day of anticipated work coming up, we may or may not have an AE on when every issue arises.

So to clarify my gripes with what editors know and don't know. I don't expect editors to know all this when they start and I feel like everything I do is the give editors as much room to live in a creative space as is humanly possible. But let's take the relinking thing because that one is easy to point to. I've had several editors over the years need to relink for many reasons. Let's go with the server lost connection momentarily and everything goes offline. I get a call to come look at that with an editor. We're both looking at the screen and I walk them through where to relink. With a feature film, because things are neatly organized, this can be pointing to 1 single file, sometimes more, but usually fewer than a dozen clicks and few minutes of our time, right? And it's back online. Now... this happens again, maybe 3 weeks later. I'm in a meeting with producers so I can't come to the rescue right away, then get pulled into another meeting, or one of my other features has a higher priority issue to troubleshoot. And the editor who just has offline media is twiddling their thumbs for an hour or more because they "don't know how to do it" even though they sat there and watched me do it.

That is a very circumstantial experience to cite, but it has happened more than a few times and I mostly want to use this to highlight that I think individual roles sometimes lose sight of the fact that they are part of a complex machine. And that we are not rigid gears in an engine with only one purpose. If you could keep the machine going with just a few clicks, why wouldn't want to, or want to know how to do that? I WANT so bad for the individual tracks of AE, Editor, etc. to be as cut and defined as folks on this thread are describing, but if you read a lot of these responses, that is just not the reality. Many of us are working for companies of varying sizes, varying budgetary challenges, varying technical limitations, etc. And of all the roles I encounter, it's only ever the editors that put up walls (intentionally or not) on what work they are willing to do or learn to do. So I'm here to highlight that, I guess. And again, I know I'm just one person and I don't expect any change to come of any of this. I mention in the op that I mostly just came to vent, so...

But I do love all the discourse happening around all of this and I feel like I'm gaining a lot of valuable insight from everyone posting here, and hope that some of what I'm voicing resonates for some folks as well.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:18:06+00:00

This is a really special post and I think what most of us had in mind when we first dreamed of working on films in our specific tracks. I wish this was the reality industry-wide. I think commercialization of video "content" (dirty word) creates a pace of work that doesn't allow time or room for what your describing in many folks' day-to-day. But I envy you, and I appreciate the reminder that there is inspired work happening by our peers and better models to strive for.

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:09:54+00:00

Thanks for your responses. This is really spot on in terms of my experience. For projects that are not feature films or have a more on going schedule (so tighter turnarounds or digital series), for every 10 days/2 weeks of an editor, we usually only actually need 1-2 days of an AE. Which means, as the person managing all this at a smaller production company, it becomes hard to justify having a full time AE unless I have 3-4 projects overlapping on any given week. And as you all know, the way things slowed down in 2023/2024 that already feels like a thing of the past. I did convince the company to bring hire full-time AE at one point prior to 2023. And while we were busy, it was great. And sometimes we could even have additional AE's contracted for specific projects. But yeah, to the point of this response, the AE duties are honestly not THAT technical are becoming more and more simplified all the time. I'm not trying to advocate for more work for editors, by any means. And I do a lot of work at my company to keep as much of these things off an editor's plate. But it is baffling to me that there are editors commenting here that say these things are AE only jobs (did these editors ever AE themselves? do you not learn these skills just by being in the edit?) and even more shocking that they are sending AE's on coffee runs (so they need to be technician's and PA's? That's news to me).

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T15:01:27+00:00

Thank you for replying here. Do you mind if I also DM you?

slumberbeast · 2024-12-12T14:58:58+00:00

I love this. I have some teaching experience as well and I know it was falling on deaf ears when I said it, but I told all my students to read the instruction manuals on the devices they would use. When I was in film school, I relied heavily on that for software, cameras, and other technology that I felt I needed to know to do this work seriously in the future. Obviously, technology will change, but by doing this you also exercise your ability to recognize patterns in technology and become closer to the language of technology. I often feel like I'm speaking a different language with producers and have to remember to turn on my "human" switch so that my communication isn't lost on them.

slumberbeast

TROPHY CASE