Gary Leva and Terence Curren
Star Wars "Trilogy" DVD Extras
By Bija Gutoff
When fans tear open the boxed set “Star Wars Trilogy” DVD, they get more than the beloved first three films of the series — “Star Wars,” “The Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” — for their home collections. Independent producer Gary Leva has packed the long-awaited release with juicy Star Wars goodies, including three audio commentaries to play along with the features and three mini-documentaries.
“Making these ‘Star Wars’ extras was a treat for me,” says Leva. “So many of the motifs and characters in these films are part of world culture now, and I think fans are going to enjoy learning where they came from. There are definitely some fun surprises in there.”
Leva edited all three documentaries with Final Cut Pro, then saved time and money in the online process by taking advantage of a new service offered by his colleagues at post-production house Alpha Dogs. Dubbed Digital Service Station (DSS), the facility offers editors a cost-effective way to capture camera tapes onto computer drives for non-linear editing.
“With DSS,” says Alpha Dogs president Terence Curren, “editors don’t have to buy or rent expensive equipment or hire additional staff. They can drop off their tapes for us to digitize, or do it themselves on our dedicated bays.”
Peeking Behind the Scenes
Leva’s three mini-features include “The Birth of the Lightsaber,” which tells how George Lucas developed the Lightsaber weapon; “The Characters of Star Wars,” which covers their evolution from inception to on-screen form; and “The Force Is With Them: The Legacy of ‘Star Wars,’” which treats the series’ influence on leading filmmakers.
Each title has interviews with cast and crew including George Lucas, Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford, as well as never-seen images and footage from the original movies.
The audio commentaries feature George Lucas, Carrie Fisher, director Irvin Kershner, sound designer Ben Burtt and visual effects whiz Dennis Muren. Fans can listen to their running commentaries at normal volume as each movie scene plays at low volume in the background. “Watching the film this way gives you tremendous insight into the filmmaking process,” says Leva.
As writer, director, editor and producer of the bonus materials, Leva managed the project from start to finish. “I did the interviews for the documentaries, then I assembled the stills and clips and concept art and began editing,” he relates.
“For the audio tracks, I recorded the comments of each person as we watched scenes, then edited them so it sounds as if they’re all in the same room watching the film together.”
A Wealth of Material
“Final Cut Pro is excellent for this sort of project,” notes Leva, “where we had material from so many sources. For the ‘Characters’ documentary, I used a great deal of digital artwork, jpegs and tifs and so on. Final Cut Pro makes it so easy to import and export digital files and QuickTime movies, and pass your project among a crew of filmmakers.”
Leva continues, “I was editing one of the documentaries and co-editing another, and because we were all using the same program we were able to transfer our media to other drives and give it to the other editors. They would give me a cut as a Final Cut Pro project with links to the media in my system, so we didn’t have to run from editing room to editing room.”
“So many of the motifs and characters in these films are part of world culture now, and fans are going to enjoy learning where they came from. There are definitely some fun surprises in there.”
He even credits Final Cut Pro with enabling him to strike out on his own. “I used Avid for years,” says Leva, “and the transition to Final Cut Pro has been a boon for our business. We’re a small company, so affordability is an issue. At the old prices — what it costs to buy Avid systems — I could not have started my own business.”
What’s more, Alpha Dogs’ DSS helps Leva keep costs down. “When we’re doing a big project like ‘Star Wars’ and smaller jobs come along too, I don’t have to hire additional staff — we can pass some of the work to Alpha Dogs.”
A New Model for Offline-Online
In fact, it was Leva’s “Star Wars” project that served as both catalyst and guinea pig for Digital Service Station. “It was the exact job that got me decided to push through our new model,” says Curren, “and a perfect example of the problems many editors have.”
Leva completed offline editing on Final Cut Pro, then brought his work to Alpha Dogs for online, including up-res (transfer to higher-resolution video), graphics and color correction.
Curren explains the snags they hit. “The tapes were stored on inexpensive FireWire drives,” he says, “and we were re-digitizing them at high resolution. But we kept having problems with the images lining up — the timecodes were off by a few frames. We had to go through every tape to make the shots match the offline.”
The process, notes Curren, was tedious — and unnecessary. “It was ridiculous that we had to manually slide all those shots back in, to get them in sync,” he sighs. “What a waste of time. I mean, you’re using software on computers. It’s supposed to be accurate!”
The Quest for Frame-Accuracy
Eager to improve his workflow, Curren did some homework. “I researched the whole process of digitizing over FireWire,” he says, “and I found that while it’s efficient for most uses, for professionals at the highest level it is not the most frame-accurate way to digitize. For the typical homemade wedding DVD it may not matter that you have a few timecode inconsistencies. But with pro-level online editing that’s destined for high-res video or film, it had better be right.”
“We’re aiming to be the Kinko’s of digitizing. After they’ve done offline editing, they can bring their tapes back for online. We make sure everything matches.”
Curren explains how the inconsistencies crop up. “Some of it is because each manufacturer implements FireWire a little differently. And there may even be variations between products — such as cameras — from the same manufacturer.” Too, he says, the way FireWire must prioritize packets of video, audio and timecode information so they can share a single wire means all three don’t always track exactly right.
“In the traditional linear world,” Curren adds, “all those bugs were worked out a long time ago. We used the RS 4:2:2 standard for converting video and audio and timecode, and it’s a locked, age-old standard for machine control. When you had that and a high-end deck, your frame accuracy was guaranteed. We just took it for granted that everything would match.”
The Kinko’s of Digitizing
“With the availability of affordable software like Final Cut Pro,” explains Curren, “more and more independent editors and small producers — like Gary Leva — can afford to set up their own shops.”
His goal is to provide them with the rock-solid reliability of the old machine standard. “We want to bring the playing field back to what we’re used to, so that when you go to higher resolution the work you did offline matches the online version.”
Editors can accomplish the higher-end transfers themselves, of course, if they have the right equipment. But, says Curren, “each show they work on may require a different format — beta, Digibeta, SD, HD, Panasonic. And each of these requires its own deck, which can cost from $10,000 to $100,000 plus the deck link cards. So small shops can’t possibly afford to own every platform.
“And even if they do have some decks and cards, not all editors have the technical skills to be sure it will come out perfect. So we thought, how do editors get their tapes into their editing system?”
Curren’s solution was to establish the one-stop service to capture clients’ tapes to Final Cut Pro (or another program) for editing. “We hand them the drive with the data all ready to go and they can just start cutting,” he says.
“We’re aiming to be the Kinko’s of digitizing. Then, after they’ve done their offline editing, they can bring their tapes back to us for online. We make sure everything matches and they get peace of mind knowing it’s done right.”
A Changing Environment
Curren notes that his company is responding to a changing film editing environment. First, more editors started turning to Final Cut Pro. “Two years ago,” he says, “Avid was the only kid in town. The attitude was, ‘Of course we use Avid — they do it right.’ But now the thrust is definitely towards Final Cut Pro.”
He continues, “We started looking at Final Cut because so many of our clients were using it. I’m seeing the swing in that direction all around town. And if you’re doing your offline editing in Final Cut, it just makes sense to online in Final Cut too. That’s why we’re getting so many Final Cut projects now. That’s where the buzz is.”