Color correction complete

Uncorrected still photo by E. Hammen

Ahren Buhmann and I recently finished a several-day stint of color correction for Beach Town (a rock and roll beach movie of the mind). Ahren doing the correcting, me saying "yeah, that looks a million times better" over and over.

What is color correction? (or, "What would possibly need "correcting" about all those beautiful images?")

Color Correction is the process of balancing slight discrepancies in the hue, brightness, or whatever, of each shot -- and at the same time making sure the individual shots look good side by side with all the other shots in a scene, which may have been taken in different light, on different days, with different filmstock, and so on.

The result is that the film as whole flows well visually. It's movie magic. The illusion!

Anyway, Ahren did an awesome job and color correction is officially finished 

Next up: the final sound mix -- so that the audio flows nicely.

Then we're done.

Social hour: I ran into Kenna Kettrick and Amanda Keogh at the theater and talked to them for a bit. Great to see them both!  Also worked a bit more with David Thomas to tweak some music.

Quick update on Beach Town; color correction in progress!

linkage photo by E. Hammen

It's been a busy week here in beach town. So I'll keep this brief.

Color correction is in progress! It is lots of fun to work with Ahren Buhmann and frankly, an exciting process.

Picture lock is one thing, but when you balance all the little pictures that you've locked against each other, it gains cohesion. The result is greater than the sum of the parts; it's something new.  And that something is the final film.

Coming up: I'm meeting with David Thomas for a bit of updating to a particular music track, and I'm making plans on getting the final audio mix worked out.

Exciting!

Beach Town Update Feb 10, 2014

L-R: Erik Hammen and Steven Sterne,
on the Beach Town set.
(photo by Mel Cafe)

It snowed last night in Seattle, so who's thinking about Beach Town, a rock 'n' roll beach movie of the mind?

Hint: me

On Sunday, I finished up the gig scene and the post-gig codas, including a bit of cloudy day, and then started on to the next record store scene. (Over on the right is Steven Sterne, spinning the wax and that's a fact. )

It was a very busy half day of shooting at the record store. We were up before dawn and had to be out before 11:00 AM. In putting together the clips for this scene, I realized that we missed a shot. 

I went into the vault and reviewed all the footage from that day, and we got a lot done. The footage goes and goes and goes.

Not a lot of takes, though, and as time got tighter toward the end, we started consolidating shots. Instead of a master and two singles, it'd be a master only. But we definitely missed one shot all together. Welcome to the glamorous world of independent film.

However! I think I know how to solve the problem.

Maybe it'll even be better than the original idea.

That's why editing is fun.

L-R: Ahren Buhmann, Emily Purington,
Riley Neldam during production.
(photo by Mel Cafe)

Back to the gig scenes -- I gotta say those came out as good as I could've imagined. They're fun and entertaining, but seem "real" as well.

It was quite a puzzle though, getting it all to work together like it needed to. I mean, you'd think I'd have learned something from the other band scene, which I put together not that long ago.

But not really, no.

All I did was relearn my weekly mantra --  the hard way.

Speaking as the resident expert, in a Rock n' Roll Beach Movie of the Mind you gotta keep the "mind" part very present. So intellectual exercises, or "doing things the hard way" are an important part of the process.

Today's second photo was taken at the production house, during that vague period between Makeup and Shooting on the day of the gig shoot. Riley and Emily are waiting.

Waiting, waiting, waiting.