Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/990701
41 Q2 2018 / CINEMONTAGE two-hour show. When editor Mary DeChambres, ACE, joined the show some 18 months ago, she was impressed by the teamwork. "I don't think I've ever worked with an assistant editing team as good as this one," she says. "Our eight assistant editors ingest, group and organize the footage of 150 competitor runs per city — and we shoot in six cities per season, with as many as 28 cameras for each run. There are 14 editors on the show and it truly takes all of us to put together one two-hour episode." To understand the complexity of editing American Ninja Warrior, it helps to be familiar with what makes up a two-hour episode: the cold opens, hometown packages (also called pop- ins) and runs. The first is the segment that opens the show and introduces the city and its contestants. Following are the hometown packages, which tell the background stories of the competitors — with liberal use of their own video footage and photos. Finally, the runs are the competitions themselves, held on obstacle courses ringed with cameras. "I put our editors up against anyone else," says executive producer Brian Richardson. "What we do is unique in TV. We're cutting a sporting event and these emotional background stories — two completely different styles of editing — and we churn out two hours every week. That's a lot of TV, and maintaining the quality is a real accomplishment." "American Ninja Warrior is an extremely complicated show to edit," fellow executive producer Anthony Mary DeChambres. American Ninja Warrior. NBCUniversal