Jemima Harrison: Evolutionary Enigma
Native Editing
One of the beauties of Final Cut Pro, according to Harrison, is that it allows filmmakers to edit native. “You don’t need to down-res to smaller files to make your footage manageable for editing,” says Harrison. “We have very fast Macs, on which Final Cut Pro handles native HDV really well, so we edited native throughout, and there were no hassles of transcoding.”
Working native lets Harrison know exactly what she has. “Seeing the picture in its native quality, for good or bad lets me make informed judgments about how to use each image,” she notes. “I can decide when it will work to scale up the picture or apply an effect, without causing quality problems.”
“I fell in love with Final Cut Pro because it gave me an unbelievably liberating tool with which I can make my own vision.”
Control Freak
It was her impatience, says Harrison, that first spurred her to try Final Cut Pro. “I’m a terrible control freak,” she laughs. “I’d be sitting beside these Avid editors, wishing them to press this button or that button and getting all twitchy. I wanted to say, ‘If you just did that, and that, the sequence would be right.’”
Once, when an editor “kept making a worse and worse hash” of a sequence, she transferred the rushes to her Mac and went home to try it herself with Final Cut Pro. The next day Harrison showed the editor her cut. “It’s a wonder he didn’t hit me!” she chuckles, “because that’s about the rudest thing you can do to an editor. But I got the sequence I wanted.”
Having gained proficiency in Mac-based editing, she was cutting her own films before long. Using Final Cut Pro, Harrison has full control over the way each sequence flows. She also has a powerful ally in her efforts to market her work.
From Brain to Fingers
“Final Cut Pro is an amazing visualization tool,” says Harrison, “because you can show your client exactly how you’re going to turn your idea into a movie.” Since she began using the program, Harrison has created short promos for every project. “We get our commissions on the strength of those promos,” she says.
“It’s a competitive world,” adds Harrison. “Commissioning editors are bombarded with people who have the next great idea. To hook them, you have to show something that’s quick, concise, beautiful — and with some style. Your promo is the headline that has to grab them. With Final Cut Pro, for almost no expense we can produce a selling tool for our films.”
Yet Harrison isn’t driven by economics alone. “I fell in love with Final Cut Pro,” she says, “because it gave me an unbelievably liberating tool with which I can make my own vision. It’s a direct translation from my brain to my fingers — that’s why it’s so sensational.”
A Magic Cottage
After winning an assignment, Harrison can keep costs down by editing in-house. “We started off using Final Cut Pro to save money on low-budget projects,” she explains. “Now, we have bigger budgets — but we wouldn’t have it any other way. The cost savings with Final Cut Pro means we can spend more money on the shoot. Plus, it means I get to edit at our dining room table.”
The family that walks on all fours.
That table sits in a 1725 thatched cottage located in the county of Wiltshire, where prehistoric and Neolithic sites like Stonehenge are just minutes away. “I spent 15 years working in London,” notes Harrison. “There’s great buzz there. But now I commute downstairs, where I look out on the archetypal British countryside scene, with cows hanging their heads over the garden hedge. And our office canteen is the 16th-century half-timbered pub in the village. It’s magic.”
Quality and Ease
That life wouldn’t be possible, she says, without help from Apple. “Apple has led the way in making my job easier,” states Harrison. “Because Final Cut Pro has been so successful, we have something of real quality we don’t have to pay a fortune for.”
Harrison plans to keep pursuing her passion for the crossroad of science and people, where compelling stories await discovery. “Apple has given me the tools to explore that territory,” she says, “without any interference from anyone. With this kit in my front room, I can produce something of the highest quality.”
The director can hardly wait to see the impact of “The Family That Walks On All Fours.” She muses, “People all over the world will see it. And just think: it was cut right here, in front of our log fire, with the woodpecker tapping on the tree outside.”
