Jacob and Katie Schwarz
,
Film and Commercial Director
The wonderful thing about the ProArt Display is that I can go in and easily choose the preset that works best for the situation that I'm in.
Jacob and Katie Schwarz are visual storytellers who have always embraced the latest technologies and techniques. They produce highly-acclaimed documentaries, movies and commercial, and their ultra-high resolution 8K HDR travel videos on YouTube are immensely popular.
Color accuracy and consistency is vital to their work, and in this interview they explain how ProArt helps them achieve this.
Color accuracy and consistency is vital to their work, and in this interview they explain how ProArt helps them achieve this.
Portfolio
2021
Youtube channel featuring 8K HDR content with 600K+ subscribers
2018
Director of Iron Cowboy: The Story of the 50.50.50 on Amazon Prime
2010
Director and executive producer at Mystery Box
Create with ProArt
Software used:
Davinci Resolve
Davinci Resolve
Meet the visual storytellers
Jacob and Katie Schwarz work together at Mystery Box, an award-winning digital production and design agency. Jacob is an American-based film director and cinematographer, and has spent most of his time traveling internationally to direct and shoot commercial content worldwide. Katie is the executive producer and CEO at Mystery Box, overseeing content development through post-production on everything ranging from commercials to feature-length films. As visual storytellers, they always strive to be comfortable with being uncomfortable, and they've never been afraid to experiment with new technologies and techniques.
Color for the real world
"We're really discerning about our color grade," explains Katie, "and so it's important to us that we have monitors that can give us the exact color we want to display." Jacob continues, "What's really great about the ASUS ProArt display [PA32UCX-PK] is that it comes with an X-Rite calibration and all the technology built into the calibrator, so we can quickly and easily calibrate the display, and make sure we're seeing the right colors exactly to the specs that the real world should be seeing. The wonderful thing about the ProArt display is that I can go in and easily choose the preset that works best for the situation that I'm in. This monitor is great because I can just go right to the setting that I need." Katie sees the benefits from the client perspective, too . "Having an HDR reference monitor on set is really valuable for the client as well," she says, while Jacob also praises the connectivity. "It has so many connectivity options. It allows us to just plug it into any system or any kind of device we need to review our footage."
Enabling "crazy things"
Jacob explains why they opted for ProArt. "We have a lot of different tools that we use. However, the ProArt line of products has been great for us because we can use it from end to end. It's a good solution that takes us from not only shooting and capturing and acquisition, but it also takes us all the way to post-production while we edit, review, and then, finally at the end, grade the footage and deliver it." "Film-making is one big question after the next. How are we going to do this next crazy thing that we've never done before?" enthuses Katie. Jacob concurs "Every day when I come to work. It's always a different challenge and it's always a different medium that I get to work and play in."
A stunning portfolio
Mystery Box's output includes the acclaimed documentary Iron Cowboy: The Story of the 50.50.50, which chronicles the epic journey of a triathlete's attempt to complete 50 Iron Man triathlons on 50 consecutive days, in all 50 US states. Other productions include the quirky musical series The Anxious Taxidermist, the sci-fi short Kepler 138, as well as a broad portfolio of commercials. Jacob and Katie's own YouTube channel has over 600,000 subscribers and features a hugely popular collection of original 8K HDR, 4K HDR and 4K travel videos.
Mission-critical display
Unsurprisingly, a laptop's display is the critical component for Jacob. "The biggest thing I was impressed with on the ProArt Studiobook Pro 15 was just the display. Having a 4K display, especially the color rendition of the Pantone UHD, it's just been awesome." "You don't have to guess what your footage is going to look like when you get home!" adds Katie. Jacob continues "One of the things that really impressed me about the Studiobook was the fact that ASUS put NVIDIA® Quadro RTX™ 5000 Max-Q graphics cards in. Those are invaluable for most of us creative professionals to make sure that we have no issues on the final export." Katie adds, "Full resolution playback is invaluable. There's nothing worse than a jittery 8K timeline." Jacob also appreciates the portability of his Studiobook "Having enough RAM, especially in a notebook that we're taking around and traveling with us, is really crucial because it allows us to quickly — and without jitters — review our footage, especially in 8K."