PICTURE EDITORS, ASSISTANT EDITORS AND APPRENTICESTo Whom It May Concern

 

         This letter is an effort by ACE to address an editorial credit situation that needs attention. You have probably noticed over the years the that our picture editorial staff hasassistants have seen their credits migrate from up near the head of the crawl to down near the bottom, appearing often times after personnel who may have been involved with the film for only a matter of days. As you are well aware, the editor and his/her As editors, along with our crew, we are is hired before shooting begins, travel to location shoots, wrangle dailies to be viewed during production - communicate & work with the production crew on a daily basis and all manner of other duties before the official "post" production begins. The motion picture editors guild is supporting ACE and the assistant editor board of directors representatives in a campaign to encourage the historicalThe Board of Directors is supportiveACE would like to recommend an editorial policy that of the our assistants’ desire to gain proper recognition for their work by encouraging the historical placement of the picture editor's crewtheir credits in the end crawl..

 

Historically, the assistant editors were listed directly after the camera crew, which mirrors the editor and cinematographer main title credits. In recent years there has been a trend to divide the movie into "production" and "post-production" halves. Placing assistant editors in this post-production section is inaccurate and a disservice. In addition to working through production, the picture editorialour department is "command central" for all post departments and the experience and expertise required of those who do this job needs to be acknowledged. So many departments depend on the picture editorialpicture editorial crew to master constantly updated technology and carry the film, literally, through it's its physical creation.

 

The placement in the crawl should apply to only those members of creative editorial who are actually picture editorial crew and not to various runners, PA's, supervisors, and so on. When credit placement is decided by whomever happens to be left at the end of the show, it is too easy for the assistants' hard work to be denigrated by placing their credits at the far end of the tail crawl. Prestige, pay and respect is associated with the placement in the crawl and we want to stand up for the our assistants who work so hard for their editors, directors, producers, and studios that count on them during all phases of feature film production.

 

There is an editorial in the March/April editor's Editors guild Guild magazine Magazine and a letter from A.C.E. has been sent out to its members and studio post departments in support of this campaiThank you for your support.

 

Sincerely,

Alan Heim

ACE President

Assistant Editor Representatives

MPEGStephanie Casey and Paul Covington