What does grading to an edl mean?

[daveyboy]

Hiya i'm hoping to get my film graded - telecined at some company.

They sent me an email saying 'Are we grading to an edl?'

Does anyone no what this means?

Also she said 'If you can provide me with examples of grading

references you are after - i will try to get someone on board for you.'

Does she mean what sort of films i like the look of to help them with the grading.

The film is 16mm b+w if that makes any difference to any of the answers.

Thanks for help

[Phil Rhodes]

Hi,

 

What I assume they're talking about is whereby you supply either film or ungraded online tapes (HD, digibeta, whatever) and an EDL from your offline edit, and they then do the assembly in the grade. This is the normal method of working for things like TV ads and music promos.

 

> Does she mean what sort of films i like the look of

 

Yes.

 

Phil

[Rolfe Klement]

Exactly as Phil says - you take your all original material (Film stock 16mm) and they only grade the sections required from the EDL (Edit decision list) -

 

because you do not want to waste time and money making scenes beautiful that are not in the final edit.

 

So the usual process is develop the neg , run a one light to some format with timecode, edit (get the EDL) in a standard format (CMX 340, 3400 and 3600) - ask your facility if they have any preference for EDL format.

 

Take the film in and the EDL - do the grade on what you need - see if at the same time you ask for some 12 or 16bit still frame captures at full res - and a digital output (QT uncompresed etc) since you will need it for promotional reasons (and is often cheaper or free if you ask for it in the TK session lay outs)

 

thanks

 

Rolfe