OK, so I have to start off and apologize for the title of this post. I don’t even know what a DP really is (unless its Dr. Pepper) but I want to make a point.
Let me start this by saying that one person whose blog I like to read and to follow on twitter is Shane Ross over at Little Frog in High Def (http://lfhd.net) or @comebackshane (absolutely the coolest Twitter name ever!) on Twitter. The main reason I follow Shane is that he works in the “real” world of editing. The truth is, he sometimes talks about things I don’t even understand. That comes mostly from his wide range of experience and also from the fact that he lives in California, the mecca of the editing world, while I live in Abilene, Texas, the not-mecca of the editing world. Oh, and Shane is fun to listen to as well.
I recently listened to one of Shane’s podcast and he talked alot about DPs, how they come in and tell you to put things into a video that are terrible ideas, and how they often end up messing up about as much as they fix in the post-production world.
At some level, its silly of me to try to equate anything in Shane’s world with mine. But, I do it anyway. One reason that Shane’s world and mine are so different is that I only work with a few different people, I know them really well, which is another way of saying I have a relationship with them. We talk outside of the editing process. We share some of the same views about life and stuff like that. We have a relationship.
Shane’s world is different in that he walks into a place to do editing and often doesn’t know anybody. That’s a tough situation to be in. To his credit, obviously Shane has made it work for him or he wouldn’t be doing really cool editing jobs for Discovery and History channels and the like. But, I have to say, I’m glad I know the folks I work with pretty well. It does make my world less stressful and it allows us to be more open with each other. In the end, if I was half the editor Shane was, we’d probably end up with a better product simply because of the relationship we have with each other. But, I’m not, do we don’t. But, I keep believing that someday, someway, I’m going to get all the filming and editing stuff figured out and will in fact produce content that rivals anyone else. OK, but leave me alone. I gotta have my dreams.
And the point of all this … When its possible, work with people who you know and who know you. When you can’t, work hard on creating the relationships that will make everyone more open and honest and, thereby, producing a better product. If nothing else, it will make the stressful job of editing more fun.
