True multimedia using Avid Xpress methods

As new video technology has become more affordable and widely available it has allowed people skilled in one creative discipline to move easily into other areas, often mixing media to explore new heights of creativity. Filmmaker and editor Peter Leckelt in Germany has harnessed the power of Avid Xpress Pro to manipulate images, both still and moving, to create highly regarded films, commercials and music videos.

The learning curve

Multimedia is the current watchword and new technology has allowed creative people to combine different disciplines to create boundary-breaking work. Peter Leckelt is an editor and director who began his professional career as a photographer. He learned to edit on Avid Media Composer and switched to Avid Xpress Pro for a project that demanded a high degree of storage and image manipulation. Xpress Pro has continued to provide Leckelt with the flexible, creative tools he needs for his style, particularly on music videos that blend video and still photographs.

I’m always trying to find new ways to work, new ways to do things. For me, Avid is the way forward.

Peter Leckelt

Now based in Hamburg, Leckelt got his first experience of video editing using linear equipment, cutting on two VHS machines controlled by a video mixer. His first experience of non-linear and of Avid came in 1996, working for a commercials director who owned a small post-production house. Teaching himself to edit in the new style using Avid Media Composer v5.5, Leckelt cut together a commercial for Philips, which relied on using different images and moods in the picture composition.

The project gave Leckelt an introduction to the basics of non-linear editing, image capture and play-out of material. "The Media Composer 5.5 was a great machine," he says, "with good interface and control tools, so I didn't find it too complicated to work with Avid. As I learned how things worked I then began to get to know other editors, from whom I learned new techniques," Leckelt explains. "By looking at how others did the job I could translate that to suit what I was doing.”

I didn't find it too complicated to work with Avid.

 

Leckelt found that non-linear editing was both more flexible and more precise than its linear counterpart. "I could capture material and play around with it," he says. "It's completely different to linear editing, for which you need a master plan. The only problem was non-linear wasn't real time; I had to render every dissolve, which slowed things down but didn't matter that much."

The ultimate challenge

Leckelt made the transition to Avid Xpress Pro in 2001 to accommodate and manage a particular project, a documentary called Ultimate Surf, and has not looked back. For Ultimate Surf Leckelt worked with a friend and director who attempted to film the biggest ever wave. In his search the director shot 150 hours of location footage, with an additional eight hours of interviews.

There was no script, no shot logs and the project called for working in high quality even though the footage had been shot on DV. "Avid Xpress Pro gave me 500GB of hard disk, which meant I could get nearly everything I needed on the machine and play around with it," he comments. "I was able to experiment with the timeline, moving things around, and could also exchange work easily with the sound engineer and the telecine house."

We use Avid on both MAC and PC.

Peter Leckelt

Leckelt began working with Avid on Mac but migrated to PC, although his company, eachfilm, continues to use the Apple platform for some applications. "For people who are not so much into computers the Mac is easier to use," he observes. "If you need a good workflow and interface and want to open lots of programmes then PC is better. The feel, particularly in using the keyboard, is different between the two and rendered images do not look the same if you compare them from PC to Mac."

In a career that started in photography, developed into video editing and has now led to directing music videos and films, Leckelt is combining the different techniques he has learned and now experiments with the technology.

Experimenting with music videos

Ideas Leckelt tried out for a friend's band, Montag, , using moving images combined with still photographs, were further developed when he was approached to direct a video for the band Wunder. Up to 15,000 pictures were imported into Avid as JPEG sequences. All the material was arranged on the Xpress Pro master sync timeline, with the video files being cut first and the JPEGs added afterwards.

By having the timeline above the picture I could see what was available and move the JPEG scenes as I wanted them. Doing that allowed me to choose where best to edit in real time and where best to edit using the high-speed copies.

Peter Leckelt

At eachfilm they own three Avid systems; an Xpress Pro 3.5 workstation, a Dell laptop running Xpress Pro 4.0 and a brand new Xpress Pro HD 5.0 system. Despite the in-house capability Leckelt says he switches between using post-production facilities, as he did for a music video for the singer Patrick Nuo. The project was prepared and off-lined on Xpress Pro at eachfilm and then imported into a Media Composer over a FireWire connection.

The team at eachfilm are now gearing up for a film comedy to be shot in northern Germany. The film, Breakwater Elvis, will be edited on the Xpress Pro HD and Leckelt is in discussion with Avid Hamburg over a HD laptop system, as the crew will be spending a month on location.

Peter Leckelt has worked on other editing systems but has always come back to Avid. "The other platforms are either designed more for effects artists or are too complicated," he says. For the future he sees a mixture of HD and DV, depending on the project and whether German and other European broadcasters move quickly to HD. Leckelt feels Avid has given him the technical and creative freedom to experiment and the relationship shows no sign of fading.

Peter Leckelt, editor and director. For more information visit www.eachfilm.de