Hollywood-based post house Light Iron recently provided on-set color, data management and final color grading for the celebrity-directed short films that premiered at the Canon Project Imaginat10n Film Festival Thursday at the Lincoln Center in New York City. The event was presented by two-time Academy Award winner Ron Howard.
The celebrity-directed shorts were:
Evermore, directed by Biz Stone
Out of the Blue, directed by Eva Longoria
Little Duck, directed by James Murphy
…And She Was My Eve, directed by Jamie Foxx
A Dream of Flying, directed by Georgina Chapman
“It was a great honor and a lot of fun to collaborate with these talents,” said Paul Geffre, senior producer. “We were pioneering the Canon RAW 4K workflow, but bringing unique stories to the screen in 4K is what we do at Light Iron.”
Production began in January for the first Project Imaginat10n movie, Evermore, directed by Stone, using Canon’s new C500 camera. Two cameras captured to Codex recorders, but due to a need for a small underwater housing, a third camera was paired with a Gemini recorder. This was the first time the new Canon RAW 4K codec was used with a Gemini recorder, and also the first time with Colorfront’s Express Dailies.
The footage was processed on Light Iron’s OUTPOST System by DIT Rafel Montoya. Montoya created same-day sound-synced and colored dailies using the look developed on set with cinematographer Andre Lascaris. This process was repeated for three of the other four celebrity-directed movies over the next six months.
After editorial, each of the Project Imaginat10n movies returned to Light Iron for finishing. Four of the movies received a full 4K digital intermediate. Colorist Corinne Bogdanowicz in Los Angeles worked with Stone, as well as with Longoria on Out of the Blue. Foxx, Murphy and Chapman finished their projects in New York, where colorist Sean Dunckley collaborated with them in Light Iron’s new facility on Broadway.
Last week’s premiere also included the five winning shorts from Canon’s consumer film contest. The challenge for all the Project Imaginat10n participants was to create a short film inspired by 10 crowdsourced photos. Collectively, the 10 shorts will be packaged as “A Ron Howard Presentation” and are available to watch on Yahoo Screen.
