Quantel Pablo grades London Film Festival top winner

Newbury – Lynne Ramsey's “We Need to Talk about Kevin” was recently awarded the prestigious Best Film Award at the 2011 London Film Festival. Finished at London post house LipSync Post, “We Need to Talk about Kevin” relied significantly on LipSync's Quantel Pablo systems to deliver its dramatic cinematic results. The film's cinematography also reflects the exceptional facilities at LipSync and the touch of expert colourist Stuart Fyvie on his Quantel Pablo colour correction system.

LipSync graded and finished no less than seven of the films that were screened at the London Film Festival, with Pablo playing a role in all of them. “For finishing and colour correcting we relied on our three Pablos. All three share media via our Genetic Engineering GenePool. We can all be working on the movie at the same time if necessary. For example, we often prep on Pablo 3 and are then able to get straight to work on the same footage on the big screen in Pablo 1”, explained Stuart Fyvie on how this was possible,

The speed and ease of use of Pablo allowed Fyvie to experiment with different effects and colour treatments in a short space of time. Pablo's colour tools run in a non-linear environment, allowing Fyvie to continually test and change the look from very early in post-production. Repetitive colours and themes to help tell the story were used throughout the film. For example, a bleak recurring reference to tomato soup and a running blue theme made colour correction a very significant part of post-production for the film.

“We Need to Talk about Kevin” stars Tilda Swinton as the guilt and angst-ridden mother of a teenage boy who has been jailed following a high school killing spree, reminiscent of the Columbine massacre. "The subject is tough but the amount of cinematic input required throughout the film made it enjoyable to work on," adds Fyvie. "You have to create an atmosphere that's conducive to the creative process; it's a big part of the job of a colourist along with really knowing your tools."