Today, the producer and director of Monitio, Jonáš Rejman and the designer Aleš Mička arrived in Paris to supervise the grading of Monitio in the following week, while the sound design will continue in Prague without Rejman.

Van der Cruyssen (l) with Jonáš Rejman (r) discussing a setting.

Like 4 months ago during the first rush-grading session, Rejman met the colorist Damien Van der Cruyssen assisted by the postproduction supervisor Matthieu Partouche at the color grading system Spirit HD Creativity Pogle Evolution at Medialab.

"The movie is receiving its final look. Thanks to the enormous possibilities of the digital postproduction we were able to match all 8 different film stocks that we used for the shooting. We had almost the whole range of Kodak stocks and also some Fuji reels. Some reels were more than 7 years old. Damien was not only able to match the color characteristics of these different stocks perfectly, but he also was able to define the different moods of the different stories that serves the dramaturgy of the script. Not having a dialog in the movie I need every piece of visual evidence to make it easier for the audience to understand," explains Rejman.

The endless process of adjusting a scene.

Aleš Mička comments the grading:

"I was always interested in how Jonáš will work on the final look of Monitio. I kept asking him about his ideas of grading, and one day, he told me to come with him to Paris and do it, rather than keeping on chatting about it. Now I am here, deeply involved in the grading process," smiles Mička.

"Aleš has a strong opinion about everything he is involved in. I felt that his presence would give me another view on the process of grading, the view of a designer, a specialist in colors and form aesthetics. I am very glad, that he accepted my invitation, " said Rejman.

The grading did not get along without huge discussions:

"We pushed Jonáš into a very radical grading during the catastrophic scene. Very grainy, a very rough, documentary style evoking the reality of a war zone. I came up with that, more from experimenting with the settings, and suddenly we had a very expressive image of the Japanese victim among the wrecks. Jonáš thought it was maybe too much in the first moments. But after a second thought he agreed, " smiles Van der Cruyssen.

The final look of the catastrophic scene.

"Yes, it was a shock. The picture was brutally rough. I did not know if it was right to be that radical. Everybody was crazy about it. I had to cool down at rethink, if this would not destroy the initial concept. And then I saw that it will work, and we went for it," adds Rejman.

After the grading, the movie was transferred to hard discs and the work continued at the postproduction house Wizz. The combustion operators Abdel Achouch and Xavier Chassaing checked the movie for scratches, created masks scenes that were graded twice and matched them as they stabilized the aerial shots.

Chassaign created together with Rejman the animation for the opening sequence, as the final credits made by Mička.

"We could not really find out how the opening animation should work in the beginning. With 6 hours of rendering for each test, it quickly became a pain. The particles that represented shattered glass were too much at times, then again to less. In the end it worked out well.
The movie is now almost ready. We need to adjust the titles a little bit, but this is the movie for 95 percent," said Rejman his departure to Prague, where he will continue with the sound design.