Post-Production

Thank you

Lyna Solibieda You're welcome!

Hi Behnam Hojati

Patrik Gyltefors

Thanks for reaching out! It's awesome to connect with someone who's working with both Nuke and Houdini. I’m currently diving deep into Nuke myself and focusing on building a solid compositing workflow. I’d love to check out your VFX course on YouTube and exchange ideas about the VFX process. Looking forward to learning and collaborating in the future!

Cyrus Sales Thanks for the warm welcome! I really appreciate your thoughts on building consistency in Nuke and compositing. It’s something I’m actively working on. I’d love to connect and share ideas as we both grow in this field. Let’s definitely keep in touch and collaborate when the chance arises. Excited to see where this journey takes us!

Mohamed Karbia Great to meet you! Thanks for the kind words and support. It’s always exciting to connect with fellow artists from around the world. Best of luck on your journey too, and feel free to reach out anytime if you want to share ideas or collaborate on small shots! Let’s keep growing together.

Behnam Hojati Absolutely, I'll be reaching out to my Network at the top of the year to get reconnected with everyone. Catch up on '25 and see where everyone is headed in '26. Look forward to connecting more!

The Thing, Behnam Hojati. The VFX made it even scarier and creepier. The prequel wasn't as scary and creepy to me.

Behnam Hojati agreed. VFX can make or break the scare factor in horror. For me, The Conjuring really stands out; the subtle VFX in the shadows and ghostly movements made the tension almost unbearable at times.

Cyrus Sales We are having this discussion here:

https://www.stage32.com/lounge/producing/Disney-does-1b-deal-with-openai...

Shadow Dragu-Mihai Thanks for sharing. I like seeing that multiple lounges are engaged in this conversation. I saw the animation lounge talking about it a few days ago. I'll direct more people to this post who are interested in discussing.

Cyrus Sales It was anticipated that Paramount would have to raise the buy out by $5B or more before shareholders would accept it... maybe that's what might happen. On the other hand, I have heard rumors that Apple might step in...

Shadow Dragu-Mihai Yeah, that tracks—$5B is a hefty jump, but sometimes these bids need a big swing to get shareholder approval. Apple stepping in would definitely shake things up and add a whole new dynamic to the mix. It’ll be interesting to see how it unfolds.

Like you said a lot of beginners really lean on using LUTs to achieve the cinematic look. I actually know a filmmaker personally who don't do much except applies LUTs to footage and that's it. But even though I feel like there is a place for LUTs as a part of the color grading or balancing process, I also feel that you need to be able to achieve the look you want yourself. At the same time if LUTs aren't used in the right way, they usually don't give the right result anyway.

Vital Butinar I personally couldn't agree more, especially as a someone who would consider themselves a beginner with color grading. I often times have conversations with other people on the topic and the most common comment I get is "throw a LUT on it." Which again isn't necessarily a bad thing but I'd like to know how to do it without what I consider "training wheels."

Well I wouldn't consider luts training wheels, but they were definitely not designed to be simply slapped onto footage and forgotten. But when they're used as part of a developed look for the project or lets say used on monitors while in production to better assist in shooting, they're great. We used something like this on the monitors on the feature that I just directed recently. Also sometimes there are transformative luts like converting some kind of camera footage into something else for various kinds of reasons.

Resolve is a great software, I've been using it for years now and I haven't found anything that would be as good for grading, but there's a lot of knowledge behind using it well like color spaces and profiles, etc.

Well, from what I’ve seen from Volpatto, Todd Osborne, and others, in color grading for productions that involve a DP, there’s really not much that needs to be done. Good LUTs created by color scientists can help achieve a nice result, but my point is that major colorists work almost 100% of the time using DaVinci Resolve’s native tools.

Mit Patel To my knowledge, there is no particular forum, and for the most part the DITs I have worked around and supervised are more or less on their own except where they are within Camera dept. (which is where I usually slot them). Though naturally they cross over into editorial dept as well. I see you have experience in data integrity, etc.. It would be interesting to speak with you as we are moving towards integration of AI into our studio work flow. If you think so, send me a network request and we can go from there.

I think that being a DIT is just someone who has good data management skills and the industry standard knowledge of how things are done.

I've never been a DIT before on any other projects than our own, but I have gotten some good comments on how structure the data and create backups and workflow that helps prevent data loss. Actually the only thing that I'm really scared of most of the time is if the recording media goes bad, which is another reason why smaller recording media is better but at the same time it wares out faster, so again a compromise.

Vital Butinar Actually, the DIT or Media Manager often goes beyond that. Sometimes he or she will prep dailies, sync the day's sound and do rough assemblies each night. So they can be a central part of the creative team, especially where, for instance, VFX shots have to be assessed very quickly in-context with other parts of the scene. On some productions, there is an on-set editor and the DIT/Media Manager works with them. Others they are more strictly part of camera dept backing up and securing the footage.

Shadow Dragu-Mihai oh I've seen that, on one production that I've been involved in there was an onsite editor. But yeah of course, depending on the production different people can have a wider scope. So of course it's logical that there are DIT's who do a lot more. Not to diminish the work they do, I just have never had a project where we have had a dedicated person who worked as a DIT.

Vital Butinar It really depends on the structure of the production, and how you like to work, of course.

☝️ Hi Richard, @RichardRBBotto , hey can you please think about this?

@RichardBotto ☝️

Tommy Luca Thanks for sharing and encouraging members of Stage32 to look further into adding a lounge. I've been hearing more about art department over the last 12-15 months however I don't think I have a full grasp at what it is. You mentioned it starts in pre-production and goes down the pipeline and can often have several subcategories. What exactly is the "art department" and what roles does it play in pre-production? Thanks again for sharing!

All that you see in the pic is worth a fortune Tommy Luca

Art is a very integral part of film production as depicted in your photo Tommy Luca! With the proper public relations it most certainly can be beneficial

I myself is into art!

Hi Mohamed Karbia

Hi, Mohamed Karbia. Welcome to the community. Stage 32 has a blog that'll help you navigate the platform and connect with creatives and industry professionals all over the world. www.stage32.com/blog/how-to-successfully-navigate-the-stage-32-platform-...

Stage 32's November Community Open House was last Tuesday. It'll help you navigate Stage 32 and connect with creatives and industry pros. The recording is up now. It's free to watch. www.stage32.com/education/products/stage-32-s-november-community-open-ho...

I suggest adding a profile picture of yourself and a detailed bio to your profile. People will feel more comfortable networking and collaborating with you if they know what you look like. And if you have a picture, your profile will show up when someone searches for you. A detailed bio will help you build relationships/network on here. You could add things to your bio like why you became a matchmove artist, your accomplishments, your goals, and what movies and shows you like.

You can upload a picture by clicking the gear symbol in the top right-hand corner and selecting “Edit profile” in the drop-down menu, then clicking the red button underneath your location and choosing "Update profile picture."

You can edit your bio by clicking the gear symbol in the top right-hand corner of Stage 32, then selecting “Edit profile” in the drop-down menu, then clicking the red button underneath your location and choosing "Edit Profile."

What's a matchmove artist?

Hi Mohamed Karbia, nice to meet another VFX artist. What software are you using? I am personally using SynthEyes and Nuke for matchmove.

Patrik Gyltefors hey Patrik, nice too meet you, I'm using 3dequilizer for tracking, maya for layout construction and nuke for scene setup for comp, if you need any matchmove support let me know ✌️

Thanks for sharing Ashley Renée Smith. I haven’t tried a dialogue boost first workflow before, but I’m definitely going to share this with my audio team. As for lifting buried lines without killing the ambience, I don’t really have a set method yet. I’m still learning and sharpening my approach as I go.

As weird as it sounds, I actually like catching mistakes like this. It’s a reminder that even at the highest level, and I’d definitely put Mad Men on HBO Max up there, they still slip up too. It sucks because you know someone behind the scenes is probably getting chewed out for it, but for me, as an indie creator, it’s a good reminder that even the biggest studios with the biggest budgets still make mistakes. We look at them like they’re always perfect, never missing a beat… but that’s just not the case.