[ PAGE: ROOM ] BARN / ONE ROOM / ONE STOVE
FILE 03 — ROOM

// THE CUTTING ROOM

A rough plan of the room directors walk into when they come up the hill. It’s drawn from memory, not measurement, and the wood stove is slightly closer to the bench than it looks.

Floor plan of the barn cutting room N — NORTH LIGHT door to yard STAIRS ↑ guest room THE BENCH 2 seats / 3 monitors / keyboard tray NOTES TABLE green notebook lives here THE COUCH screenings / naps / dog wood stove CARD WALL index cards, by scene currently: 84 up, 6 pinned sideways DRIVE SHELF ↓ kitchen below N

// ON THE BENCH

Jog / shuttle controller

Old USB knob. Third unit; I kill one every four years.

Keyboard, worn

The J, K, L, and space keys are blank. Earned.

Reference monitor

Calibrated to Rec.709 in November. Re-checked each quarter.

LTO deck

Two-generation archive. Cartridges labeled in pencil, filed by project.

Green notebook

One per project. Scenes on the left, problems on the right.

Kitchen timer

Fifty-minute cycles. The pomodoro is too short for picture.

// WHAT A DAY LOOKS LIKE

  1. 06:20Stove lit. Coffee. Kitchen is quieter than the room.
  2. 07:00First pass: watch yesterday’s work cold, once, without notes.
  3. 07:40Second pass with the green notebook. Mark three things to fix.
  4. 08:30Director arrives (if in residence) — otherwise a call at 09:00.
  5. 09:00Cut. Fifty minutes on, ten off, until noon. No phone in the room.
  6. 12:30Lunch at the kitchen table. Dailies never at lunch.
  7. 13:30Structural work: cards, outline, the long view.
  8. 15:00Walk up the hill. Twenty minutes. Not optional.
  9. 15:30Fine cut. Second stove-loading of the day.
  10. 17:30Screen the day’s change once through, on the reference monitor.
  11. 18:00Back up to the shelf drive. Back up to the off-site drive.
  12. 18:30Close the bins. The room rests.

† “In residence” means the director is staying in the guest room above the barn. Stretches run a week to a month. There is one coffee pot and it is shared.