Evolutions is proud to be partnering with London Film Academy, now offering student work placements to those on their 2-Year BA Filmaking course. Our first successful applicant will spend four weeks in Client Services, Media Support and Edit Support respectively, gaining invaluable experience on the progression and processes of a large, independent post production house.
One of the UK’s largest independent Post Houses continues to expand in Bristol by welcoming two new senior staff members to its regional facility.
Janne Harrowing joins as Bristol Head of Technical Operations from the BBC, where he spent the last three years coordinating the work of the BBC EDGE Group. In this role he was responsible for advancing production technologies, trialling what 5G could bring for content production and researching IP contribution technologies. Prior to this, Janne specialised in high-end documentary post production and advised big-budget natural history productions on technical workflows.
Paul Goodman joins as Senior Editor from Envy, where he spent twelve years working on projects such as: Surgeons: At the Edge of Life (Dragonfly & BBC), Drunk History UK (Tiger Aspect), Supervet (Blast! Films), 999: What’s your emergency (Blast! Films), and Flirty Dancing (Second Star Productions).
Gabriel Wetz, Managing Director of Evolutions Bristol said ‘I couldn’t be happier to have both Janne and Paul join us. Janne brings a wealth of knowledge and confidence from his previous role and will help us develop in all technical areas. With a focus on the increasing challenges provided by evolving technologies, HDR workflows, and looking towards integrating IMF delivery into our pipeline, Janne has a broad remit and I am in no doubt of the passion and experience he will add to our company. Paul brings an additional depth of creative experience from his long tenure at Envy working on a massive list of high-end content. We warmly welcome both to our fantastic team in Bristol’. Both joined Evolutions in the week commencing the 15th July.
Evolutions Bristol is a regional branch of Evolutions TV, one of the largest independent post production companies in the UK, and post produces programmes such as Countryfile (BBC Studios), Gardeners World (BBC Studios), Serengeti (John Downer Productions) and Crystal Maze (RDF West).
Paul Goodman (left) and Janne Harrowing (right).
Travelling to Panama, photographing Whale-Sharks and becoming a BAFTA albert affiliate, learn all the latest Evos news from edition 13 of The Beagle!
Make sure you click here to read!
As of the 8th March 2019, only 17% of women in the UK worked in technical roles. And so, to mark International Women’s Day, Evolutions wanted to highlight the incredibly skilled women working in technical roles at all levels throughout the company! Featured from left to right are Emily, Carlotta, Chloe, Bethan & Natacha, Laurel, Rachel, Cat, Kat and Angela.
In the picturesque market town of Thirsk, nestled in the rolling North Yorkshire countryside, ten law-abiding citizens are embarking on a journey into an extraordinary life of crime. They’ve been tipped off that a cash-in-transit van containing £250,000 will be left unattended for a short amount of time. If they can successfully plan and execute a heist and keep the quarter of a million pounds hidden from a crack team of Detectives for two weeks, it’s theirs to keep. But, as news of the crime sweeps the town, former Detective Chief Superintendent Sue Hill and former Detective Superintendent Ray Howard lead a team of police investigators who will stop at nothing to catch the thieves. Using modern policing techniques, they attempt to track down, arrest and charge those involved in the heist.
A total of 2950 hours of media shot.
184 hours being filmed a day.
A 16-day shoot.
Cut down into 6 x episodes(!) in a matter of 16 weeks…
Read the whole article here to find out how this mammoth production was pulled off!
If you’ve ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes of a Soho Post House, here’s your chance to sneak a peek! With articles from our Ops, Producers, Design team and more, The Beagle is keeping our staff updated across all of the Evolutions sites. Expect to see a new issue every quarter. Enjoy!
To read edition 12 of The Beagle, click here.
Evolutions is delighted to announce a new facility based in Shine TV’s production offices in Gloucester Avenue, Primrose Hill.
Comprising 20 Avid offline suites over 4,000 square feet, the facility, which opens for business on 8th May, will be home to some of Shine TV’s most complex productions such as Hunted and The Island for Channel 4 and the new entertainment show for Sky One, Loot, amongst many others.
The investment of over £750,000 is part of a new output deal between Shine TV and Evolutions. It includes Avid offline suites, a purpose built MCR area and various client break out areas. The facility is designed by Owen Tyler, Technical Director, with the aim of mirroring the look and feel of Evolutions’ other buildings. It will be connected by dark fibre to Evolutions’ Soho offices, enabling complex media ingest and management to be handled remotely by Evolutions’ 24/7 edit support team. Final post will be carried out by Evolutions’ top creative team in Soho.
Evolutions will be employing a team of 6 people to run the facility in Primrose Hill, supported by the Soho team at all times.
Alan Williams, Shine TV’s Director of Production said ‘We are delighted to forge this new relationship and bring Soho post production service levels and expertise under our roof here. We are very happy to be able to collaborate closely with such a fantastic team and provide our productions with the best level of post support within our own offices.’
Simon Kanjee, Evolutions’ MD said ‘This is a very exciting opportunity not only to work on some excellent and challenging programmes, but also to change the post model somewhat. Technology now enables us to provide Soho quality facilities anywhere in London. We can expand our business by creating new close relationships with our clients, and expect to replicate this model elsewhere.’
Huge congratulations to many of our Evolutions Bristol clients for their awards nominations this season, most notably: BBC TNW ‘Owl Power’, nominated for an Outstanding Nature Programme Emmy in the category of News and Documentary; BBC NHU ‘Life Story’ (Panda Nominee for Cinematography); Rolf Steinmann’s ‘In Between’ (Panda nominee for Cinematography and Best Short); James Reed for Underdog Films – ‘Jago: A Life Underwater’ (Panda nominee for Cinematography, Editing, Music, People and Nature AND Sound); BBC NHU ‘Tribes, Predators and Me (Panda nominee for Presenter Award); Big Blue Live (Panda nominee for Technical Innovation Award).
Evolutions are one of the most prestigious names in TV post, with a diverse credit list including QI, TOWIE, Tipping Point, and The Apprentice and almost every fixed rig show on the air, such as 24 Hours in Police Custody, One Born Every Minute and Secret Life of 4 Year Olds. To accommodate this workload, the last year has seen Evolutions open a third London facility, boasting 24 Avid Media Composer suites, two Pro Tools studios, three Symphony suites and grading facilities. They’ve also expanded their Bristol operations with the purchase of natural history specialists Big Bang.
Meeting client deadlines while moving house
“Previously we’d have had to outsource 30 or 40 rooms in our busiest quarters, which didn’t allow us to have the direct engagement with clients that’s so important to Evolutions’ ethos,” explained Operations Director Owen Tyler. “We have a very loyal client base and established suite model that works well for us and our clients, and we wanted to be able to offer everyone the same consistent – and consistently excellent – level of service.”
Evolutions secured a facility on Berwick Street, Soho, but had just six weeks to get ready before major clients needed projects underway. “It was a bit of a scramble,” Owen admits. “Jigsaw24 were very supportive, coming up with workarounds and loaning us video cards and other kit so that we could hit client deadlines despite disruption to the install.”
Building an Avid pipeline
“We’re an Avid house, and we always go with the latest and best Avid solution available,” Owen says of Evolutions’ decision to equip Berwick Street with 24 Avid editing stations running on HP Z840s (“we like the grunt of multicore processing”) and two Pro Tools | S6-based audio suites with DAD monitoring.
“The S6 is the next step on from the ubiquitous ICONs. There wasn’t another desk we’d have considered in terms of price and suitability. We worked with Jigsaw24 around the studio design and the DAD AX32 monitoring solutions’ which allowed us to configure the studio in such a way that we needed fewer audio interfaces. It was interesting to draw on the team’s knowledge of the film space and implement a film box into television – it’s worked well and our guys are very enthusiastic.”
The suites are all linked by “hundreds of terabytes” of Avid ISIS 5500 storage which, combined with the uniform setup of each cutting room “means we can switch people around and accommodate more clients as and when they need us. Our clients want to work with specific creatives on our team, and this new facility makes it easier to accommodate that.”
Staying at the cutting edge
“Our directors and owners are on the floor working with clients every day, which helps us be very reactive to our customers needs,” says Owen. “We evolve custom workflows to help the client deliver what they want to deliver. For example, we’re working on pretty much every significant fixed rig show at the moment, and that’s using technology we developed ourselves using off the shelf hardware, to give clients something that had previously been cost prohibitive.
“Creativity in this marketplace isn’t about just onscreen creativity – it’s about technology, and while the rate at which new formats and codecs appear is challenging, it allows us to develop closer relationships with clients, because they want more engagement prior to shoot. Jigsaw24’s combination of expertise, efficiency, support and competitive pricing is key in allowing us to deliver that.”
Evolutions will open a new purpose-designed 30-suite post-production facility on Soho’s Berwick Street in September.
The completely file-based operation, which represents a £2m investment, will occupy all four floors of a brand new 13,000 sq ft self-contained office development.
The 59 Berwick Street facility will consist of 24 Avid Composer offline editing suites plus four Avid Symphony online suites and two Avid Pro Tools sound dubbing theatres, all running on high-spec workstations and running the latest versions of software.
Production office space, client breakout areas, a screening room and a bar with roof terrace will also be added.
An additional 25 members of staff, from runners to creatives, will be recruited.
As with all Evolutions’ facilities, 59 Berwick Street is to be marketed to Indies and broadcasters making entertainment, light entertainment, comedy and factual programmes. Read more