Greetings from Goa to my fellow creatives on Stage32 :) I am a documentary filmmaker and editor from the little beach-side state of Goa in India. I've worked on 3 long form documentary projects, besides editing all of my own short features for television. I love editing, especially documentaries, where I can look through hours and hours of footage and help the director come up with a storyline and would really like to collaborate on projects of filmmakers worldwide as the editor.
Thank you, Gaspar. Isn't it a wonderful world where we can now actually consider being able to work with each other across continents? Astonishing. How would such an arrangement work? And from a merely practical and probably naive perspective, what kind of files would get exchanged, and how?
Hi KC, yes it is amazing, considering it was unthinkable for us up to some years ago. But, more amazing, Walter Murch edited The English Patient remotely from his home back in 1996! That's documented I the book The Conversations and makes for interesting reading. I have worked with out-of-state directors and also for television mini docu features. How it worked (there are many other ways of course!), is that I got the rushes on a physical drive by courier. The scripts and other documents such as transcripts, background research etc were sent over email and we had discussions over Skype. Once I began editing, I sent cuts (mp4 files) at intervals to the director as digital downloads. So we were able to review the edit at different stages. For a more hands-on director, sequence files can also be sent as XML exports. So it doesn't really matter which editing software is being used, as long as the rushes are in the same directory structure at both - the editors and directors ends. Once editing is completed, if color correction and sound post work is to be out elsewhere, the sequences can be exported and sent across as digital files to be imported by the sound mixer / colourist. I've written a bit about this on my website. If you'd like to read it, here's the link: http://www.gasperdesouza.com/video-and-film-editor/