mr_goodbomb
Active member
I am not the best at color correction. I had a guy I met at a genre convention offer to do the color timing on my feature film when a final cut was made. We started working together, an had agreed that he would do the color correcting for the entire project and the animation on the title sequence. We had a premiere lined up, and his deadline for the final cut was that premiere date. After discussing and working with him for a bit, I realized he was rather difficult to deal with. Chock it up to his being an "artist," he was fairly opinionated and defensive, and many times I had to yield to his opinion to make progress. At that point, the premiere was getting closer and I knew I wouldn't be able to find someone else in time, so I let it slide and worked out the kinks when he got difficult, smiled and tried to work past his difficult attitude. Since, it became apparent that he wasn't that up on his technology. He eventually refused to take anything digitally, so if I had files to send him, rather than setting up and FTP or using file services for large files, I had to burn them to DVD and drive to meet him (an hour or so each way, which got rather expensive). As well, if any extra work had to be done, such as when I exported the film in scenes and cuts needed to be made between shots when the from-the-camera color didn't match perfectly, I had to travel to his house to make the cuts myself because he refused to and became livid about the potential of having to do "more work than (he) should have to." When these issues came up, he'd stop working and wait for me to come do the added work before continuing. He also decided, after several weeks, he wouldn't be able to do both the color correction and the title sequence in time for the premiere, so we decided to have him create a temporary title sequence for the premiere, and he'd do an entirely separate one for the finished cut.
On viewing the temporary titles, I told him it'd suffice for both. He was becoming so difficult to deal with that I didn't want to discuss the second version and was willing to accept the first version for the finished cut. Again, shouldn't have put up with him, but we were on a deadline, and he had asked for half of the payment upfront.
I told him that the render time would take at least 24 hours, and for the film to be ready for the premiere, he should start the export 2 days earlier, and I'd pick it up the day of, several hours prior. He told me he wanted to continue playing with the cut, and I eventually yielded from my "export at least 2 days earlier" position and just said "as long as it's done in time, I don't care," as he wouldn't believe me that rendering would take that long.
When he started rendering, the night before, about 24 hours before the premiere, he asked me to complete payment and send the other half via PayPal. I did. I was so tired of dealing with him that I didn't want to argue, despite that he didn't do the title sequence he was being paid for. I just wanted the final copy in hands and him out of my workflow. I called the morning of the premiere to check, it wasn't even halfway rendered. By two hours before the premiere, enough time for me to get in my car and pick it up and be back in time for the doors to open, it was at about 70%. He took no responsibility for the product not being completed in time, never uttered the words "I'm sorry," and got particularly rude when I even suggested that we paid for a product that wasn't delivered.
It was rendered by the next day. We ended up premiering an older cut, which was fine, but we did pay a fair amount to have a new cut in time, which it wasn't. That process probably would have been expedited had he been willing to work for his cut (download files, use file sharing services, etc), and absolutely would have been expedited had he listened to me and exported the film by the time I told him to rather than argue and continue to tinker. The film's producer and I are both rather upset, as we've spent a fair amount of money and didn't have anything to show for it in time for the premiere.
It's all said and done now, and we won't be working with this guy again, but that said, what would you do, or would you just let it go and chock it up to experience?
(I'd like to add that, yes, scheduling a premiere before having the cut done was silly, but we were offered the opportunity for a screening and I jumped at it. We had an early festival cut available, but what this issue comes down to is setting a deadline and paying money to have the deadline met, which it wasn't, due to one person's arrogance and inability to do as paid or work with others. The cut will be available for the DVD release, but had that been our goal, we would have certainly found someone else who's easier to work with and more, creatively, appealing to us.)
On viewing the temporary titles, I told him it'd suffice for both. He was becoming so difficult to deal with that I didn't want to discuss the second version and was willing to accept the first version for the finished cut. Again, shouldn't have put up with him, but we were on a deadline, and he had asked for half of the payment upfront.
I told him that the render time would take at least 24 hours, and for the film to be ready for the premiere, he should start the export 2 days earlier, and I'd pick it up the day of, several hours prior. He told me he wanted to continue playing with the cut, and I eventually yielded from my "export at least 2 days earlier" position and just said "as long as it's done in time, I don't care," as he wouldn't believe me that rendering would take that long.
When he started rendering, the night before, about 24 hours before the premiere, he asked me to complete payment and send the other half via PayPal. I did. I was so tired of dealing with him that I didn't want to argue, despite that he didn't do the title sequence he was being paid for. I just wanted the final copy in hands and him out of my workflow. I called the morning of the premiere to check, it wasn't even halfway rendered. By two hours before the premiere, enough time for me to get in my car and pick it up and be back in time for the doors to open, it was at about 70%. He took no responsibility for the product not being completed in time, never uttered the words "I'm sorry," and got particularly rude when I even suggested that we paid for a product that wasn't delivered.
It was rendered by the next day. We ended up premiering an older cut, which was fine, but we did pay a fair amount to have a new cut in time, which it wasn't. That process probably would have been expedited had he been willing to work for his cut (download files, use file sharing services, etc), and absolutely would have been expedited had he listened to me and exported the film by the time I told him to rather than argue and continue to tinker. The film's producer and I are both rather upset, as we've spent a fair amount of money and didn't have anything to show for it in time for the premiere.
It's all said and done now, and we won't be working with this guy again, but that said, what would you do, or would you just let it go and chock it up to experience?
(I'd like to add that, yes, scheduling a premiere before having the cut done was silly, but we were offered the opportunity for a screening and I jumped at it. We had an early festival cut available, but what this issue comes down to is setting a deadline and paying money to have the deadline met, which it wasn't, due to one person's arrogance and inability to do as paid or work with others. The cut will be available for the DVD release, but had that been our goal, we would have certainly found someone else who's easier to work with and more, creatively, appealing to us.)
