Dialogue Editing

Automated Conformations 245
Save As in a text format. This will leave you with a very tiny auto-assembly
task. The new events can be imported into your revised session, where they
ought to fi t nicely.
If you follow the instructions of the change list, your session’s structure
should refl ect that of the new picture version, but you still need to verify sync
and repair damaged transitions. Use the new OMF to confi rm the sync of
your new assembly. Find easy landmarks, then nudge the tracks of the conformed
session until the geography is identical in both old and new. You can
also use Titan’s “Fix Sync” to snap the new events into sync. As you repair
transitions and regions damaged during the conformation, remember to look
at volume automation, which will certainly have sustained some injury.
Ask any experienced dialogue editor about conformations and you’ll discover
the perfect formula for painless success. The procedures just described make
up only one of many methods for matching an old sound edit to a new picture
cut. Talk to enough editors and you’ll develop a system that suits your
personality.
Automated Conformations
Armed with a good change list, patience, and a sense of humor, you’ll eventually
get through the conformations and then nurse your edits back to
health. However, picture changes never come at a good time but inevitably
fall in your lap when you’d rather be focusing on tomorrow’s temp dub or
when you have opera tickets.
Thankfully, there are now several software solutions that automate conformations,
among them EdiTrace, 3 Virtual Katy, 4 and Change Note Assistant. 5 All
of them work in more or less the same way, by comparing an existing Pro
Tools session with a change list and then coming up with a new sequence.
Some interact directly with Pro Tools, turning the confo process into a player
piano operation. Others work via EDLs, requiring you to subsequently
3 EdiTrace is a product of Sounds In Sync (www.editrace.com).
4 Virtual Katy is manufactured by Virtual Katy Development Ltd. (www.virtualkaty.com).
Katy Wood was a sound editor on Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring and became
famous for her ability to manage and cajole Avid change notes and convert them into
human-friendly forms.
5 Change Note Assistant is a product of Nonfi ction Software, LLC. For a thorough tour
of it, see “Automated Conforming Using Change Note Assistant” by Eric Stratman, in The
Editors Guild Magazine (vol. 24, no. 6, November/December 2003).