Case Studies

The media and entertainment world is going through some interesting changes. Newspapers and printed magazines are losing double-digit percentages of revenue each year, linear television networks fight for shrinking audiences and advertising money, Hollywood is merely a fraction of what it used to be, and large post houses and historic film studios have shut down or struggle to survive.

At the same time, the independent film industry is booming, niche production houses and post boutiques are flourishing, and quality online information and movie channels are more popular than ever. VGTV Norway is a perfect example of this trend. This video operation spin-off of the leading Norwegian newspaper VG has several online and linear television channels, including a 24/7 news channel, that provide very popular high-quality content to a vast and loyal audience.

With a production crew of 400 people, a cast of 200 actors and over 2000 extras, hundreds of hours of raw footage shot by several crews on 130 locations, 9 months of editing and 10 months of VFX work, Alberto Rodríguez’ and Rafael Cobos' 12.3 million dollar television series “La Peste” (The Plague) is the flagship original drama production of Movistar+, the largest VoD provider in Spain and part of media giant Téléfonica.

In Los Angeles on a Saturday morning in November, a crew of 10 students from Hollywood High School, helmed by 17-year-old director Celine Gimpirea, are transforming a corner of the Calvary Cemetery into a movie set. In The Box, a boy slips inside a cardboard box and finds himself transported to other realms. On this well-manicured, impossibly green lawn, among rows of flat, black granite grave-markers, are rows of flat, black camera cases holding DIT stations, iPads and MacBook Pros — the tools that will bring the story to life.

AC/DC, Coldplay, The Rolling Stones, Robbie Williams, Metallica, David Gilmour, Duran Duran, Placebo, Dixie Chicks, Zipperface, Beyoncé, Björk… You name them, James Tonkin has worked with them. In this extensive interview, he talks about the gear he takes on the road to shoot and edit concerts of the world’s greatest bands, and about his new high-end post house in London. A good read for anyone who is interested in camera gear and post production technology.

A couple of weeks ago we got a call from our friends at BlinkTV. They were heading to LA from London for a secret project and needed a Jellyfish for a massive edit they'd be doing with a super tight deadline. How could we say no?

Check out this feature in the latest Tao of Color issue with DIT Rich Rodman. He took a Jellyfish to WrestleMania a few months ago and was able to leave with the camera department. Yes you read that right... he left with the camera department!

Last month Scott Simmons from ProVideo Coalition called us about an upcoming job he had. He'd be part of a team of 5 editors working around the clock for over a week at one of the country's largest music festivals. The catch was that it was an Adobe Premiere job... "Do your servers work with anything other than FCPX?" he asked.

We get that question a lot, and it's not too surprising as the Final Cut community was really the first to embrace our products and workflow. To answer Scott's question, of course our servers work with Premiere, but We believe in showing not telling, so we shipped a Jellyfish to Nashville and his team got to work.

Today Scott published his experience on the front page of the PVC website. Have a read and let us know what you think.

Last winter we received a call from one of the biggest broadcasters in Europe, RTS (Swiss National Television) who were desperate for a shared storage solution that would allow them to stay on the Final Cut platform. For two years they tried nearly ever major storage vendor looking for something that could meet their needs; all the while on an OSX update freeze due to their aging XSAN's compatibility limitations.