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'MAGLESS' DAILIES
Sound Mixer Chris Munro pioneered and developed the ‘magless dailies’ concept, originally with the Fostex PD-4 timecode DAT, and has refined it with the use of Fostex's DVD-RAM products. In fact, Chris was honoured with the Charles Parkhouse Award for his work in this area of production sound. The day’s audio can be loaded into a non-linear editor such as Avid Film Composer2 complete with all the automatically-generated scene, take, reel information and more in just a couple of minutes for each hour of audio directly from the DV40 or PD-6’s DVD-RAM disc, with no additional software!
After syncing to picture, an export to another DVD-RAM disc produces the 'daily disc'. The editor gets all his labelling done for him by the acquisition machine, along with a guide audio track; the production team watch rushes in original digital audio; and most importantly, the production saves tens of thousands of dollars in no longer having to use (and store!) expensive mag stock, while wiping off hours from the whole post process.
Chris Munro has been involved in motion picture sound for over thirty years, and he is recognised as setting quality standards for others to aspire to. He has worked as a Sound Mixer on an impressive list of feature film, including “A Fish called Wanda”, “Robin Hood Prince of Thieves”, “Event Horizon”, the last three “Bond” pictures, and “Tomb Raider”. In association with Gerry Humphries, he established Twickenham SoundStation as a significant force in feature film post-production audio.
Magless Rushes
For his contributions to the general quality standards of motion picture sound, and particularly for his development of the "magless" rushes method, Chris Munro was reecently a highly deserving recipient of the 2001 Charles Parkhouse Award.
Application Diagrams and Production Workflow
Chris has taken time out to scrible a few diagrams on how the DV40 fits into the film production process. Click on the 'thumbnail' images below to see larger versions.
Using the DV40 and PD-6, Chris has developed and pioneered the practice of loading the original audio recording into the non-linear (AVID) editor in a file format, with associated timecode, so that it can be synchronised with the digitised mute picture. This allows the rushes to be viewed without the need of a magnetic tape sound transfer, or having to operate a linear cutting room alongside the non-linear set-up.
Producers have become increasingly nervous about having to make judgements from video rushes, where matters like focus, make-up or even performance cannot reliably be judged. Similarly the dialogue editor often has to assess a track that has been through various unhelpful processes, and may even have to decide to order automatic dialogue replacement, when the original track is actually perfectly satisfactory. The new system avoids both of these problems.
Furthermore, an annoying disadvantage of the non-linear editing systems has been that with the need for telecine transfer and real-time digitisation after the rushes have been viewed, the editor may not be able to start cutting until two days after shooting. The new system restores the facility of being able to cut on the morning after the shoot. The advantages in time and cost savings are clear, but it is particularly satisfying to recognise its contribution towards maintaining the highest possible quality of motion picture sound.
Chris believes the advantages of Fostex DVD-RAM and the 'Magless' system are numerous..
- Editor has early access to material and does not have to wait until all dailies have been viewed and viewing tapes made before digitisation in to Avid.
- NO REAL TIME PLAYOUTS make lunchtime dailies achievable.
- NO MAGNETIC TRANSFER gives significant cost saving (could be $50-300,000).
- Sound Editor does not have to conform to original sound, saving time and improving sound quality.
With best quality sound available in Avid it is possible to accurately spot ADR saving unnecessary ADR.
- Any sound work done by editor can be automatically accessed by sound editor and will not have to be re-made
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