I’m very excited to once again be teaching several classes at the 2012 NAB Post|Production world conference. It’s going to be much busier this year than years past as I’m teaching five total classes from Monday through Wednesday. If you aren’t going to NAB or attending the conference then please forgive this self-indulgent post about those classes that I’m leading. Hey, I’m just happy to be here at all.

If you’re on the fence about attending the Post|Production World conference then just look over the grid (PDF link to the grid) to see all the cool classes that are being taught this year. It’s a jampacked week of learning as I was a student there before I was a teacher and I can tell you that I certainly learned a lot from the conference. I’ve always found instructors to be very knowledgeable and more than happy to talk with you after class. I’ve also found them very approachable on the show floor as well and I’m always happy to talk to students anywhere in and around Las Vegas.

You can register for the conference and get details about the packages here. If you’ve got an iPhone then grab the 2012 NAB Show iPhone app as it’ll help with planning and moving around the event.

In-depth: Music Video Workflow

This will be the third year doing the music video workflow class. It’s a lot of fun with a lot of information jammed into the 3 hours. We’ll use real-world music video examples (including a number one video on the GAC countdown) as well as talk about multiple NLEs.

This In-Depth session will walk through the various steps involved in the production and post-production of a music video. Production topics will include preparation for the shoot (file formats, slates, playback), shooting topics – like why it’s important to shoot a slate as well as off-speed performance for a slow motion effect and the most important part of the process: post-production.
Post topics will include : file preparation, syncing, offline vs. online, client approvals, mastering and deliverables. A special emphasis will be placed on syncing and various methods that can be used including grouping and multi-clipping and auxiliary timecode and how it can be extremely useful for music video editing.
Also worth noting is that this session will discuss different editing platforms including Avid Media Composer and Final Cut Pro as the two main NLEs as they support groupings of clips. Adobe Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro X will also be discussed. This will be a fun, information- filled class with some real world music videos used as examples.

A Crash Course in HDSLR Post Workflow

This class will expand on a DSLR post webinar I did a couple of years ago. I’ve learned some new techniques, some new tricks and found some cool new tools since then which we will talk about in this class.

HDSLRs have changed film and video production. For the majority of post-production applications their compressed H.264 format isn’t the best option for editing and post-production. This session will focus on the many different options available for HDSLR post.
The main question revolves around which non-linear editing application to use and we will discuss the pros, cons and specifics for all the major NLEs (Apple Final Cut Pro 7 and X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro). In addition to the NLE we’ll look at options from transcoding footage with 3rd party applications; some cheap, some free. There are also options that many editors may be unaware of, such as adding timecode and other metadata, to help make HDSLR footage more robust and post-production friendly.
Attendees to this session will leave with a lot of information about various software tools that can be used to help in the HDSLR post-production process.

Essentials of Avid Editing for Migrating Editors

The “making the move ”workshop is new to Post|Production World this year. There are classes on making the move to Final Cut Pro X, Adobe Premiere Pro and Avid Media Composer. It should be an interesting set of sessions in the wake of FCPX. I’ll be leading one on making the move to Avid Media Composer. This is a three hour in depth class and there’s a lot of information we’ll pack into those three hours. If you’re thinking of “making the move” to Media Composer then this will be the class for you. Questions will be welcome.

Avid Media Composer can be an intimidating non-linear editor. Maybe it’s the application’s reputation or it could be the interface. The truth is Media Composer isn’t much more difficult than any other professional NLE. The concepts are very similar as is the way many of the functions work.
This session will introduce the basic concept of 3-point editing and how Media Composer is built off of that concept. We’ll look at the creation of a Media Composer edit step-by-step, from creating the project and importing media to performing different types of edits and applying basic effects.
These concepts are all very similar from one NLE application to the next so if an attendee is familiar with another NLE they’ll be able to easily grasp many of these concepts. But an editing novice will also learn a lot as we’ll be looking at some basic concepts that everyone working in NLE applications need to know.

Multi-camera Essentials for Avid Editors

Multicam editing in Media Composer is always a lot of fun. This class will be a look at a number of tips and techniques to make multicam editing faster and easier. We will look at multicam editing from both a small interview set up, to a live concert as well as a music video with tons of takes.

A strong point of the Media Composer package is its ability to edit multicamera shoots as well as music video style shoots where the editor might have 20, 50 or 100 takes of a song performance. This strength comes from tools like grouping, multicam and auxiliary timecode
This session will look at how those three features can work in tandem or entirely separate depending on the edit task at hand. For example, if you’re shooting and editing multicamera concerts or interviews, then both multicam and grouping can be used. If you’re working on a music video, then grouping and auxiliary timecode will be the tools that can help get the job done faster and more efficiently.

Power Techniques for Avid Bin Management

Okay I admit it, bin management seems like a rather boring topic. But the Avid Media Composer bin is such a powerful place that there are many different tips tricks and techniques that a lot of editors don’t know. In fact I seem to discover something new about the Avid bin every week myself! I’ve been having a lot of fun (and learning a lot) while getting ready for this class.

The Bin is one of those places where Avid editors spend a lot of time but it’s often thought of as just a place to hold footage, while in reality there’s so much more. All items held in a Media Composer bin contain a lot of information that can be displayed, arranged and sorted in various ways. There’s multiple options for viewing clips, sequences, titles and effects. Many different metadata columns can be viewed, saved and customized.
This session will dig into all the different icons, settings, menus and customization options within a Media Composer bin. Different types of items can do and display different types of things within a bin and many of these differences will be compared. The session will also look at ways to use custom bins for organization as well as moving bins to and from other projects.

If you have any questions about these sessions (or NAB in general) please post them in the comments below or email me at editblog at gmail dot com. I hope to see you at NAB 2012!