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Editing Editing On The Set

Even if celluloid film editors of yore dragged their large and bulky Moviola or Steenbeck film-cutting machines onto the set, they would have needed to wait for the lab to develop dailies for them to even begin the post-production process. Now we have high-powered dual-core processor laptops which will let us begin the editing process before the actors remove their makeup. I'm going to break this topic in two: editing on the set for narrative-type works and on location for documentary-style projects. There is obvious crossover, but each has enough unique situations to warrant the split.

Narrative projects are Hollywood-style, three-act "stories," usually with scripts, storyboards and actors. I'm going to include commercials and music videos with this grouping, assuming that the editors shoot in their city/town of residence, for reasons that will soon be obvious.

Whether the project's Director of Photography (DP) is shooting tape (HDV, DV or Betacam), disc (Sony's XDCAM HD optical disc or similar) or solid state (Panasonic P2 or similar), he can load footage from the set onto a laptop's hard drive. So, while the crew is eating lunch, the editor can copy the morning's footage to a computer and be organizing and editing before the afternoon's lights, camera and action. Let's look at a few of the advantages and disadvantages of this process.

Many Hollywood movies of 90 to 120 minutes in length can easily take many months to edit. If it takes three months to shoot a film, editing on set can give an editor a 90-day head start on the post-production process. Commercials and music videos have a much shorter timeline, but they also have much tighter deadlines. No matter what the project, it always seems to be due "yesterday," so getting a jump-start on the time-intensive editing process is always a plus.

Another advantage could be the editor's feedback on the shooting of a scene. Many directors may have egos that don't allow "constructive criticism," but those who do can greatly benefit from an editor who alerts the auteur of a problem in continuity or a lighting inconsistency, for example. The director can then reshoot the scene before taking apart the set or releasing the actor.

One big disadvantage could be the loss of objectivity, as Walter Murch mentions in a must-read book on the process of editing (see sidebar). If an editor were to get too close to an actor, she/he could let the actor's personality interfere with the personality of the character that actor is portraying. The same goes for any of the crew members. A bad relationship with the gaffer or Director of Photography, for example, may taint the editor's objectivity toward the lighting in the film, due to this problem with personalities of crew members.

Most of the above applies also to documentary-style projects, but documentaries have their own challenges. The above narrative section could apply as well to documentaries made in the editor's own hometown and with easy-to-access locations. An editor can shoot non-fiction videos in his place of residence, but, for the purposes of this article, let's assume a documentary is a project that takes its makers away from their own mailing address.