Medallion*PFA Film and Video’s newly completed component digital post environment played a major role in the company winning the post contract for Atlantis Films’ megabucks high-tech action thriller series, TekWar.

According to Joe Scrivo, vice-president and general manager at Medallion*pfa, component digital will be used for the entire 18-episode series because the system guarantees the clean production of the large number of special effects involved.

‘For TekWar, the primary requirement was that it be done in digital format. The last thing you want is for your special effects sequence to stand out because you’ve lost quality achieving those effects,’ says Scrivo. ‘The digital system lets you stay as true to the quality of the original footage as possible, no matter how complicated the post-production work is.’

With the public developing an appetite for high-tech, effects-heavy shows like Robocop and Star Trek, a mass of product ideally suited for component digital technology is coming down the pike, says Scrivo.

‘Technographics usually need you to go through three or four generations to get an effect. The big advantage to moving to component digital is that it enables you to go from generation to generation without any quality loss.’

The ease of the non-linear editing system component digital provides, and the flexibility of being able to build infinitely on generations of footage makes it a much-valued technology throughout the post process.

Ironically, component digital lets technicians achieve more complicated special effects in less time. Digital is much less hassle, says Scrivo. You simply pop in the tape, hit remote, and go to work.

For example, the Abekas A-66 Digital Disc recorders record up to 50 seconds of footage, which can be moved around quickly when layering, compositing, or building up an effect.

‘The access time is instantaneous – it’s not like a tape where you have to record it off and then wait for the tape to unwind and then queue it up. You just find your point, and boom, it’s there. From an operational standpoint, the whole system makes us slicker.’

Component digital also lets film and television producers translate their end product from Canadian to European broadcast standards without any of the glitches or grainy effects that can be a byproduct of analog translation.

The digital equipment has been incorporated in-house at a cost of about $1.5 million to provide clients with the best quality product to distribute internationally, says Scrivo.

Since its implementation six months ago, at least 90% of Medallion* pfa’s clients are taking advantage of the digital lab services, sound and video editing facilities. The driving force behind the demand is the quality of film the system renders, says Scrivo.

‘Projects have been rejected by some European broadcasters because of the quality of product the analog process can provide. Component digital renders a completely clean finished product, and people had been waiting for that a long time, so when it became affordable, we bought into it. It’s had a major impact on our client base.’

The essentials of Medallion* pfa’s digital environment include nine Sony Digital Betacam tape machines, Alpha Image 16-bit digital switchers, Abekas A-57 digital effects and Axial 2012 edit control systems, Abekas A-66 Digital Disc recorders, as well as ColorVision Copernicus component digital color corrector and digital paint in the edit suites.

In the past, component digital technology was too expensive to be used by any segment of the industry except in the area of high-end commercial production. Five years ago, building a component digital post house would have cost six or seven times what it cost Medallion*pfa this year, says Scrivo.

Over the past two years, the reality of a digital world has forced manufacturers to produce equipment that is functional and affordable for long-form productions.

With digital post equipment manufacturers like Sony and Ampex looking at how to make the technology affordable, the smaller post houses may soon have access to digital systems. How long it will take to fully digitize the industry is hard to tell, but the wheels are turning. ‘It’s only a matter of time,’ says Scrivo.

While component digital may be the cutting edge of post-production technology, analog remains the mainstay of the industry. Medallion*pfa still works on D2 and 1′ tape for film post because most of the big Canadian houses (excluding the new fully digitized CBC Broadcast Centre) still require product in this format.

Analog-based equipment can be mixed and matched with component digital processes, so producers don’t have to have 100% of their product processed in a single format. The system’s flexibility accommodates an industry which is in the process of a major shift from one technology to another.