Over the past year, remote work has become a permanent fixture of post production. Many artists like the flexibility of working from home, and clients have grown to accept it. Prior to the pandemic, if you had told a director or a DP that they would be reviewing color on an iPad, you would have been laughed into an insane asylum, but today they’re all doing it and no one’s squawking.
In the new year, we’ll continue to facilitate a combination of remote and in-person work. We are currently supporting productions where the editors are doing most of their work from Brooklyn or elsewhere, but they come into the facility once or twice a week for reviews with the director. People are also returning to the facility for sound mixing and color. People want to hear their mix in a big room and see their picture on a big screen. They also miss the collaborative effect of sitting in a room with someone. The creative interaction is hard to duplicate on the phone or over Zoom.
As a facility manager, I see positive aspects to remote work. It’s less expensive and requires less real estate. On the other hand, I miss having everyone in the facility. If I have a question for an editor, it’s nice to walk into his room and ask. Communication is choppier when people are spread out. We need to find ways to improve that.
There is a lot of talk now about work moving to the cloud. For certain aspects of post and visual effects, the cloud sounds like the perfect solution, but our response is, “Show me.” The sales pitches sound great, amazing in fact, but when we put it through its paces, we find it’s not quite ready for certain aspects of our workflow. The cloud may be the future, but we still have a way to go.
As for Goldcrest, we continue to evolve our business model. In the past, we were known primarily for independent features and documentaries. Over the past year, our sound department expanded their episodic footprint and did so seamlessly. Our team has done a phenomenal job and built a sterling reputation. We’re working with great talent on high profile projects, both at the network and OTT level. Our picture team is taking on higher-end features and has built a very successful dailies service. Our growth plans include expansion into picture finishing for episodics.
We’ve also launched visual effects services in partnership with Fancy VFX. We see that as a game-changer. It brings up into the high-end commercial market, an area of the business that is new to us. It also provides our feature and episodic clients with access to world-class visual effects talent.
Goldcrest has emerged from the pandemic in a strong position. 2021 has been a record year for us and we expect 2022 to be better yet. We're going to continue to grow, continue to add top-class talent, and continue to expand our horizons.
Domenic Rom is the Managing Director, Goldcrest Post (www.goldcrestpostny.com) in New York City.