While backing up my VITRVVIVS files I reflected on my Sony Vegas file naming convention. The file names are listed below to illustrate the incremental numbering for each session so I can rollback if something goes wrong:
VIT-EDIT-FINALCUT-01.veg
VIT-EDIT-FINALCUT-02.veg
VIT-EDIT-FINALCUT-03.veg
What this means is, with the date modified system info as well as my file naming convention, I can tell approiximately how many “editing sessions” I did for VITRVVIVS. And the grand total is…
42 sessions in 17 days
That makes sense when I think about it since I would probably start a session early one day, save it with the new number, then at the end of the day save the changes with the next sequential number. The time period was from July through September 2008 spread out over evenings and weekends.
I then checked my After Effects files which use the same convention VIT-EDIT-FX-SHOTS-##.aep
And the result is…
20 After Effects sessions in 13 days
So, post-production took approximately 2 weeks of After Effects color correction, color grading, composting, and effects and about 2 weeks of final editing and sound mixing in Sony Vegas…spread out over 3 or 4 months.
3 responses to “VITRVVIVS Time Spent in Post-Production”
Ah, a man who appreciates naming conventions!
I’ve thought quite a few times about doing a post on the file naming conventions I use for FrameThief…
In general, I use the date as the first part of almost every file name I create: e.g. 10.17.08_namingconventions.doc.
(I realize I shouldn’t use periods in the file names, but it’s a hard habit to give up. Putting the year first would also be smart.)
I’m a huge fan of chronological organization. You can generally figure out what year a project was being done… Then narrow it down from there.
Thanks Sven. I typically name the beginning of my files with a letter code for the project so that way I can sort through a folder of files by project quickly. For the times that I use dates I tend to do YYYYMMDD because those sort better as well.
VIT-SCORE-FINAL-20080519.wav
I didn’t use dates for the editing files though for some reason. I also have a folder naming convention that I have been using to collate the files for each step in the project such as:
A = Research and Development
B = Frame capture
C = Editing Compositing and Post
D = Mastering and DVD/File Authoring
E = Web, Print, and Other Deliverables
So the folders are then appended with numbers for each step and a qualifier such as:
A0-FONTS
A0-RESEARCH-SCRIPT
A1-PHOTOSHOP
B0-FRAMES-ORIG-COMP
C0-CLIPS-AVI-PROCESSED
C0-AFTEREFFECTS
C3-AUDIO
etc…
The hierarchy is then something like this:
PROJECTS > STOPMO > VITRVVIVS > C3-AUDIO > VIT-SCORE-FINAL-20080519.wav
or
PROJECTS > STOPMO > DAMOCLES > C0-CLIPS-AVI > DAMO-FULLCUT01-20061207.avi
I got really confused with my naming conventions, mainly because I didn’t know you can save a project with trimmed copies of everything in it. That is very useful.
Another problem I had was modifying a file, deciding I liked the old version better, rolling back, editing that version, and then accidentally replacing the older version when I backed up everything for that project. I would forget which drive had the most recent version on it. That got to be a bit of a nightmare. I like the way you’re doing it.