Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/466366
www.postmagazine.com 28 POST FEBRUARY 2015 depending on the time period." Although the show goes live once the Top 24 contestants are selected, the preceding shows require extensive post production work. Chainsaw begins edit- ing in September for the season's Janu- ary debut; the American Idol fi nale airs at the end of May. Craig Gooder is the post supervisor, keeping "everything moving in the right direction," DeRonde says. Auditions draw hundreds of contes- tants to each of six cities, where rounds held for executive producers and judges generate "hours and hours of footage for each contestant," says DeRonde. "We meet them and learn about them, so we feel something if they make it or fail. We do over 10 hours of audition shows." With so much footage, "there's no way to store it at full resolution," he notes, so post is done at 20:1. Editors cut on Avid Media Composers V.6.54. There's 36TBs of Avid ISIS storage for the show and 16TBs of nearline Drobo RAID stor- age for all the fi le-based cameras. At least 16 cameras are deployed in each city, with Sony XDCAMs serving as the A cameras. Seven of them are dedi- cated to the audition room while four or fi ve ENG crews are in the fi eld and other shooters man Canon 5D cameras. DeRonde directs the audition shows so he's on the road with the associate producers taking notes on every contes- tant and making priority lists of charac- ters for the eight assistant editors who sort footage and do string outs. Then editors go through the string outs and start to build stories from "pods." Mike Samano, the lead assistant, developed a lot of the organizational processes for the show, says DeRonde. "The logistics happen in the background so the editors only have to worry about how to tell the story — they're not looking for stuff . The effi ciency of the as- sistants is a huge part of why the editors don't have to work nights and weekends. The assistants do the science, which allows the editors to do the art." The acts of the show are initially built on a cork board with index cards. "Be- cause we have self-contained pods, when we lay out the show, editors can plug them in as the acts allow," says DeRonde. "Each contestant is essentially a full story; we may not need all their footage, but at any time we have full three- to fi ve-min- ute pieces on each of them." Editors are also tasked with "fi nding the story of each city" where auditions take place, threading clips of Keith Urban taking viewers to "quirky and fun" places in Nashville or following Jennifer Lopez back to her childhood home in the Bronx through episodes. "The auditions are in a room, so any time you can get the city vibe into a show it makes things more interesting," says DeRonde. Once the city auditions wrap, 250 contestants make their way back to Hol- lywood. They'll be whittled down to the Green Mile 40, then the Top 24 and the show will go live from the studio. "We'll cut one- to two-minute packages about each contestant: what they're singing, how they prepared," says DeRonde. "We shrink to four assistants and fi ve editors at that point." Jon Ragsdale does the online fi nishing and color correction for episodes in Avid Symphony, except for "special projects, like segments in the fi rst show, which go to our [FilmLight] Baselight for a color pass," says DeRonde. MANHUNT 2 Manhunt 2 follows ex-Navy SEAL Joel Lambert in new real-life games of pur- suit as he attempts to evade the world's most skilled trackers. Season 2's six episodes will once again air on Discov- ery Channel in more than 220 countries and territories. Shot around the world — New Zea- land, Mongolia, Scotland, the Philippine POST FOR REALITY TV Discovery's Eddie Barbini (left) is executive producer on the channel's Manhunt 2 (above). Chainsaw has been posting American Idol for years. Mike Samano (top right) and Bill DeRonde (bottom right) oversee editorial on Avid Media Composers.