With the massive advancements in technology making programs like The Mandalorian a finacially viable possibility, allowing for Star Wars to be brought to the small screen with big screen quality, so the disciplines around it like editing change also. Here, the Rough Cut podcast discuss those changes and how in a world where the Volume changes almost every aspect of film production, the role of the editor changes with it.
An editor’s role is never going to be the same. Gone are the days where editors are handed footage after a project is shot. Now, directors can create and mimic environments in real-time. Because of this, editors now play a role earlier in the process. Using storyboarding and pre-vis, the Mandalorian editorial team actually worked with the Director and crew on things like where actors would be in the volume and how the shots would be captured, not the other way around.
“We have to use it as a writer’s room in a way, because we’re pre-cutting an episode—so, storyboards, then as pre-vis, and then as it’s finally shot,” Dylan said.
Dana and Jeff explained the unique process of working with the volume further. “There were some challenging moments, cutting with pre-vis,” Dana said. “I didn’t have a great amount of experience with visual effects prior to this, so trying to imagine where the ATST is and what the ATST is…”
Because of this unique workflow, the editors would come to the volume with pre-vis intact, showing the directors the different story beats and entry points for any given scene. Jeff described it as a reverse editing and directorial process. Andrew explained that the editors had to think through the scenes before they were even shot, mapping it out from start to finish.
“We have to do the whole episode from beginning to end—dialog scenes and everything, because they are mapping out every single moment of every stage,” Andrew said. “When you think of the Werner Herzog scene in episodes one and three, his office is not real. He’s got a desk and that’s it. We had to plan for that.”
Ultimately, this meant that the editors needed to be close by for the actual production, not just in post-production. Andrew mentioned that there were several times when Jon Favreau would call him from his office to the volume, and they’d solve editorial problems during production in real-time because the volume offered that opportunity.
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