Leading Australian Post House Relies on Bones Dailies to Deliver High Quality Dailies to 20th Century Fox
DFT Digital Film Technology, provider of high-end post production solutions announced that leading Australian post house Cutting Edge utilized the Bones Dailies post production workflow solution to deliver dailies for 20th Century Fox X-Men spin-off prequel X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
Bones Dailies is a turnkey, scalable software solution that manages the entire Dailies production process, from ingest (30fps – 25% faster than real-time) to the creation of a color-graded Dailies master. Whether facilities are working in SD, HD, or 2K material, ingesting content from the Spirit, or other devices such as video tape machines, or digital files (e.g. from digital acquisition cameras), Bones Dailies offers a non-linear approach that dramatically increases the efficiency of the entire Dailies process.
Bones Dailies features fast and accurate audio / video synchronization using intelligent and patented algorithms and provides integrated color correction capabilities as well as supports ASC-based color grading for interchange with DI systems. Through the use of the Color Decision List (CDL) standard developed by the American Society of Cinematographers (ASC), color decisions made in Bones Dailies are retained in the system and used to form the basis of the final grade.
Traditional Dailies requires many of the processes to be done on the Telecine, however Bones Dailies takes the process off-line into a file-based environment. This has changed the entire way Dailies are managed, saving time and money and allowing for collaboration anywhere in the world. The non-linear and digital approach of Bones Dailies also helps free up the Telecine allowing facilities to optimize their Telecine suite to offer new service opportunities.
With Bones Dailies, Cutting Edge were able to scan the 35mm negative on their Spirit4K Datacine®, apply a best light color correction with their daVinci2K and record totally uncompressed HD 4:4:4 images in real-time to EditShare disks. Once in Bones Dailies, the lab rolls were marked up manually according the Scene, Take, Camera etc. and all the metadata was maintained by Bones Dailies in its internal database, alongside the Keycode information coming from the Spirit 4K. Location audio was imported into Bones Dailies faster than real-time and specially designed algorithms analyzed each file, identifying Sticks/Slate closures. Audio and image synchronization is semi-automatic based on a variety of sync markers.
“Bones Dailies provided us with a tool to deliver fully graded, fully logged, fully sound synchronized 10 bit 4:4:4 quality Dailies. Being an uncompressed, non-linear, template based system; we were able to instantly create taylor made versions by a single click of a button” comments Stuart Monksfield, General Manager of Cutting Edge, Sydney. “Our client, 20th Century Fox, loved the flexibility as we had to specifically tune deliverables for the various departments involved, and all without any loss of image or sound quality whatsoever.”
Bones Dailies is able to record logarithmic HD or 2K RGB 10-bit 4:4:4 images directly to standard file systems, local storage or SANs, therefore any playout from Bones is at the same high quality as what originally came off the Spirit DataCine.
“Bones Dailies provides a way to boost productivity in the Dailies process,“ comments Morris Lindenkreuz, DFT product manager for Bones. “It is a template-driven tool, which automates processes ultimately saving time and eliminating mundane tasks. Facilities can work concurrently on the Dailies processes – audio and video ingest and synchronization, ASC CDL based primary, and secondary color-correction, and playout of the color-corrected, sound synchronized, fully logged Dailies to multiple file formats, all while transferring the next film roll.”
There is an increasing demand for cost savings along with increased quality requirements. Bones Dailies is specifically designed to streamline the Dailies process in a cost-effective and time-sensitive way. Producers, directors, DP’s and post houses will benefit from the improved workflow.
Bones Dailies software subdivides tasks so multiple users can work in parallel. Tasks include: Audio ingest and preparation, image ingest and preparation, metadata logging, audio and video synchronization, grading, playout and file generation for various file-based deliverables. Bones Dailies supports up to 2 parallel SDI output channels for play-out of SD or HD content.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine was shot in Australia and New Zealand over 21 weeks on approximately 850,000 feet of film (+-157 hours of footage), using as many as 11 film cameras on some days. It was filmed on the Arriflex 435, with Primo and Angenieux Lenses and on the Panavision Panaflex Millennium XL, Primo and Angenieux Lenses. The project used Kodak Super 35mm Vision2 200T 5217, and Vision3 500T 5219 stocks. The Dailies were delivered on approximately 130 Digital Betacam Tapes, 500 XDCAM disks, 400 HDCAM SR tapes, and 2,500 DVD’s . X-Men Origins: Wolverine was produced and distributed by 20th Century Fox and has become a financial success at the box office. According to Box Office Mojo Wolverine has grossed roughly $177.8 million in the United States as of June 28, 2009, and $183.2 million in rest of the world markets, giving it an estimated total of $361 million worldwide.
About Bones Dailies
Bones Dailies is a Linux-based software platform designed to significantly enhance the throughput of your current dailies solution. It is a turnkey, scalable system that manages the entire Dailies production process in a non-linear fashion, from ingest to the creation of a color-graded dailies master. Bones Dailies features a template-driven process for image and audio ingest, audio syncing, primary and secondary color-correction and playout. Automatic audio slate detection and other helpful tools speed up the sync process significantly. Whichever way you want to work, Bones Dailies adds a high level of flexibility, efficiency and offers the ultimate picture quality to your Dailies deliverables.
Bones Dailies can operate as a single seat system on locally attached storage or as a multiple seat system on a shared access SAN. It is an open system that supports standard file systems and works with DPX files. In a multiple seat configuration all tasks can be shared and performed in parallel - Telecine or tape transfers, audio preparation and sound synchronization, color correction and playout.
About Cutting Edge
Cutting Edge is one of Australia’s leading post production groups with two facilities in Sydney and headquarters in Brisbane. Cutting Edge specializes in post production for feature films, television commercials, reality television and outside broadcast. For more information please visit: www.cuttingedge.com.au
