In these rocky economic times, one would think that launching a new postproduction facility would be far from a wise idea, and that such a venture would have a slim chance of success. However, Vendetta Post, Santa Monica, is bucking this trend with a vengeance. Formed in November 2002 by industry veterans Andrea Aron and Sandy Beladino, the company is a finishing boutique located on the same premises as audio post house Margarita Mix de Santa Monica. Offering commercial online and compositing services, Vendetta Post is owned and operated by Beladino and Aron, with editors/artists James Bygrave and Pete Mayor, and assistant Shauna Prescott on board.
"All of us had worked together in the past, and believed that things would work out better if we were smaller," Aron says. "We wouldn’t have any of the ‘stuff’—the layers and layers of bureaucracy. Sandy and I were talking toward the end of last year, and it seemed like the timing was right. We looked at each and said, ‘It’s now or never.’ "
An 11-year veteran in the post arena, Aron began her post career in ’92 working for Red Car, the editorial facility that now has offices in New York, Chicago, Santa Monica, San Francisco and Dallas (and soon in Buenos Aires). During the company’s expansion, Aron was charged with launching the edit house’s Chicago office. After leaving Red Car, Aron joined The Post Group, Los Angeles, as the facility’s commercial postproduction supervisor.
In ’95, Beladino was staffing a new facility, The Finish Line (TFL), Santa Monica. (One of the original staff hires, Aron became the company’s director of operations.) Beladino has worked in production and post for the past 20 years. Her production management experience includes episodic production at Universal Studios, network sitcom production, online production for ABC Los Angeles, and acting as operations manager for the ’84 Olympics at ABC Sports, New York. At Varitel Video Post Production, Los Angeles, she made a career transition from production manager to account executive. Beladino then joined Novocom, Hollywood, to launch its commercial postproduction division, and in ’95, she helped open TFL.
"It made sense for us [to open small at Vendetta] because we’re focused on the compositing and online editing—versus effects work, which has taken a dip in the last four years," notes Beladino. "You are not seeing those big effects-heavy spots anymore. It is a lot more content, maybe some compositing and online imaging."
"Every commercial needs finishing," adds editor/artist Bygrave. "What it comes down to is getting everyone in the room and working out all the issues to make the spot ready for air. There will always be a need for people to operate under such conditions." Recruited from London by Beladino in ’96 to join TFL, Bygrave’s work has garnered numerous honors, including nods from the Clios, Design & Art Direction (D&AD) Awards, and the London International Advertising Awards. He has both directed and supervised commercial visual effects shoots in the United States and the United Kingdom.
Rounding out the team is editor/ artist Pete Mayor, who is fluent in the use of both Quantel’s Henry and Discreet Logic’s Flame and Inferno workstations, a talent that has enabled him to establish strong working relationships with directors such as Marcos Siega of bicoastal/international hungry man and Peter Nydrle of Nydrle, West Hollywood. Mayor also has extensive experience working on high-definition film projects. In addition, artist assistant Shauna Prescott brings extensive experience with Discreet Logic’s Combustion and Adobe After Effects, Photoshop and Illustrator. Prior to joining Vendetta Post, she spent seven years at TFL as a tape operator.
The Work
Opening a new company when the advertising market is contracting may seem like a crazy idea, but in fact, according to Beladino, there could not be a better time. "In the past couple of years, people have had big ideas and little money. For post companies that have tremendous overhead, meeting those budgets took an awful lot of work," she says. "People wanted to get out of that and into where they [could] appreciate a really great online artist and exceptional service, at a price where they do not have an enormous overhead."
Meanwhile, Aron contends that the economic climate actually helped them get the company off the ground, particularly when it came to finding their current home at Margarita Mix. "We didn’t have to build out from scratch," she says. "It was easy to find someone to share space with. Also, the cost of equipment has come down in the last few years, in a way that we [could not have imagined] a few years ago."
Although Vendetta Post is a separate company operating from subleased space within Margarita Mix, it shares reception, client services and machine room resources with the audio post house. "We realized that the old, traditional facility model is obsolete," Beladino notes. "It is impossible in today’s market to run a healthy facility with excessive overhead, so there were a number of different companies that had a symbiotic relationship not competitive to us to choose from."
Vendetta Post houses two bays, each with a dedicated Quantel Henry workstation and Macintosh graphics workstation. Flame is available to augment either bay. Both Bygrave and Mayor were instrumental in the selection of workstations, bay design and an overall philosophy for the company. "We designed the rooms to accommodate multiple workstations, allowing the artists and clients to work collaboratively without jumping in and out of several rooms," says Bygrave. "What we’ve done is use the Flame and Henry together—overcoming each piece of equipment’s shortcomings by putting them in tandem. We also use the whole Macintosh suite of tools."
No more than a few months old, Vendetta Post has already been involved in finishing a number of commercial campaigns, including spots for Apple computers, Merrill Lynch, Sprint and Dial soap, among others. For example, there is Apple’s "Cosmos," directed by Mark Coppos, of bicoastal Coppos Films via TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles. The spot, which was produced to open Macworld 2003, and has been featured on Apple’s Web site, required extensive rig removal, composited footage into monitors and added reflections and shadows.
Another recent spot is Merrill Lynch’s "Anthem," directed by Tony Kaye of bicoastal Minder Media, out of The Boathouse, Boston. For that ad, the artists at Vendetta onlined multiple versions, created a morph between two shots of a bull to create the signature bull of Merrill Lynch fame, and composited a new sky behind the bull. They also removed the tethers/shackles around the bull’s hooves. Wall Street scenes were shot at Christmastime and Vendetta provided extensive "deforestation"—i.e. removing Christmas trees and lights from the front of the stock exchange building.
For a Sprint campaign that includes "Bowling" and "I Love You," both directed by David Shane of hungry man for Publicis & Hal Riney, San Francisco, the company onlined both spots, and composited footage of singer Little Richard into two cell phones in "Bowling." Another spot directed by Shane, Dial Bodywash’s "Pool," for GSD&M, Austin, Texas, included straightforward online work, with some enhancement of the Dial imprint on the bar of soap in the product shot. Future works include spots for Kohler, PG&E, and Nike Golf.
What’s the engine behind the company’s early success? For one thing, the Vendetta Post team wants to keep its nascent shop boutique-sized—the founders are banking on their small size and lack of overhead to differentiate themselves and profit in today’s competitive marketplace. "We have gotten good feedback because we’re so small, and so focused on talent," Aron contends.
"Our main intention was to bring people together in one location," adds Beladino. "We chose a building that has probably the best telecine in the country—Company 3, Santa Monica—as well as [a top] audio post house—Margarita Mix—and we have compositing and finishing, so for the last couple of months, clients have found it to be very convenient. They can get all that work done and they don’t have to move their car."
