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| Newsletter Volume 08, Issue 02 |
PNYA Fall 2022 Newsletter Download PDF____________________________________________________New York Post Comes Up Big in This Year’s Emmy Awards PNYA member companies and professionals were well represented in this year’s Emmy Awards with eight nominations for post-production work and two wins. Severance received two nominations for Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Drama Series, with Erica Freed Marker, ACE, (In Perpetuity) and Geoffrey Richman, ACE (The We We Are) as the nominees. The series garnered a total of 14 nominations. The HBO Max drama Succession picked up four post-production Emmy nominations (among 13 noms overall). Nominated for Single-Camera Picture Editing for a Drama Series were Editor Ken Eluto, ACE, and Additional Editor Ellen Tam for the episode All the Bells Say, and Editor Jane Rizzo for the episode Chiantishire. Nominated for Music Composition for a Series (Original Dramatic Score) was Composer Nicholas Britell. Nominated for Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series (One Hour) were Re Recording Mixers Nicholas Renbeck and Andy Kris, and Production Mixer Ken Ishii. PNYA member companies Warner Bros. Sound, PostWorks and Phosphene provide services for the series. Netflix’s The Staircase, nominated for Lead Actress (Toni Collette) and Lead Actor (Colin Firth) in a Limited or Anthology Series, has its post work centered in New York, with PNYA members PostWorks, Company 3, Crafty Apes and Picture Shop contributing.
____________________________________________________ In advance of its summer hiatus, PNYA’s Post Break hosted a pair of lively and informative panels. On June 30, a session titled The E&A Teams: Still Cutting explored the critical relationship between editors and their assistants. Editor Katie Ennis and her assistant Julie Kreinik described their work on such projects as Dexter: New Blood, City on a Hill and the Hulu musical comedy Up Here. Editor Shelly Westerman and her assistant Payton Koch talked about editing American Crime Story, Pose and Ratched, as well as the Hulu series Only Murders in the Building. Jamie Kirkpatrick moderated. A panel discussion in May, focused on remote work. Warner Bros. Director of Post Production Barry Gliner, Lost Creek Creative Owner/Producer/ Editor/ Director Mike Noble and BREAK+ENTER VFX Supervisor David Reynolds examined remote modes of work in various aspects of post and in film and television production as a whole. Post Production Coordinator Eli Lederberg moderated. On August 18th, PNYA’s Equity & Inclusion Committee hosted a discussion on negotiating pay rates for post-production. Focusing primarily on administration (PA, Coordinator, Supervisor, AP, Post Producers), the E&I Committee looks forward to hosting a 2nd panel gears towards editorial next. Post Producers Claire Shanley and Kendall McCarthy joined moderator Gautam Singhani in exploring how and when to approach prospective employers about pay. Post Break returns this fall. CALENDAR 9/23/2022 Alchemy Post’s Andrea Bloome PNYA board member heads a New York Foley studio that’s provided sound for scores of films and TV shows…and is committed to helping others follow in its “footsteps.” Andrea Bloome is an anomaly in the film and television industry: a female head of a thriving Emmy Award-winning post production facility. Alchemy Post Sound, the company she founded in 2012 with her husband, Foley artist Leslie Bloome, is a leading independent provider of Foley services with an impressive credit list spanning features, television, documentaries, animation and games. Alchemy’s facility in the Hudson River town of Peekskill, a short 50-mile drive from New York City, boasts three state-of-the-art Foley stages and is a mecca for filmmakers seeking to bring their projects to life with expertly detailed, custom-crafted sound effects. Recent projects include the series Tokyo Vice for HBO Max, The Bear for FX Networks and Outer Range for Amazon Prime among others.
Andrea arrived at her current post by an unusual path. Among her first jobs, she was as a cook on an Alaskan cruise ship. She later worked in the photography department at Sports Illustrated and as a technical writer and programmer for Banc of America Securities. She went on to form her own company, DTG Media, a developer of web applications for businesses. “My coolest client was the Citizens Committee for Children,” she recalls. “They gathered information on child welfare from police, food banks, city governments and other sources. I created a database that allowed them to pool that data and make comparisons between data points on subjects ranging from rates of domestic violence to the number of grocery stores in the area.” As Andrea’s business grew, Leslie’s work in Foley also took off. He was in high demand from studios and independent producers, including Sony Pictures and the Saul Zaentz Center on the West Coast and post facilities in New York City. The work was rewarding, but it kept Leslie on the road a lot. With two young children, the Bloome’s wanted to limit his need to travel, so they decided to take the plunge and open their own Foley studio.
Fueled by a boom in film and TV in New York and LA, Alchemy Post Sound became busy quickly. They brought on an intern from NYU and soon made their first hire. Not long after, they made a second hire, Foley mixer Ryan Collison. The company has grown from one Foley team to two and is currently in the process of training a third. A union shop, Alchemy currently has a staff of 12. “We’ve reached the point where we need to keep training new people.” says Andrea. “One of our challenges is that it takes two or three years to train a Foley artist.” That’s part of the reason that Alchemy continues to run an active internship program. It’s a chance to train aspiring sound mixers and editors while making students aware of behind-the-scenes career opportunities in entertainment. “We usually have one college intern and one high school intern each semester.” Andrea notes. “A lot of the high school kids have never heard of post-production sound; often they want to get into music. We teach them about the world of sound editorial, mixing and Foley. Their typical reaction is, ‘I didn’t know this existed.’” Andrea says that one of her smartest decisions early on was to join the Post New York Alliance. With a business located out of the city, she saw PNYA as a chance to network with people in the industry. “The meetings were intimate and very informative,” she recalls. “As someone without a deep background in the industry, it helped me to understand the different facets of post. It also raised the profile of our company and put us in touch with a lot of great people.”
Eventually, Andrea joined the PNYA board and launched its publicity committee. “The board is made up of very dedicated people who do a lot of work behind the scenes,” she observes.
Andrea notes that Alchemy’s internship program and membership in PNYA are not only tools to help the company grow. “It’s also part of our commitment to give back to the industry and to the people of New York,” she states. “We want to do what we can to provide meaningful opportunities to others.”
____________________________________________________ Yana Collins Lehman Named CEO of Trevanna Post Trevanna Post, the industry leader in post-production accounting, has promoted Yana Collins Lehman to Chief Executive Officer. Lehman, who previously served as President and COO, succeeds Jennifer Freed, the company’s founder, who will focus on her role as CEO of Trevanna Tracks, a developer of music licensing software. 
In her new position, Lehman will be responsible for the performance and operations of the company’s offices in New York, Los Angeles and London. She will also direct strategy, future growth and innovation. “Yana has been part of every stage in Trevanna’s success,” said Freed.“She has a passion for post-production and a clear vision for the industry’s future. She has been effective both in leading our staff and as an advocate for our clients. Trevanna is in very good hands.” The company has recently provided post-production accounting services for Obi-Wan Kenobi, Licorice Pizza, and The French Dispatch.
Lehman joined Trevanna Post in 2004 as an accountant when it was a boutique operation based in New York City’s iconic Brill Building. She was appointed President and COO six years later, and since then has led in expanding Trevanna into Los Angeles and London. “I’m very proud of Trevanna,” Lehman said. “The people who work at Trevanna care about every one of our projects. We consider ourselves filmmakers, not bookkeepers, and we love what we do. I believe this is why we have great clients, who have continued to hire us for the past 25 years.” Looking ahead, Lehman believes the company’s challenge is to assist its clients in responding to tax credits and other complications in completing projects. “Our goal is always to hire and train people deliberately. There are a lot of projects we have to turn down. We look forward to scaling our operation so we can work on as many projects as we’re offered.” Lehman got her start with Independent Pictures under Cary Woods and Andrew Karpen, while a graduate student at Columbia University. She later worked as a paralegal at Sloss Law/Cinetic Media before joining Trevanna Post. She is an active member of Local 161. Since 2009, Lehman has served as chair and board member of the Post New York Alliance. She successfully lobbied New York State to increase film industry jobs by passing a 30% film and television post-production incentive. She is an outspoken advocate for the state’s post-production industry and has worked to build bridges between the entertainment industry and local governments.
____________________________________________________ Post Exec Mark Kaplan Joins Goldcrest Post as Executive Vice President Veteran post-production executive Mark Kaplan is joining Goldcrest Post as Executive Vice President. A highly-regarded
industry pro, Kaplan will be tasked with growing the facility and attracting more work from both inside and outside New York City, including Los Angeles and London. He comes aboard the facility after 20 years at Technicolor, Los Angeles,
(now Formosa Group) where he was Vice President of Broadcast Sales. “Mark is a dear friend, and I am thrilled to be working with him again,” says Managing Director Domenic Rom. “He brings proven leadership skills and a history for helping companies grow. He’s a perfect fit for his new role at Goldcrest and we are delighted that he has chosen to be part of our team.”
Kaplan is relocating from Los Angeles to New York as he assumes his new responsibilities. “My role is quite broad. Although my focus is on sales and “Although sound is my forte, I look forward to reaching out for picture post and visual effects opportunities, as well.” He also has a deep background as a producer and director of live theatrical events. Most recently, he directed the world premiere of playwright Dylan Brody’s And…Again, starring Paul Provenza and Mo Gaffney. In discussing his move to Goldcrest, Kaplan points to his relationship with Rom and the facility’s tie to London-based independent producer Goldcrest Films. “The opportunity to work with a company that has produced more than 150 films and fully understands the point of view of the producer, the director and other creatives, made this a no-brainer,” he explains. “This is also a chance to help a company run by passionate people expand its scope and become a force worldwide. We’re not New York-centric. We’re not Los Angeles-centric. We’re not London-centric. We’re a global company capable of servicing productions anywhere.” He adds that with the pandemic winding down, this is an especially good time for high quality post-production companies. “Goldcrest gained a lot of experience in remote work during the pandemic and a knowledge base that they can apply moving forward,” he observes. “They are in a great space and primed for growth.” ____________________________________________________ Nice Shoes Finishes Netflix Documentary “Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey” Nice Shoes provided color grading and editorial finishing services for Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey, Netflix’s four-part documentary series about the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) and its self-proclaimed prophet, Warren Jeffs. Directed by Rachel Dretzin and produced and co-directed by Grace McNally, the series explores, in shocking detail, the FLDS’s decades of practicing polygamy, forced underage marriage and pregnancy, and the events that led to Jeffs’ 2011 life sentence. The series was on Netflix’s global Top 10 English TV list for 2 weeks, reaching #6 in its first week. The series was also in the Top 10 in TV in 29 countries.
Colorist Marcy Robinson collaborated with Dretzin and McNally, as well as cinematographer Justin Zweifach in finalizing the look of the series. "Marcy was, hands down, the best colorist I've ever worked with as a director,” says Dretzin. “She is passionate, engaged, imaginative, driven to get it right." Nice Shoes also handled finishing for Growing Up, the new hybrid docu-drama series from Creator Brie Larson, Culture House and Disney+. Senior Colorist Sal Malfitano collaborated with Cinematographer Christine Ng in finalizing the look of the show, which tells the true stories of young people taking on the challenges, triumphs and complexities of adolescence. Nice Shoes ultimately delivered final color in both DolbyVision and SDR for each of the 10 episodes in the show’s first season. Each of the ten half-hour episodes tells the incredible, coming-of-age story of a single individual “hero.” The stories are told through interviews, archival media and creative dramatizations of pivotal moments in their past.
Nice Shoes helped shed light on emerging technologies in architecture, sports, fashion and many other industries in providing post-production services for the new Netflix documentary series The Future Of produced by Vox Media Studios and The Verge Colorist Kevin Ratigan performed final HDR color grading for the 12 half-hour episodes that comprise the show’s first season. Produced for Netflix by Vox Media Studios and The Verge, and narrated by Jurnee Smollett, The Future Of surveys an incredible range of technologies and how they might impact society in the years and decades ahead. In an episode titled “Skyscrapers”, futurists discuss possibilities for vertical cities and sustainable architecture. “Cheeseburgers” reveals efforts by tech start-ups to engineer ethical and environmentally friendly fast food. ____________________________________________________ Buttons continues use its hybrid Hybrid audio and remote-controlled recording systems 24/7. It also continues to offer social-distancing covid options at its new location, 32 West 39th St., 14th floor, with no covid activity to date. The new space features three ADR suites with three additional booths for podcast recording.
Recent mixing projects include eight 60-minute episodes of American Dynasty for Fox Nation and six 60-minute episodes of Titans: The Rise of Hollywood for Amazon Prime and Curiosity Stream, as well as commercial projects for Estee Lauder. ADR projects include Netflix’s LEO with director, Robert Smigel recording Saturday Night Live’s Cecily Strong and more. ADR of Jeffrey Wright and Tessa Thompson in Westworld for HBO, The Ex-Wife for Paramount Plus and Sort Of for HBO Max. For over thirty years now, since founder Rich Macar’s original digital days at Sound One, the story continues for Buttons NY. ____________________________________________________ Mechanism Welcomes New Head of Production, Julieta Gleiser Mechanism Digital is blossoming at the end of summer adding to its expertise and efficiency with a new Head of Production. “This is a great time to add new staff because the initial lag in film production created by covid has resulted in a surge of high-quality post-production projects,” says President and Visual Effects Supervisor Lucien Harriot. “Two features we are proud to be partnering with are Eileen, based on the novel by Ottessa Moshfegh and A Thousand And One directed by A. V. Rockwell.
With work on-set and supervising a half dozen projects through spring and summer—and a flood of new films on the way—Mechanism expects it to take six months to fill its head of production role. “We went through close to a hundred resumes and conducted over 20 interviews with senior producers before finding Juli,” Harriot notes. “She is exactly what we were looking for, a seasoned professional who was already plugged into the unique combination of industries that our studio specializes in.” “I'm proud to see our VFX team grow and the increased throughput of creative work we have handled lately,” Harriot adds. “The big takeaway for me is that the most important hat I wear is as the catalyst between what clients need and what our amazing team is capable of.”
____________________________________________________ Framestore New York Delivers VFX for Snowfall and For All Mankind Framestore's New York studio has been hard at work on VFX for key scenes in two of this year's hit shows, Season 5 of Snowfall on FX and Season 3 of For All Mankind on Apple TV+. For Snowfall, the team created, animated and integrated a CG tiger into gruesome shots for E505 and E506, pushing the boundaries of photoreal quality typically found in episodic projects. In the Season 3 finale of For All Mankind, Framestore worked on the destruction of an office block and its aftermath, filling streets with smoke and debris and augmenting the melancholic aftershock of its characters.
The New York studio is also working on a host of episodic projects scheduled to be released at the end of 2022 and into the new year. ____________________________________________________ Phosphene VFX Supervisors Weigh in on Adapting to the Needs of Each Project
However, the role of VFX supervisor can vary dramatically from show to show. Bair continues: “It is a different but equally compelling challenge to collaborate with a show-side supervisor and dive into someone else’s vision.” Bair just wrapped Maestro, Bradley Cooper’s sophomore film about Leonard Bernstein. Bair enjoyed working closely with the director, the studio, and the production team. “Part of the excitement is the intensive research at the top of a new show. Not just the exploration of advances in VFX, but also being able to really research the film’s subject or location.” While Bair will be overseeing Maestro through post- production, he also enjoys jumping into projects already deep into post, as he recently did on Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale. Phosphene VFX Supervisor, Aaron Raff, recently travelled the globe shooting the upcoming series Retreat for FX. Raff loves being part of the approach right from the beginning, explaining: “That's the fun challenge of supervising. Finding the most clever, efficient, and effective ways to utilize VFX.” On the other hand, Raff continues: “I also really value working with show-side VFX supervisors on shows like In the Heights and See. There isn’t always one right way to do things, so it can be really important to collaborate with other VFX supervisors and share tools of the trade.” One of Phosphene’s steadfast rules has been to lean into people’s strengths and passions. Phosphene VFX Supervisor Greg Radcliffe, for example, thrives on set and loves to be on location as much as possible. “As soon as we knew Greg was in his element on set, we tried to make as many opportunities for him as possible,” explains Phosphene Co-Owner, Vivian Connolly. “The most exciting part for me is being able to solve the unknown by working with the other departments,” said Radcliffe. Conversely, Phosphene VFX Supervisor Christian Lowe, prefers leading a team in-house. “This was a fantastic happy accident,” says Connolly. “We had two incredibly talented VFX supervisors who each preferred a different aspect of the job. While both supervisors work independently, they also often collaborate on projects.” ____________________________________________________ Download PDFDisclaimer of Liability
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Shepherding these film VFX projects is the company’s new Head of Production, Julieta Gleiser, whose experience includes such blockbuster productions as Pirates of the Caribbean and Fantastic Four, as well as projects in animation and VR/AR. “Julieta is the perfect skill-set-fit for our shop and we are super excited her breadth of experience and leadership,” says Harriot. 
