Talking With the Edytor of “Arcadian” Starring Nicolas Cage

This post originally appeared on the  Adobe blo g  on April 5th, 2024.

Starring Nicolas Cage, Arcadian follows a father, Paul, and his two sons, Thomas and Joseph, living in a post-apocalyptic world. The family has spent their entire life on a farm, experiencing tranquility by day and horror at night, hiding from the monsters that come out in the dark. One day, Thomas doesn’t return after visiting his crush, Charlotte, at a nearby farm, so Paul leaves the safety of their home to find his son while Joseph stays back to defend himself against the nightly monster attack.

Edited using Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe After Effects , Arcadian is a creepy dystopian feature you won’t want to miss. We sat down with the film’s editor, Kristi Shimek , who shared a behind the scenes look into making this film. RLJE Films will release Arcadian exclusively in theaters on April 12.

Editing Arcadian

How and where did you first learn to edit?

I feel like I was always drawn to editing. I enjoyed playing around with my parent’s video camera, and VCRs, and I learned tape to tape and live editing that way. So I really didn’t get much experience cutting on NLEs until high school, when I took a media class and realized the power of being able to easily move things around. At university, I became serious about making editing my career and learned a lot more about the technical side as well as the theory of editing.

How do you begin a project/set up your workspace?

My workspace is pretty standard. I always have at least two computer monitors, a preview monitor, a mixer, speakers, and headphones. Sometimes I’m working on my own system, and other times I’m working with something the studio provides, so I try to keep it simple and effective so that I can work with whatever is on offer.

When I’m working on a project, I always talk in depth with my assistant about the easiest way for us to pass things back and forth