In my latest VanityFair.com piece about the Oscars’ Best Editing category, I explain the crazy complex way Avatar was cut. I’m pretty sure you need an extra lobe in your brain to pull it off:
Unlike for most films, Avatar’s editing process began the moment Cameron called action. An Avid editing suite sat stage-side at the spare Los Angeles warehouse where Cameron shot the performance-capture portions of the movie. Instead of dailies, the director watched minutelies: he reviewed every single shot in the moment. Cameron had almost limitless options editorially because of the manner in which he was shooting. In a traditional live-action film, when multiple actors are in a scene, the editor is limited to the performances in a particular take. But Avatar’s editors could combine different takes. In one scene, they might choose Sam Worthington’s Take-Six, for instance, and Sigourney Weaver’s Take-Two. While this provided tremendous flexibility, it was also hugely complicating. And it was just the first of many edit steps.
Next came the camera moves. Cameron was working from a virtual toybox that allowed him to shoot in his C.G. world using the performances he had already filmed. The actors were long gone from the soundstage as the director decided how close to make his close-up and where to pan. Day after day, as Cameron shot and reshot and reshot the scenes—this process did nothing but indulge his usual perfectionism—Avatar’s three-man editing team stitched the narrative together….