Making tracks: film editors modify racing venues to give Seabiscuit a period look.(Digital Video)

Even though the setting for the feature film Seabiscuit is the 1930s, the movie's premise is timeless. Based on a novel by Laura Hillenbrand, Seabiscuit is a story about a down-and-out racehorse that transforms itself from an underdog to a champion, and in the process, captures the hearts of the American people during the Great Depression.

Yet, re-creating this past era for the film could not be accomplished using only practical elements. To complement the period costumes and props, the director also used postproduction video edits to set the stage for the film's story line.

To establish the desired look, Academy Award-nominated film editor William C. Goldenberg worked with digital artists at Sony Pictures Imageworks on the film's 300 visual effects. For the most part, these effects were used to create racetrack modifications and crowd enhancements, all of which were incorporated into the final production with Avid Film Composer XLs.

In addition, Goldenberg (Ali, Pleasantville, The Insider) and each of his two assistants used Film Composer XLs to edit the more than 600,000 feet of film shot for the movie. In particular, Goldenberg meshed together an unusually high number of scenes (450) using a series of narrated black-and-white documentary stills and superimpositions (images placed directly atop one another), which were incorporated into several scenes throughout the film. To facilitate these tasks, the Avid systems were linked together with an Avid Unity MediaNetwork, enabling the editors to simultaneously access and share the film assets without interrupting their work flow.

A Day at the Track

According to first assistant director Adam Somner, there were three major considerations while scouting for film locations: foremost, the group wanted to use the actual locations from the story line whenever possible; second, it wanted to find venues that hadn't been too modernized; and third, it needed access to the track for long periods during the film shoots. As a result, many of the movie's racetrack scenes were shot at Santa Anita, Saratoga, and Keeneland, with the Saratoga shots substituting for the Tanfaron track scenes, and Keeneland doubling for Pimlico. To make the replacements appear true to the time, the editors digitally modified the modern roofs and awnings of the grandstand buildings and changed the color schemes of the tracks.

The team further altered the racetrack footage by removing other contemporary elements. For instance, the Santa Anita location in California includes a turquoise-colored safety trampoline that runs along the rail of the track; to give it a 1930s look, the editors changed the color to brown. Also, they removed the Jumbotron display, timing sensors, modern speakers, and other present-day equipment. "A big project was modifying the glass-front restaurant at the top of the grandstand," says Goldenberg. "The architect who built director Gary Ross's home--an expert in 1930s architecture--was brought in to offer his opinion as to what the structure would have looked like, and then it was created digitally."