Technology Thrill Ride - Working with Michael Mann and Bryan Carroll on Miami Vice

On his latest feature film, Miami Vice, director Michael Mann again relied on Laser Pacific to help create and service the cutting edge workflows he employs for his films.  In what has become a sort of shorthand between Laser Pacific and his post production team headed by Miami Vice co-producer, Bryan Carroll, Laser Pacific created the post production support system which served as a Digital Motion Picture laboratory for this large-scale digital production.

Laser Pacific served as the eyes and ears of the set and as a sort of central clearing house for all of the digital and film images shot each day. Theequivalent of well over 1.5 million feet of film in the form of digital images shot on the Thompson Viper Camera as well as approximately 76,000 feet of 35mm motion picture film arrived at Laser Pacific for quality control, transfer, syncing and the creation of the dailies viewing copies that would be screened on location and by Universal executives. In addition,Laser Pacific provided and maintained the 2K digital projection screening facilities for Michael Mann’s Santa Monica-based Forward Pass Productions offices during the extensive testing process as well as the digital screening facilities for the Miami-based production. Laser Pacific also provided digital projection technology and support services for the numerous digital screenings for the preview as well as the premiere screenings in Miami, Los Angeles and London. Culminating more than a year of support and collaboration on this project, Laser Pacific created thedigital cinema package that was delivered to theaters that exhibited the digital cinema version of Miami Vice.

“Michael Mann doesn’t leave the quality of the images to others,” says Laser Pacific president Leon Silverman. “He takes care of that himself, and I am proud that he has looked to Laser Pacific to help him realize the results he seeks on every screen. We understand that Michael and Bryan expect commitment. Working on a Michael Mann film is a thrill ride where everyone stretches to do his or her best work.”

“Bryan Carroll is simply one of the most creatively focused, technologically savvy producers working in our industry today,” added Silverman. “He truly represents a new generation of producing expertise. Not only does he understand the impact of the new workflows and the mind-boggling complexity of today’s digital production, editorial and postproduction options and choices, he understands it in purely creative terms. He can translate geek into filmmaking power. When you combine these talents with an artist like Michael Mann, you’ve got technology fueled creative alchemy.”

Laser Pacific’s introduction to Michael Mann and his intense passion for the creative, technical process began with an explosive 1990 mini-series – Drug Wars. Over the past 5 years, Laser Pacific collaborated with Mann on the 2001 film Ali, continuing through the television series Robbery Homicide Division, and expanded on Collateral. On Ali and on Collateral, Laser Pacific served as front-end lab for both film and digitally captured images, sending files to the cutting room, providing dailies, and creating a quality-controlled screening room where Mann could see accurate images. On Collateral, Laser Pacific ushered the images through the preview process and the premiere screenings.

On Miami Vice, everything was kicked up a notch. After extensive testing of various cameras, Mann and cinematographer Dion Beebe, ASC, shot most of the film using the Thomson Grass Valley Viper HD camera. Laser Pacific again provided front-end lab services and high definition laboratory dailies services, helping to set up a traveling screening room for dailies that utilized an NEC 2K-iS8 digital projector. Laser Pacific’s expert staff served as technical consultants on dailies, preview screenings and premieres in London, Los Angeles, and Miami, tuning the projectors and theaters to Mann’s specifications.

Preproduction testing was extensive, and Laser Pacific was there at each step, helping to determine which workflow was most efficient. “Bryan Carroll is amazing at taking what has been perfected over the years in the film production and lab process and creating digital workflow systems that mimics it, so that people are familiar with each step,” says Andre Trejo, Laser Pacific Vice President, Account Services. “Our job was to smooth out the behind-the-curtain technology. Michael and Bryan have witnessed the evolution of this technology. Together, we came up with a straightforward, efficient, and understandable way of bringing their vision to fruition while not letting the technology become an obstacle.”

During the shoot, Laser took the 4:4:4 camera original tapes and used them to create 4:4:4 HDSR dailies and dubs for the cutting room and for studio viewing. Mann was able to see high definition dailies, projected with the same 2K Digital Cinema projection technology that would be used at previews, premiere screenings, and for the digital cinema release.

“The filmmakers asked for the highest quality dailies system available, and we delivered,” says Laser Pacific Director of Technical Services Kevin Wines, who also served as Digital Dailies/Preview Supervisor and Lead Engineer on Miami Vice. “For the entire shoot, they saw dailies on digital cinema-level projection equipment, which is an extremely rare thing.”

“Our challenge was to take the information captured by the filmmakers, manage that information, convert it, turn it around quickly and get it back to them so they could make creative decisions and know that the images would always reflect those decisions. We were absolutely successful at providing them with accurately displayed images with a look that was consistent and dependable.”

Wines says that the filmmakers were zeroing in on the look over the course of the shoot. Company 3 handled the color correction and digital intermediate and then sent their masters back to Laser Pacific, where the final master was created, loaded onto digital cinema servers and shown at screenings and premieres. Wines worked with engineers at Company 3 toensure that what the filmmakers were seeing on various systems – and in the screenings – was consistent. Adds Wines: “Editorial and timing changes, sometimes at the last minute, were constantly coming out of the creative process and we had to make sure that these changes were reflected in the versions we were screening.”

For the multiple preview and premiere showings, which together numbered about 20 screenings, Wines was always on hand to tune the projectors using custom files.

Wines worked closely with Michael Mann directly. “Michael has an incredible eye and amazing color memory. For every screening, we spent anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour in the theater with Michael making subtle adjustments to the projector,” says Wines. “What Michael saw at Company 3 was what he wanted to see out in the real world. Each of the screening environments had slightly different screen size, projector throw and ambient light levels. Michael has the ability to walk into a theater and see these differences instantly. Over time, that information became consistent, and I was able to save the adjustments as files, which I could then send to the next theater, where they could be used as a baseline or starting point. Then, when Michael walked in, the projector would be closer to perfect which allowed the optimization process to become quite efficient.”

Wines says the key to success was consistency of creative intent. “We needed to understand Michael’s intent, and translate that into what the technology does to fulfill that intention. All your experiences come to bear in a situation like that. Michael is an extraordinarily tech-savvy director. But generally filmmakers speak in creative terms, and it’s my job to know how that translates into the digital and film worlds. You can’t buy that in a box. The tools are there, but the human factor is what makes the difference.

“With the advent of digital technology, along with the incredible flexibility, there are so many ways to make it wrong,” says Wines. “You have to be conscious of how you manage the look for creative filmmakers. It’s my job to make sure it’s right.”

Laser Pacific was also chosen by the filmmakers and Universal Studios to create the DCI-compatible digital cinema package that was distributed to theaters for the Miami Vice theatrical release. Laser Pacific used the digital cinema content preparation and packaging technology it co-developed with Kodak Digital Cinema and perfected on the release ofMission: Impossible III. The system features a superior JPEG 2000 digital encoding system developed by Kodak. This system is the industry’s highest quality and file efficient encoding system and its most recent refinements were used as part of the Miami Vice project.

Digital Cinema Mastering Technician Michael Maloney’s role was to take the finished audio and video elements from the DI files and to create a color transcode to the digital cinema ‘X’Y’Z color space. These ‘X’Y’Z  files are then encoded with the Kodak JPEG 2000 digital compression technology, confirming that each of the reels were accurate, down to each  frame, and marrying the audio and video. In addition, the digital cinema files are packaged into secure encrypted reels. Playlists for digital cinema servers are created so that the film will play on the various DCI compatible projectors and servers in theaters. Maloney then makes sure the package meets DCI and SMPTE requirements, and the resulting package is sent to the distributor, which sends copies out to theaters on hard drives.

“My role is to make the digital equivalent of the release print,” says Maloney. “The biggest challenge on Miami Vice was meeting thecompressed postproduction schedule. Over the course of the project, we were refining the workflow as well as the finished product. The studios have definitely committed to digital cinema, and as more and more features are released digitally, we’re already that much further ahead of the game in terms of working out the operational kinks. Miami Vicewas a true test of our abilities as we able to deliver these files within a few days of their release, allowing the filmmakers to work up until the last possible minute.”

“And with Michael, we know he is going to do just that. His creative process is to put everything he has into the picture and he will use every second available,” says Silverman.  “The goal at Laser Pacific is to utilize the technology, our creativity and our brain power to help create a transparent technically creative service to filmmakers. Michael and co-producer Bryan Carroll understand that the technology must be seamlessly integrated into the workflow so that the creativity is unfettered. That’s where Kodak Color Science and Laser Pacific innovation work, allowing creative filmmakers to concentrate on creating. As Michael’s experimentation with the digital tool set has grown, so have his expectations in terms of image quality, efficiency and workflow process.”

“The work that Michael Mann is doing is prescient,” says Silverman. “He sees digital technology as part of his creative palette of tools, which is something we’ve believed at Laser Pacific for a long time. We’re now putting this idea into practice, stretching ourselves to invent and adapt the necessary support services. Working with Michael and Bryan is an exhilarating ride. Michael Mann’s energy is legend and the legend is true. He consistently reaches to achieve. He is one of the hardest working filmmakers in our industry today. To be able to keep up, to be able to service his needs with the same intensity that he expects of himself makes me so proud of our team’s ability and commitment. With the delivery of Miami Vice, as at the end of all the Michael Mann projects we have been involved with, we take a break, catch our breath and rest up a bit, ready for the next opportunity to hopefully reach and excel.”