At noisybrain.Productions, Don and Daniel Berube are digital storytellers, helping clients tell stories that are equal parts passionate, compelling, and creative. As such, these seasoned veterans always keep their eyes open for the latest innovations that can improve their production and post-production practices—whether it’s to enhance their creativity, improve their productivity and speed up workflow, increase their flexibility, or help them better serve the needs of their clients. At noisybrain, the Berube brothers pride themselves on staying ahead of the curve and continually extending the boundaries of their current capabilities.

 

Don and Daniel were first introduced to Focus Enhancements’ Direct To Edit® Technology and the FS product line at a trade show in 2000. “Since day one, we were believers of the product and workflow, and have been strong supporters ever since,” said Don. 

 

DTE Technology® streamlines the edit workflow by capturing DV or HDV streams to hard disk. FS products let videographers record directly in edit-ready QuickTime, Avid DV-OMF, and other native NLE formats in timeline—no capturing, no file transfer, and no conversion. By eliminating the digitizing process, footage can be ready for editing almost as soon as it’s been shot.

 

Alongside Apple and the Boston Final Cut Pro User Group at Macworld Boston 2005, Don impressed the crowd attending a live concert performance at the Berklee Performance Center with the Direct To Edit workflow—going from concert to edited output in minutes. The idea was to record the last song of the concert performance to a group of FS-4 units, rush the FS-4 units out to the lobby to their Final Cut Pro mobile editing station when the song ended, and have a broadcast-quality, edited piece ready to demonstrate to attendees as they exited the theater.

 

The group filmed the concert using three cameras, with an FS-4 unit attached to each one. The FS-4 units captured the footage in QuickTime format that was immediately ready for editing. Once the concert was over, the editing team connected each drive to the editing station, transferred the files into Final Cut Pro, and used Final Cut Pro MultiCam feature to edit the piece in real time just as the audience entered the lobby. “The goal was to have final output just minutes after the show ended,” said Don. “There’s simply no way we could have done this without the FS units. The ability to bypass the capturing process and ingest from tape to hard disk was absolutely essential. And it’s not just about recording directly to disk; it’s also about recording directly in the file format we needed for our NLE.”

 

In another situation, Don and Daniel filmed a one-hour interview in New York City. They needed to produce a printed transcription of the interview by noon the next day, meant handing a final digital copy to the transcriptionist by morning. And in between, Don and Daniel needed to drive back to their office outside Boston. “The ability to bypass transferring from tape to hard drive meant we could sleep that night. In general, FS gives all of us a more reasonable work schedule. No one is tied up in the editing room ingesting tape. Our editors are able to work fresh and edit fresh. And that’s how we get the best results.”

 

And at noisybrain. Productions, they’ve identified other ways to improve workflow efficiency with the FS units. In the field, Don utilizes the scene marking feature of the FS-3 and FS-4Pro HD to prepare the footage for Daniel and his team in the editing room. The FS supports nine folders for scene marking. Don pre-names each folder (such as dialog, outtakes, b-roll, and so on) and then organizes files into each of the folders during the shoot. When he hands Daniel and the editors the hard drive at the end of the shoot, all files are neatly organized into folders. “When you’re rolling an interview, you know right away when you are capturing a great moment that you will inevitably want to use in the edit. With the FS, I can mark it as it is being recorded in the FS and Daniel immediately knows where to find it,” said Don. “It’s not just a new way to shoot video,” said Daniel. “The FS gives you a whole new way to change your production environment.”

 

From day one, the Direct To Edit workflow has saved noisybrain. Productions significant hours of post-production time by eliminating the need to ingest tape and convert files. It has also proven valuable in a variety of other applications, leading Don to call it “the Swiss Army knife.” “Each week I use the FS for a different task. I use it in the field, in the editing room. I’ve used the loop playback mode on the FS-4Pro HD to display High Definition content at tradeshows. I’ve even used it at home to transfer files from my PC to my Mac,” he explained. “It’s not just a way to record video without using tape. Yes, it helps us save time—sometimes exponentially—but it’s more than that. The scene markers, time-lapse features, loop playback, file type flexibility—there are just so many ways to use the FS.”

 

The FS has served as a bridge between various NLE systems. noisybrain.Productions shoots primarily in QuickTime for Final Cut Pro. However, there are times when clients require a different file format, such as Avid OMF. With the FS, Don and Daniel can easily export to OMF without rendering. “It saves us hours of conversion time,” concluded Don. And recently, Don used the FS-3’s time-lapse feature to shoot Harvard Square over two consecutive nights. “The FS-3’s time-lapse mode worked great,” concluded Don. “I could adjust the time-lapse interval up to 24 hours. It gave us the results we wanted.” Don concluded, “All in all, the FS is a great tool to have in my pocket.”

noisybrain.Productions is a collaborative, full-service production facility based in suburban Boston. noisybrain was founded by brothers Daniel and Don Berube, both world-traveled with more than two decades of production and editing credits on public and network television. Don and Daniel have created productions for various clients, including Canon USA, Bogen Imaging, Format Filters, JVC Japan, Tiffen, and MIT’s Academic Media Production Services. Daniel is an Apple Certified Trainer and Editor, as well as the founder of the Boston Final Cut Pro User Group. Don is a producer/cameraman skilled in various SD and HD acquisition formats. The two are currently collaborating with wildlife filmmaker Art Smith to document the changes taking place within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). For more information, see www.noisybrain.com, or email info@noisybrain.com.

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Compatible with most HDV, DV, DVCPRO,® DVCAM, DVCPRO 50, and DVCPRO HD® camcorders and editing software, FireStore products feature Direct To Edit (DTE) video recording technology that converts the output from your camcorder or VTR to a nonlinear editing (NLE) format and records it on FireWire disk drives.