Sansom Media

Our Color Grading Method

mike — Mon, 07 Dec 2020 18:42:44 +0000

In 2019 we started transitioning from Adobe Premiere to DaVinci Resolve. The reasons for this decision were two fold: we experienced a better edit workflow with Resolve, and its color grading capabilities are the best in the industry.

The majority of the footage we shoot is from our RED Weapon cameras. In our color image pipeline, we use IPP2 color science, RedWideGamutRGB for our color space, and Log3G10 for our gamma curve. This creates the flat-looking LOG image, which gives us full range and flexibility when working in R3D footage.

We are documentary filmmakers, and our esthetic coloring principle is to keep our footage looking as authentic as possible. But the coloring possibilities in Resolve are nearly limitless. We balance and color each individual image, never relying on the use of LUTs alone. However, we are always up for the challenge to create ‘looks’ when the style calls for it!

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One of our favorite things about Resolve is its unlimited node-based color grading. Every scene can be adjusted to minute detail. A node can be assigned to balance the gamma of the image, then add another node to just change the color temperature of the shot. Then add a node to adjust the saturation, another to tweak the color of the sky. Add a tracker to a node to raise the brightness of the subject’s eyes while that subject is moving across the frame, and so on. The possibilities are endless.

Yes, Vertical

mike — Sun, 01 Nov 2020 21:32:07 +0000

Many times our footage is used in Instagram Stories, which embraces the vertical format of phones. Always up for a better user experience, we challenged ourselves with how can we give users great vertical content, but not with using the common phone to capture it?

The answer was simple: we turned our RED Weapon to shoot vertically. The results were outstanding, and we even surprised ourselves! 8K, slow motion footage vertically? Yes!

Traditionally, most camera setups shoot landscape, framing the shot for that horizontal space. But by rotating the camera to shoot vertically, we frame specifically for the format. Every pixel is dedicated to the vertical playback resolution, making our Instagram Stories stand out.

Fullsterkur: 8K Post-production and Mastering

mike — Fri, 30 Oct 2020 20:45:13 +0000

In 2017, we set out to produce Fullsterkur, a documentary exploring the strength culture of Iceland. Fullsterkur is the third documentary film in the Strongland series that has aired on Netflix and CBS Sports. We filmed for 11 days all over the country and we returned home with over 22TB of RED and Inspire 2 drone footage.

As we processed the footage for the edit, we found out that Adobe Premiere has a limit in its timeline length capabilities and that limit is 24 hours. Yes, we inadvertently created a 24 hour timeline! We scaled back the timeline to multiple working prep timelines and got to work on crafting the narrative. The editing process took up to ten months to complete, working with footage both in English and Icelandic. In the end, we had a finished documentary that was 87 minutes long.

Then came the challenge to encode the master sequence. We master our projects ProRes HQ 422 in 8K resolution. Fullsterkur was going to be a huge export. How big? 1.8 terabytes. We decided the best idea was to encode it directly onto the local drive and not to an external drive, fearing corruption encoding a file that size. The time it took to encode the master was an astonishing 28 hours! After a couple of encoding miscues, within a week, we had a finished ProRes HQ 8K master.

We had to make specific encoded files for distribution, this included Netflix, CBS Sports, YouTube and the Austin Film Festival, where it was a marquee feature.

We are proud of the international audience reach of Fullsterkur where it currently has a IMDB rating of 8.3/10 and is widely considered a documentary masterpiece.

Because We Can / Filming in 8K

mike — Wed, 30 Sep 2020 21:36:02 +0000

In 2017, we jumped from filming 5K to 8K with our upgraded RED Weapon cameras. We boasted, now, we can film 8K! And we were excited about the prospects. We were so excited we asked ourselves, why not master in 8K if we are filming in 8K? So we did. And when people asked us why would you do that when no one can watch it? Our response was, “Because we can!”

We believe in giving people the best viewing experience possible. Also, being early adopters of 8K puts us ahead of the curve as the release of 8K televisions and monitors become more standard. From filming 8K to mastering in 8K, viewers will be able to watch our stories in the way it was originally intended.

Check out our 8K Trailer!

Origins

mike — Wed, 12 Aug 2020 17:11:34 +0000

Sansom Media has an inextinguishable passion to tell stories and never stop learning. We specialize in documentary and commercial filmmaking.

Sansom Media started because of a passion and has grown because of that original spark. We excel at non-fiction filmmaking. We execute with relentless efficiency. Our team is light and lean with well over 100 years of combined experience at its core. Where needed we add additional resources to projects from our network of creative professionals. We can film, produce, edit and deliver a feature length documentary with a crew of less than ten.

In 2003 Todd, founder of Sansom Media, had a desire to learn about filmmaking and found an opportunity to do research at Combat Films and Research while finishing his degree in Mass Communications–with an emphasis in Public Relations. There he learned and grew with Director Dodge Billingsley and Shane Seggar as his mentors.

In his own words, “There were many turning points for me along the way. One that stands out to me was the first time I was asked to make a rough cut from a paper script. I quickly responded yes! I’ll start first thing next week. I went home and searched “rough cut” on the internet, then purchased Final Cut from the bookstore and began learning how to use the software.”

Combat Films and Research gave Todd a vast opportunity to learn researching, editing, filming and more while working on documentary films. He traveled to Afghanistan, Abu Dhabi, Azerbaijan, throughout Europe and the US filming and documenting stories for Combat Films and Research. Covering warzones, military strategy, historians, ambassadors and everyday people.

We have always sought to be on the leading edge of technology and storytelling. We moved to RED cameras and 4K workflow early on. One of our team was on the RED development team for the RED ONE. We quickly jumped to 8K when that format was introduced, being some of the first to edit, master and deliver 8K to YouTube.

We continue to move forward in our storytelling with new ideas, concepts; things that add to the story and don’t overpower the narrative.