The Unsupervised Session: Tips For Offsite Client Review

Grading In An Unsupervised Session: Strategies For Handling Clients

As colorists, let’s face it, we’re in a client driven industry.  Keeping our clients happy while at the same time informed about what’s going on with their projects is important.

There is no better way to make this happen then the supervised session.

A supervised session allows you to walk the walk and talk the talk.  You and your clients can discuss subtle image adjustments in real time, you can read your clients body language to know when their just ‘ok’ with a grade but want more. And of course, your interaction with them is vital.

You can compensate with small talk while you’re working on a detailed correction and oh yeah, those chocolate cookies you put on a plate on the table right after lunch?  Yeah, those go a long way!

I’ll go on record to say that I prefer client attended sessions – more gets done, more gets done…faster.

The fact is clients can’t always attend a session.

But how do you get your client to react to your work in a constructive way when they’re not in the suite?  Or in other words, how do you overcome the challenge of working unsupervised  but at the same time, pass along your work to the client for final approval and sign off?

Well, the answer to those questions is one part technical and one part trust between you and your client.

At the end of the day, we as Colorists, want to be sure that what we’re seeing in the suite is what the client is seeing on their end if they’re are in suite.

It’s critical to the accuracy of the grade, that the feedback your client provides (if any) reflects upon the true integrity of the footage.

Let’s dive in.

The Importance Of Monitoring

Let me say this bluntly.

Monitoring with clients in a non-supervised environment is a gigantic issue that at its best is a pain.

Clients will initially think, no matter what you tell them that what ever screen they’re looking their content on is the end all be all – that thats what the footage really looks like!

You’ve probably spent thousands of dollars developing the accuracy of your suite. So, while your color suite is set to spec and is perfectly calibrated for color accurate viewing, the client generally will not have a similar set up – not even close!

Clients view content on laptops, un-calibrated computer monitors, crappy televisions, iPhones, and really everything in between.