Dailies and Proxy Workflows Explained
The term “Proxies” refers to two different topics that I will cover here. The first is in relation to the editorial workflow and the second refers to how a director or producer will view the raw footage.
Editorial Proxies
Before post-production begins it’s important to communicate how the media will be handled when it comes to editorial proxies.
There are different ways to set up the proxy workflow. We prefer to use a non-destructive LUT workflow with proxies, meaning we do not bake in a LUT but add it in the Premiere project.
This allows us flexibility if a shot is not reacting well to the LUT conversion.
Proxies can be created automatically upon ingest in Premiere or set up independently. We like to use the auto-proxy ingest if the project is going to stay in the Adobe software environment because it ensures the files will be identical and have matching audio configurations.
Proxies For Viewing
While Grain Wave Post doesn’t offer dedicated digital imaging technician (DIT) services or full dailies services, we do provide dailies and synced dailies string-outs for review purposes.
The concept of “dailies” or “rushes” can get confusing quickly. These are basically smaller versions of the source footage used for review. On professional sets, there will often be a DIT providing dailies to the director and producers so they can watch the footage at the end of each day. These files are usually synced with production sound and potentially even color corrected.
We are “transcode only” by default, meaning that when you hand over your raw media, we create proxies for editorial but not synced or colored media for review.
We understand how important it is for producers to be able to review footage offline, so we do offer synced string-outs with burned-in metadata and LUTs.
For more information on which workflows we like to use for documentaries, check out this article:
Docu-Style Post-Production Workflow