Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/65909
giant light fixtures, which feed the public areas, are reclaimed 1920 Olive baskets I found at the Rose Bowl flea market. I turned them upside down and put a 300-watt CFL in it. It looks cool, it's efficient and it's reclaimed," reports Hens. The desks and work surfaces are made of almost 200-year-old reclaimed, local Douglas fir. "We have planking that is used in all of the rooms, for platforms and ceiling panels, that is 100-year-old reclaimed Douglas fir from an old Victorian House in Los Angeles. Those types of approaches help keep your costs down, but more importantly lets you source materials locally and gives a lot of character to your studio." Hens spent about six months scouring Southern California for things to use in the new space. Other reclaimed items include furniture (what isn't made of reclaimed material was reclaimed industrial carts from the Rust Belt); toilet paper and paper towel dispensers as well as towel racks (made from reclaimed gas pipes from Los Angeles); lighting fixtures; door hinges; and joist hangers from a factory in the Old West. "We used the joist hang- ers for architectural and aesthetic reasons, and I didn't have to buy them from a manufacturing company in China that doesn't use green practices, and it didn't have to be shipped across an ocean," explains Hens. When it came to insulating the thousands of square feet of their space, Chop House used reclaimed denim from a company called Ultra Suede Denim, just one of the companies, sources as well as practices suggested by architect Mullinix. In terms of day-to-day green initiatives, Chop House Post is com- pletely file-based. "We don't do tape, we don't do film; we think it's toxic and don't want to put it back in the environment." For digital archiving they call on LTO tape, which is said to last for 30 years, according to the LTO Consortium. The post world has been "a pretty messy business for a long time," says Hens. He points to gear as the big offender. "Everything we have is the latest and the most compact systems possible; we do everything on the desktop, Mac-based for the most part, and we stay software-driven as much as we can because it takes less electricity to drive that equipment." He points to Resolve on Mac in all their color bays and Smoke for Mac for finishing as examples. "There is a bigger impact when you start thinking green more than you realize," acknowledges Hens. "At first you think, 'Wow, that's going to be really expensive and a challenge,' then you start rethinking how you do business and you realize you are becoming more efficient and more competitive." DIGITAL FX Greg Milneck, president of Baton Rouge's Digital FX, has always been environmentally conscious, but a recent expansion of his space allowed him to start from the ground up. Digital FX (www.digitalfx.tv) began as a post house, but later added production services to handle new work coming into Louisiana thanks to aggressive tax incentives. Their growth continued recently with the addition of a new studio and camera department, housing make-up suites, a kitchen, offices, stage, cyc and greenscreen. The new building is in the final stages of getting its LEED certification. LEED certification was established by the US Green Business Counsel Building (www.usgbc.org/LEED/), and according to its site provides building owners and operators with a framework for identifying and implementing practical and measurable green building design, construction, operations and maintenance solutions. "We are probably at the minimum LEED Silver, but hoping for Gold," reports Milneck. He acknowledges that achieving Gold status is difficult because of the costs involved, noting that is one of the big challenges of going green. There are tax incentives for solar panels and such, but Digital FX still found it too expensive. "Solar panels were on the list, but we had to cut it. While you do get tax credits, you still have to lay out the money, and it could be years before you get the payback." While always green sensitive, Milneck and Digital FX wanted to take it to the next level with their new con- struction, so they hired an architect and contractor who were familiar with LEED certification. But he admits it's challenging for a production company because there are things that go against the current norm of the industry. He offers up florescent lighting as an example. "This is especially hard to pull off in a post facility because there is only so much you can do to maintain what you have to deliver, but it's one of the things that helps you get that LEED certification: it means retrofitting existing fixtures and ensuring new ones are compact fluorescents. You could use LEDs, but they are just not there yet and the cost is prohibitive." Milneck admits that compromises www.postmagazine.com Digital FX is aiming for LEED Gold certification with the addition of its new building as well as green practices within its older space. Post • May 2012 21