How to get the most from your Post House ...

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Post production is as essential to video production as turning the camera on and hitting record. The act of refining a story and giving it meaning can only be done in the realms of post production. The processes of editing, sound mixing, colour grading, special effects (the list goes on and on) will more often than not, take place in a Post-Production Facility or Post House'.

Here are six tips to really get the most out of your post house and ensure that you have the best-finished programme you can.

1. Work with, not against your Post Producer

The most important contact you have at the post house. They are your dedicated account manager and technical guru rolled into one. It's in both of your interests to appreciate each other's role in the process to create the best possible production, as it's likely both companies will feature in the credits. It is their job to understand the edit technology and make the unending (and often incoherent) terminology of the post production process clearer for you, the client.

2. Be Understanding

The production will, more often than not, be working towards a transmission deadline an immovable finish line that curtails the end of production. Whenever every minute counts, delays inevitably occur. Drives stop working, DVDs will have BITC where it doesn't need to be, people become ill and so on. When these things happen, shouting and losing your rag at the Post Producer or Editor isn't the best solution to keep things moving forward.

3. Know your backups

An established post house will have experienced most problems (although there is always room for surprise in this industry) that can occur during the editing process. They've fought the fire and came out alive. Therefore, it's likely they probably have contingency plans in place for when the smoke turns to flames. For your own peace of mind, you should know some of these redundancy processes. Where is the backup stored and is it easy to access if a hard drive fails? Small issues like these, if anticipated correctly with your post-house, won't become issues at all.

4. Bring your own stock

Keeping costs down across a production often boils down to saving pennies where you can. Having your own supply of Blu-ray discs, drives, or indeed your own cloud platform will allow you to monitor your usage when it comes to deliverables. Make sure that your post house can accommodate your production provisioning for itself, almost like a BYOB restaurant - it's always worth checking if there's a corkage' fee for bringing your own stock as well.

5. Know what you're getting for your Offlines

More often than not the Offline will be handled by the post house. Considering this is where your editorial team will spend the majority of their time, knowing what they have at their disposal is crucial. Are there spare iPhone chargers around and is there a stationary supply? A huge issue is always the Wi-Fi connectivity; will it stretch to all the suites you have occupied?

There are a hundred things to check, but put yourself in the shoes of your Post Producers and Editors I'm locked in here for weeks on end, do I at least have access to a diet coke or two? Check out your offlines, and make sure they're as comfortable (within budget) as they can be.

6. Post Post-Production

What happens when your edit has wrapped, the programme's delivered and there's a vague murmuring of the next series on the horizon? How you store the terabytes of video is a bridge often crossed when people have got their minds set on the next project. Thinking about how you'll store the rushes, masters and everything in between, before you actually need to make a decision, will delight not only the production company and the post house, it keeps things creatively and financially in check too.

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