To Linear or Not to linear that is the question

Hey i was wondering what is the difference between linear and non-linear editing. I also wanted to know some of the systems they use for both. I have Final Cut 5. I have been ask to do some non-linear considerations.
So Which is better and why.


Please no tomatoe ( the Dan Qual spelling ) throwing

Huh?

Are you trying to use a flatbed, Moviola, Steenbeck? Or tape-to-tape?

There are still linear editors out there who swear by tape-to-tape. Just not many.

> I have Final Cut 5. I have been ask to do some non-linear considerations.

Again...huh?

<<<There are still linear editors out there who swear by tape-to-tape. Just not many.>>>

We took our BetaSP linear editor out about a year ago and put an Avid in there.

Linear editing consists of recording pieces of your show one after the other onto a piece of tape (film, etc). At least in the case of tape, you can't go back. If you make a mistake or the client changes their mind and wants to go back and change scene one, you can't--or at least not easily.

Nobody is organizing marches to go back to linear editing.

Koz

Thats what i was thinking. Iwas asked to come into a nonlinear studio to edit something and i was saying to myself ," i should just get the footage and put it in final cut. the guy wanted me to try to use my eye and style on a linear editing system. once i saw what he had i was like " there is noway i can do the norm on this system... but i guess some people really like S&M LOL:-)

I used to know people who could edit Quadraplex 2-inch videotape with a microscope, edi-view liquid, and surgical razor blades.

They're probably dead now.

Koz

Now thats funny!!!!

Dead on the edit room floor nodoubt, and just after the client said hey i wanna change the opening.

Linear edit bays nowadays are relegated to doing the Online assemble. You'll be hard pressed to find people offline cutting tape to tape.

ALthough I think that Michael Kahn still edits on a Moviola. Or did I hear that he FINALLY switched to digital NLE for WAR OF THE WORLDS?

NL is the way to go no one uses l editing anymore, i use in random tp mabe add a few pieces of video togethor, but not offen and only if is faster than capturing and editing. but as far as editing a project NL is the way to go L editing is damn near dead

> I was asked to come into a nonlinear studio to edit something and i was
> saying to myself ," i should just get the footage and put it in final cut.

J., make sure you have the distinction right: LINEAR is tape-to-tape, Moviolas, etc. NON-LINEAR is digital. If somebody's asking you to edit non-linearly, they're asking you to use Final Cut or Avid.

I love how easy it is to get off track when people throw in the own experiences instead of sticking to the question.

Linear Editing - That is using at minumum, two tape decks. One deck has the Master tape and the other one the assemble/edit tape.

In the later days of Linear - It was much easier than in the early days IE:60-70's to play the Master tape with Timecode and make decisions what pieces of the linear media to copy to the Assemble deck. By making Timecode in and out decisions on the Master tape, you could insert them or overlay them onto the assemble tape. Therefore the assemble tape was assembled from pieces of the Master tapes footage. With this method you had CRT monitors that allowed you to see the Master tape playing with Timecode and the resulting copy to the Assemble deck.

Then along comes a computer fast enough to actually edit in a NonLinear fashion. That is to be able to instantly select any Timecode point on your incoming media and start copying it from there to the output known as the Timeline. We do this by first digitizing - capturing the media clips from tape onto a hard drive and then importing them into FCP. From there the Viewer is used to select specific Timecode ins and outs to finally place on the Timeline (which is the Assemble deck area)

The real problems with analog tape all those years is the fact that one copy from Deck A to Deck B introduced a generation loss. Every copy from analog tape to tape caused further degredation of the original analog material.

A computer allowed us to digitize (the analog) into digitial and prevent any further generation losses until it had to go back to analog output.

DV was the first really All digital video video format that still used tape decks but was captured in a 1' and 0's fashion, instead of analog carrier and luminance/chromanance signals as originally in NTSC.

The movement to digital formats is a step forward into a more stable color space environment with many good and bad outcomes.

The DV format was all digital and that is why you could transfer it via Firewire from the camera to the computer, without a deck. Sony and others are now experimenting with other methods of capture to keep the video in the all digitial domain.

That was probably more than you wanted to know but, it is important to realize how easy it is to edit great video today as Easily as we do.

" LINEAR is tape-to-tape, Moviolas"

wait a minute. Moviolas linear? no way. film editing on a flatbed is NON linear. a pain in the ass, but non linear. You can lift up the middle of the cut and splice it right on to the end. no problem. you can swap shots around any way you like. takes you an afternoon, but you can do it.

fp

Interesting topic...I was taught to consider non-digital editing to be linear, because in flatbed editing, there is no "random access". and it's not "non-destructive". Basically my first instructor equated "non-linear" with "digital". I see your point, though, Frank -- Mike, Nick and Graeme etc., do you agree with Frank's definition?

I agree...because linear by definition means editing in a straight line. Place a shot, move on...place another shot...move on...add another. If you wanted to replace a shot, or adjust the pacing, you had to cut from that moment on...recutting everything.

On film, you can add something to the middle, or pull something out, or trim here and add there, and everything AFTER that edit point is unaffected.

Only tape to tape is linear.

Hi
To define linear editing think in a typing machine.
You must write directly in paper and in sequential mode. That's why it is called editing in the same enviormment and sequential.
If a mistake happen you must rewind the paper and do it all over again.
Non-Linear editing is when you use a word processor app.
The data is converted from paper, where the text is, to bits and they are stored in a random order on the Hard Drive. After all the changes, copy, paste, move, you wil have your final text. It's time to print.
Non-Linear means that a different suport is used to work and than exported to another in the end. Tape-Hard Drive-Tape.
The material is store in the HD so you can edit in a non sequential way like starting the movie with the final shots and then moving them where ever you need on the timeline.

Rui

difinitley agree.

there is still a certain amount of time neexded to GET to the specific point in a reel of film.
you cant just jump there.

but 30 pieces of film haging in a trim bin, waiting to be assembled in ANY order
that;'s non-linear.
and as everyone points out, so is the abiltiy to extract, insert, re-arange in way you like.

the big thing that delineates TAPE editing for me is the duration issue.
you can't extract or insert a shot and CHANGE THE DURATION of the tape.
if you want to do that, you have to use the master as a source and go a generation.
tape to tape editing for me is great for music videos because of this.
you have pretty much a set-in-stone duration.
i equate it to painting, where you have a pre-ordained scope set by your canvas.
and i used to think that cutting music videos on tape was a bit like a jackson pollock painting:
i would work in "layers".. laying down one layer after another going over and over building up a pretty dense cut
i liked working that way a lot, and i did like the physical aspect: cueing the tapes up, and rolling them in. i could develop quite a rythm.
i'd work that way again, but of course music videos are more effect laden these days.
i was mainly working in cuts only suites, but i do envy the people in linear suits: no rendering time for them: they can tweak and fiddle with their FX in real time!

film can more like sculpture: contstantly peeling away to reveal the shape within.
PLUS you can take a big glob of clay and stick on another bit wherever you like!

computers... eh..
similar to film, but it's like using a word processor :-(
i wish i could find a way to make them more physical
on "three dollars" we looked into using a driving game consol: steering wheel, and pedals!
that would have been fun but we couldnt get FCP to talk with it.

nick

> I wish i could find a way to make them more physical

Oh, come now...you're telling me you've never talked to the computer?

I took Walter Murch's work habits literally. He says he raises his Moviola higher up so that he has to edit standing up. I sometimes do that. And to go with the "editing is dance" analogy, I usually gauge my cuts in real time -- I use the Trim window maybe once every six months.

Thanks Frank and Nick for standing up for flatbed non-linear editing. Avid and other computerized versions of non-linear editing got their base architecture from flatbed editing. That's why the Avid icon for bin is a graphical representation of film bins with clips hanging down from a rack.

As for linear editing, I occasionally use it myself in certain circumstances, but for the most part I consider it a very useful training tool for new editors. Linear editing is simplified from the point of view that there are no real "effects" to speak of, not even dissolves from the basic systems. The editor gets to UN-learn what they've picked up on home systems, or from schools with only NLEs, which is typically a dependence on effects for effect's sake. Instead, not only do they learn to cut cleanly, but linear machines force the editor to think ahead, and to make decisions instead of just dropping clips into a timeline and endlessly going back and forth trying out shots.

I'm a big believer in it as a learning tool. It helps with the fundamentals.

Andy

I remember planning edits so that it would be easy to change titles and the like every 30 seconds with a clean dissolve without anything layered on top...so if the client had a change you could deal with a 30 second sequence instead of re-editing the entire show. All the while...the clock was ticking at $350 an hour.

Logging 3/4 tapes was essential for a decent off-line...and you could always take a break as we trudged to the needed time codes.

When D-2 decks came in, the glory of read-before-write made b rolls almost a thing of the past. Although the composite outs made green screen a pain.

Best
Chet Simmons
Las Vegas

yes, the concept of "choice" is much more real in a linear environment,

and that's something it has in common with film.

you have to make real and precise decisions about the cuts you're making. why is THIS frame better or worse then THAT frame.

an editor i know say's "there's got to be a damn good reason for ANY frame being used in the film"

it's a discipline that's more easy to lose sight of with an NLE.

oops.. i just blew my arguement, by thinking of computer based editing as "NLE"

still... film IS random access.

(and did anyone here use those early TAPE-based NLEs: 30 vhs decks all giving you one preview edit after another? (i didnt).. that was ALMOST a system..)

nick

thanks guys and mok you were right i had it mixed up. i am just use to the term digital editing and to here the techy word for it just threw me a little left.
This user group is really " off the heezy "( meaning the best yet, really good, narley:-)
i didnt think that this topic would raise that much chatter but that is a good thing.

New Slogan: LAFCP user group, Where the edit speaks to you. then dip to wht, emboss then tittle, and fade backround to 30% wht noise:-)

I think it's possible to discipline oneself in digital editing to make informed choices just like in flatbed or linear tape-to-tape editing. One thing I noticed about pre-digital editing is that although cuts were a little looser, they were no less effective because the editors and directors knew what was important -- which was emotional flow, not perfect matching, not visual "smoothness". As good an editor as, say, Akira Kurosawa was, his perfect match cuts weren't the only way to cut well...and Thelma Schoonmaker wasn't using a digital system when she cut GoodFellas. John Woo was probably working with conventional non-digital editing, as well, when he made those mind-blowing slow-mo/normal-speed cuts in The Killer.

I think if we just free ourselves from slavishly making every cut "smooth", we can re-discover that human element which made the precision (made possible by digital editing) an almost moot point. Old-time editors didn't *need* the ability to undo things with the touch of a button -- they made strong choices, and we got the point.

the reason i never forget that film editing is nonlinear is when i cut my first feature (after only working on flatbeds before and too young/green to get my hands on those fancy avr3 media composers) on a 3/4 tape to tape. wow. that really blew. 1st and LAST time. hell hath no fury.

fp

Koz, Some of us Razor cutters are still around. If I had the old microscope and the edivue I could probably still find the guard bands and video tracks and make the cut. I can still hear the splice going through the headwheel......DMB

"I used to know people who could edit Quadraplex 2-inch videotape with a microscope, edi-view liquid, and surgical razor blades.

They're probably dead now.

Koz"

Nah, I still had a pulse last time I checked. Also worked on Editdroid(bunch of betamax machines), CMX 6000 (many laserdisks), Montage (rack full of VHS machines) and there are a couple others whose name I can't even remember (editflex??). Avid still wants the world to think that they invented non-linear editing, it's just not so. How about 2 quad machines with editech? To be an editor all you had to do is get it to work, if you could edit it was a bonus. I'm wondering how many people out there can remember the heyday of Ampex. How about when squeezezoom came out (the first DVE.) Ahhh the good old days. I can operate a whole lot of stuff that's just not around anymore for all the good it does me.

Joe

i was wandering what is the difference between non-linear and linear editing as i have to do an essay and research on this...would be gratefull if u can explain...kind regards jason

Hi.

Jason, try this link:

[www.quantel.com]

Quantel Digital Factbook is like a Bible for this industry. You may focus your essay on Linear and Non-Linear Editing but read about systems, formats, graphics, analog and digital convertion, compression, keys, all in the book, and write about it on the essay. Editing envolves all of those items.
Anyway read the book, its a good resource for Producers, Directors... and of course Editors.



Rui Barros
Editor Colorist Trainer
Lisbon, Portugal
RTP Post-Production
Apple Certified Trainer FCP 7
Apple Certified Pro FCP 7