CHICAGO—As a director and cinematographer, I’ve worked on numerous feature film, television, documentaries, live events and commercials throughout my career. My latest project was a pilot for a television show called “Deranged Marriage,” which follows an aspiring Bollywood starlet whose dreams of furthering her career in America are thwarted when her now ex-agent bungles her U.S. visa application. She enlists the aid of a shady lawyer to orchestrate a fake matrimony with a struggling actor, against her overbearing parents’ desire to finalize a previously arranged marriage.
Golan utilized DaVinci Resolve to handle editing and graphics work for “Deranged Marriage” pilot.JUGGLING RESPONSIBILITIES
On “Deranged Marriage,” I’m a writer, producer, director, DP, post supervisor and colorist, as well as one of the editors. With so many responsibilities on my plate, I used DaVinci Resolve Studio for my end-to-end post workflow, which included color correction, editing and finishing. Not having to switch in and out of different programs, as well as not having to transcode or optimize the media, saved me time, energy and really helped streamline the workflow.
Not only was Resolve great for producing the look we were going for color-wise, but by using its 3D Keyer, I was able to do all of the green screen compositing in Resolve rather than having to switch systems to an external compositor. For example, in one green screen shot the talent was holding a pineapple with green leaves, and the leaves were keying out. By using a combination of the layer mixer and key mixer, I was able to create a fast and simple method to generate a holdout matte, which allowed me to finesse it and deliver the shot. I also used the spill suppression in the 3D Keyer to clean any residual green spill on the talent.
Resolve’s 3D Keyer is a simple yet powerful tool. You just drag over an area to instantly pull a clean key and isolate areas in a shot. Because the show was shot in RAW on Blackmagic cameras, the footage we pulled in had a great deal of resolution and quality, which made for easy keying and also allowed for easily punching in and reframing a little when needed. And using node sizing to quickly paint out things like a boom mic was also a big time saver.
The custom titles feature in Resolve was also very useful for completing the text credits, and it was easy to match and modify text when needed. I appreciate the ability to use compound clips in Resolve and to expand back into the timeline to make tweaks. The only thing I didn’t do in Resolve was create the motion graphic intro, but I did make adjustments to the motion graphics later in Resolve.
START TO FINISH
Being able to work in Resolve from start to finish was very helpful. It’s simple, and saved me time by not having to switch between programs. Being able to do it all in the same ecosystem keeps me focused and makes everything seamless. Since there was never any question of whether or not our projects would be finished in Resolve, I figured, why not start them in it as well?
Ari Golan is the director, cinematographer and VFX supervisor at Atomic Imaging, Inc. and Golan Studios. He can be reached atari@atomicimaging.com.
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