How it works
One pipeline, any size crew.
Most productions pass your project through four companies. One shoots it, one cuts it, one fixes the effects and one finishes it – and the intent leaks out at every handoff.
Equipment
Cameras. ARRI, Blackmagic and Sony CineAlta. Retina was shot on a Sony CineAlta HDW-F900R, with a Phantom HD for high-speed work and a DSLR for spaces nothing bigger would fit. An iPhone comes out for special cases – where nothing larger can go, or where its look is the point. That is no longer a compromise. The package is specced per job, so the format follows the look the picture needs and the budget it has.
Sound. Mixes are delivered in 5.1 surround with M&E tracks – music and effects, dialogue removed – so a film can be dubbed without going back to the stems. Broadcasters and distributors expect it, and it holds up releases when nobody planned for it.
- Cameras
- ARRI · Blackmagic · Sony CineAlta
- Specialist
- Phantom high-speed · DSLR for tight spaces · Apple iPhone for special cases
- Audio delivery
- 5.1 surround · stereo · M&E tracks for film and television
- Picture delivery
- 4K as standard, 6K where the project calls for it, in the formats and aspect ratios you need
Here, the person who directs your project also shoots, scores, cuts and finishes it. Fifteen credited departments across the filmography, one pipeline, no handoffs. The music goes out under the name 10UTO.
That doesn’t mean working alone. Scallop Pond had a cast and crew of more than a hundred, and every film here has had actors, locations and people on the floor. Crews scale to the picture, and if someone is better at a job than I am, I would rather hire them than fake it. What doesn’t change is that one person stays responsible from the first page to the final master, so nothing gets lost being re-explained to the next company.
Covering that much myself is a lever, not a preference. On a commission it keeps your budget on screen instead of in four companies’ overheads. On more personal work it keeps the intent intact – the person who decided what a scene means is still there at the mix.
My pipeline is current, and machine learning is part of it – briefed, directed and kept only where it earns its place, like any collaborator. It handles cleanup and iteration. It doesn’t decide anything about your film. Everyone has the same tools now, so the tools aren’t the difference: choosing which of forty takes is the one, holding a shot two seconds past comfortable, hearing that a scene runs a beat long – that is the work. You are hiring the judgement, not the software. Where I stand on AI.
I take on a limited number of commissions at a time. If the calendar is full, I’ll tell you straight away.
Capabilities
Music Videos
Concept through delivery. Narrative, performance, or something stranger – developed with the artist, not handed to them. I shoot it, cut it and finish it, so what you approve is what ships.
- Treatment
- Direction
- Cinematography
- VFX
- Finishing
Commercial & Branded
Spots, brand films and campaign content shot with the same coverage discipline as narrative work. Built to cut down for social without looking like an afterthought.
- Spots
- Brand film
- Social cutdowns
- Product
Post & VFX
Full post for outside projects, original score included. Retina’s visual effects, set extensions and all, were built in-house and presented at SIGGRAPH. See the effects work.
- Editorial
- VFX
- Set extension
- Color
- Sound
- Original score
Documentary & Other Media
Short-form documentary, event films, title sequences, and the projects that don’t fit a category. If it’s moving pictures and it’s interesting, ask.
- Short doc
- Titles
- Event
Visual effects
VFX built in the same room as the film
Every effects shot in Retina was built in-house by the person who shot the plates – which is why they hold up. The work was presented at SIGGRAPH in 2016, and it is available on its own for other people’s films.
Destruction & Simulation
The Manhattan Bridge collapse: the real bridge shot on location, its center painted out, modeled back in Cinema 4D, then fractured and brought down with rigid body dynamics. The cables were the hard part – hair linked to splines inside sweep objects, constrained and run with spline dynamics so they whip loose as the span fails.
- Rigid body
- Fracture
- Spline dynamics
- Cleanup
Set Extension & Environments
Rooftops, skylines and interiors that do not exist, cut in beside plates that do. The aerial over the rooftop on Retina was assembled from reference shot by hand, with the renderer chosen for that shot because it matched the live-action plate better than the default. Audiences took it for a real helicopter.
- Matte painting
- Modeling
- Lighting
- Lookdev
Compositing & Finishing
Integration is where effects are won or lost: grain, edges, motion blur and grade matched until the seam disappears. Compositing in After Effects, straight into the same color and sound pipeline that finishes the picture, so nothing is handed to a vendor who has never seen the film.
- Comp
- Roto & paint
- Grain match
- Grade
- Built with
- Maxon Cinema 4D · the Adobe suite · DaVinci Resolve
- Edit & grade
- DaVinci Resolve, and whichever editing application the job already runs on
- Presented at
- SIGGRAPH 2016 · visual effects and set extensions from Retina
- Delivery
- 4K as standard, 6K where the project calls for it, in the formats and aspect ratios you need
Process
Brief to delivery, in 6 steps
Conversation
You send the brief – what it is, when you need it, roughly what you can spend. I’ll tell you within a day or two whether I’m the right fit and whether the calendar allows it. No pitch theatre.
Treatment
A written treatment with references, a shot approach and a schedule. You approve the idea before anyone books a camera. Revisions here are cheap; revisions later are not.
Prep
Casting, locations, crew, kit and a shot list. Long prep is the single biggest reason my shoot days stay short and my budgets hold.
Shoot
Lean crew, thorough coverage. The director is on the camera, so what gets shot is what the edit needs – not a pile of footage someone else has to rescue.
Post
Editorial, visual effects, color, sound and mix, all in-house. One round of notes is included at picture lock, and you see the same person the whole way through.
Delivery
Masters in the formats and aspect ratios you need, plus social cutdowns and captions if they’re part of the job. Project files archived at my end.
Working together
Let’s make something
The more of this you can answer up front, the faster I can tell you whether I’m the right fit and what it will cost. Nothing here is compulsory except a way to reach you.
Let’s talk
Have something worth shooting?
Music video, commercial, or a feature that needs a director who can also finish it – tell me what you’re making.
Get in touch