The Movie Minute with Madeline, Episode #10

Greetings all,

Madeline here, back with what is now the tenth entry in The Movie Minute! For this week’s topic, I chose to focus on one of my other primary roles here at Poor Bear Stories: the DIT!

As explained by StudioBinder’s Kyle Deguzman, a DIT, meaning “digital imaging technician”, is one of the most important roles in digital filmmaking. While the task they’re most known for is wrangling data off the memory cards and into storage drives, the DIT has other important roles as well, such as collaborating closely with the DP and organizing the raw footage into dailies.

Here’s our process for DIT duties: before we shoot, we need to make sure that we have enough drives for our raw footage and mic tracks. We prefer the SanDisk 4TB Extreme Pros which run $400 each. Once we have all data loaded on our external drives we ultimately bring home and back them up on our Network Attached Storage (or NAS) system which is accessible via the internet by our remote editors.

When transferring data from the cameras to the actual drives, we must understand how the file structures work for each camera/memory card, for which there are a variety of formats. For example, the Panasonic Lumix GH series typically uses SD cards, newer Sony Alpha cameras use CFexpress Type A cards (sometimes V60 or V90 SD cards as well), the DJI Mavic drone uses microSD cards, and the Sony FS7 uses a special XQD card. It’s also essential to make sure there’s a way to connect the storage media to the computer, as most laptops do not have a suitable SD card reader built in, therefore, an external reader is necessary for the XQD and CFexpress Type A cards.

The location of the files depend on the camera, and some manufacturers have similar structures for their different cameras, but this is not always the case. In the case of the Panasonic cameras, the clips are typically located in one or two “1XX_PANA” folders within a “DCIM” folder. For the Sony Alpha cameras, still photos are usually in a separate folder (100MSDCF) from the videos (M4ROOT\CLIP) as opposed to the GH5 where still photos and videos share the same folder.  Sony uses a similar file structure for the FS7, though the names of the folders may be slightly different. In addition, the RODE audio files are usually recorded onto the mics themselves, which are connected via USB-C for data transfer.

One important note: we always double check all files have been accounted for as dual card cameras like the Sony Alpha series will automatically roll over from a full memory card to the next, creating two separate video files in separate folders. i.e. The remaining footage might actually be in a “PRIVATE” folder – requiring the editor to piece the two files together in post-production.

Another important step is to organize the camera files into folders to make them easier to identify and pick out during post-production. We usually have the footage sorted into folders based on the camera used as well as the day of shooting. Once the footage has been organized, we copy the files to multiple drives onsite to ensure redundancy and efficiency for our editors who head back home. At last, one of those drives will go to our main office in Orlando where it is uploaded on our NAS. 

Most small and even medium sized video production companies do not prioritize DIT as seriously as we do at Poor Bear Stories. Fortunately, we have learned from the best – operating alongside broadcast television DITs and learning best practices over the last 4 years with ever-changing and developing technology and storage solutions. 

Overall, the DIT is one of the most important roles in filmmaking, whether the project is big or small. Without one, there comes a huge risk of the data being corrupted or going missing- which can be a major disaster with all the time and money invested into a production. Having a good DIT that collaborates with the crew ensures the risk becomes less of a major concern. 

That’s all for this week’s entry in The Movie Minute. Starting with next week’s entry, you might see some small changes to how these entries are made, but nevertheless this will still be an amazing series of blogs that explain the highlights of the storytelling journey that is filmmaking. See you all next week! -Madeline

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