'Men in Black 3' Looks to Sixteen19 for Editorial Support

Barry Sonnenfeld’s Men in Black 3 spent considerable location time in New York last summer, with a rigorous production schedule supported by NY’s Sixteen19. “This was an extremely buttoned down project,” reports managing director Claire Shanley. “Everyone on MIB3 was at the top of their game, and we were committed to insuring total reliability for every piece of gear.”

“After kicking off the editorial process in Manhattan during the shoot, we shifted to East Hampton in July,” reports postproduction supervisor Paul Levin. Working thousands of miles away from Los Angeles, expert technical support and workflow oversight were critical. “I’ve worked with Sixteen19 on a number of major projects in the past, and I knew we could count on them both to provide dependable systems and to see us through any unanticipated problem. Sixteen19 exceeded our expectations.”

Men In Black 3 first assistant editor Jason Solberg

First assistant editor Jason Solberg reports that when a glitch in the Avid Unity was discovered during a tech run-through on Sunday, July 3, “Sixteen19 director of technical services Travis Boyer worked deep into the night to resolve the problem. By Tuesday morning after the holiday, we were totally on track. I know Paul [Levin] had great experiences with them in the past, and I’d recommend them for my upcoming projects. You need to be absolutely confident your gear will work, and that you’ve got a reliable support team at your back,” he says. “MIB3 produced almost half a million feet of film, as well as digital footage acquired on ARRI Alexa. Barry doesn’t do a lot of takes, but this feature has a tremendous amount of action.” he adds.

Paul Levin notes that the audio layback and color correction services Sixteen19 provided in Los Angeles to prep MIB3 for screenings worked flawlessly. “Barry was particularly impressed with Sixteen19 colorist Steve Beganyi. He was a total pro and absolutely delivered for us.”

Sixteen19’s MIB3 technical package included five dual-boot Avid Media Composers running v5.5.9.3 and v4.0.5.13, linked to a 32 TB Avid Unity running v5.1.3 Each system incorporated a 50” Panasonic Pro 20 Series monitor, two 27” Apple Cinema displays and a 27” JVC studio monitor. Sixteen19 also ran a line from the VFX station to Barry Sonnenfeld’s East Hampton theater to enable screening on site.

“MIB3 was a terrific opportunity to showcase our broad production support capabilities,” Claire Shanley concludes. “We appreciate Paul Levin bringing us on board, and look forward to working with Paul, Barry, and their team on future projects.”