A little video project - would appreciate your feedback.

Liam_Vegas wrote on 10/30/2004, 12:50 AM
I have <nearly> completed another little video project that I enjoyed pulling together for a local ocean science center in Dana Point,CA.

See if you think the video gives you an interesting/entertaining insight into the event/Ocean Institute.

http://stream.imagebeam.com/customers/OceanInstitute/

I always find that I end up learning something every time I do such an event as this.

In this case I didn't have a lot of notice to prepare and it wasn't until I arrived and took real notice of how the center was setup that it hit mit how I should handle the shoot.

It seemed to me the center had created a little "spoof" type evening where the guests (teachers) were going to be treated as if they were stars arriving at the premier of some movie. I was asked to simply capture the events of the evening - with a couple of interviews with the staff/sponsors and teachers. I decided to do it a little differently.

I managed to persuade the marketing director for the center to take on the role of being the "on-camera host/talent". Luckily he was a natural. My plan was to build on the "spoof" rather than merely just passively capture what was happening.

The client loves the rough cut so far and apart from doing a little tighter editing in places - and adding some graphics/thirds it is pretty much done.

I did the shooting/editing (PD170 & VX200 cameras) and I had one other videographer who I directed to take some of the b-roll too. In prior events I have found that sometimes doing the A-roll stuff took so much time that I felt that I didn't always get all the footage that I would like.

Please feel free to comment on the video. I appreciate any feedback I receive.

If I were to critique my own work I would have to say that I am quite pleased with the result but what I really lack is the skill to do some fancier edits. I feel that occasionally I want to add some impact/punch to just small parts of these videos - not sure I can describe precisely what I want to be able to do (maybe that is part of the problem). I guess I am at the point in my Vegas/video editing development where I feel pretty comfortable with doing basic editing.. and I just want to take it a little further than I currently know how to.

Theoretically I know I can use any FX in the Vegas palette - but I just lack the practical experience of actually doing this - and knowing exactly what to try out. My challenge to myself is to learn how to make better use of FX's in my work going forward.

And.. I realize that you can overdo things very easily... but nevertheless I hope you see what I am trying to say here.

Thanks!

Comments

Grazie wrote on 10/30/2004, 1:19 AM
Hiyah Liam - you wanna do tjhis over on :

http://www.gooddogproductions.com/chat/vegas_cafe.htm

we can do an interactive . .I'll keep your piece running and we can chat - yeah?

Of cours I have loads to feedbak .. interested?

Grazie

Liam_Vegas wrote on 10/30/2004, 11:53 AM
Thanks for the feedback. All great ideas.

In the case of Bently (the "host") as we were going for a spoof type thing I didn't think it was all that necessary for him to identify himself so formally. However that is where the "graphics/titles" come in. I will put lower thirds over some of the interviews...although for our purposes it is not necessary to identify everyone.

The audience for this will be future sponsors for the institute and the teachers themselves. It will likely never be shown without other materials being provided... but I agree - I always like to have some closing visuals that show the facility so I may add in some information in a closing slide. The primary intended format of the piece will be on DVD so lokking at it via the web will not give you the best view of how it will eventually look. But - they were surprised with how good it looked anyway via the web (especially if you switch to full screen).

For another "angle" on the institute there is another video I produced for them which features another open evening.. this has more about the actual exhibits. Science Night at the Ocean Institute

That "Bridge" thing is actually a Tsunami simulator - that I do have some good shots of - in the case of the teacher night it was not in use.

johnmeyer wrote on 10/30/2004, 12:16 PM
I watched pieces from the beginning, middle, and end. It is a very good, quality production.

Don't ever feel you need to "punch up" a piece, unless you are "into" doing bad MTV videos (which is a redundant statement).

Suggestions:

1. Use a tripod as much as possible. I know that modern producers uses hand-held a lot (and I do it as well). However, unless you really want that "nervous camera" feel, use the tripod.

2. Keep the establishing shots short. You had a pretty long intro with the stacked glasses, bartender, closeups of the food. A little goes a long way, and you can really keep the shots short, especially if you use up-tempo music underneath.

Again, I think it is a very nice piece of work, and you should feel very happy with the result.
Grazie wrote on 10/30/2004, 12:26 PM
Good chat this morning Liam! - it's now 8:30pm in London

Grazie
DVDeviations wrote on 10/30/2004, 1:08 PM
Hi Liam,

Another great shoot! I love the intro, I grew up in Laguna Niguel/Dana Point, so I have seen a lot of shots of Dana Point, and I found your point of view of the Ocean Institute original. I did notice something though, (timecode is 1min 22 seconds), the interviewer is interviewing "Kari" then the shot goes over to a woman in yellow for about a second and then back to Kari. It's just for a second, but I am wondering who that woman is, so it distracted me from Kari's interview.

P.S. Nice plug for Saturn of San Juan!

Colleen
FrigidNDEditing wrote on 10/30/2004, 2:58 PM
Only real thing that stood out to me is that the color balance from your "B-role" camera seemed to be different. Try and get some warmer tonality in the outside shots. Otherwise Very good, nice, exelente. :)
Liam_Vegas wrote on 10/30/2004, 5:19 PM
Hi colleen!

the interviewer is interviewing "Kari" then the shot goes over to a woman in yellow for about a second

VERY TRUE. I needed to chop out a bit of dialog - and was looking for some better cut-away to use. For now - that is it... but I'll continue to look for another one.

This is another one of the things I have learned - but not always executed on. Whenever I interview someone - I need to get some additional B-roll where that person is featured in the shot. That way - if I need some reason to do a cut-away (to hide a jump-cut) I can have some more relevant content. Sometimes I rely upon being able to choose some relevant b-rol that supports the audio - but in this case I didn't quite feel I had something better to use. I'll look back and see what I can come up with.
PierreB wrote on 10/30/2004, 5:21 PM
A quick build on Marquat's comments: nice work, nothing technical to suggest (as if i could!). The spoof wasn't initially evident to me, a casual viewer (I intentionally did not read your comments until after viewing the video). So it would be helpful to me to have signals that the teachers are the movie stars in this production (hollywood-type searchlights as graphics? Heavy-duty flash/strobes to introduce interviews?)

Good job!

Pierre
Liam_Vegas wrote on 10/30/2004, 5:21 PM
I suspect what you are seeing is less about the difference between cameras and more about the result ofshooting happening across sunset. I'm never quite happy with the white-balance around this time. Probably running in auto-white balance mode would be better. I'll see what I can do.

Thanks
Liam_Vegas wrote on 10/30/2004, 5:30 PM
1. Use a tripod as much as possible. I know that modern producers uses hand-held a lot (and I do it as well). However, unless you really want that "nervous camera" feel, use the tripod.

I often find the choice of using tripod is related to how much of a "run-n-gun" style shoot I am doing... and whether I have a production assistant to help with the gear. I feel that my "hand-held" stuff has improved since I got a good camera support system from Varizoom (you see me using it on the "red-carpet" near the beginning). I also find a tripod tough to deal with when doing a "2-up" interview which was what I was doing most of the time on this shoot. I would agree however... that I am not entirely happy with the result and I wish I could do better.

2. Keep the establishing shots short. You had a pretty long intro with the stacked glasses, bartender, closeups of the food. A little goes a long way, and you can really keep the shots short, especially if you use up-tempo music underneath.

I see exactly what you mean. I will go back and cut those parts down.

The music was done by Smartsound - so I can just re-create the music to the slightly shorter length very easily.

I also agree that I am not at all trying to make a very cheesy video through the use of pointless effects. It's just that I know there are times I want to add a subtle impact to some part - and that if I had more experience I would be able to do this sort of thing. I'm sure I'll get there eventually. There is just no short cut to experience!

I must also admit that I am still going through the process of establishing my editing style and I still feel that I spend far too much time simply thinking about what I want to do with the video. I feel that others (who are more experienced) would be able to run through the video and pull something together far quicker than I can currently. I may be too hard on myself.... but in the end this is part of my process I go through to improve my techniques.

Thanks again for the help.
Liam_Vegas wrote on 10/30/2004, 5:32 PM
So it would be helpful to me to have signals that the teachers are the movie stars in this production (hollywood-type searchlights as graphics? Heavy-duty flash/strobes to introduce interviews?)

GOOD IDEA. Thanks. Now... where to find such effects?
DVDeviations wrote on 10/30/2004, 8:03 PM
Hi Liam,

I knew that was what you were doing, but I noticed it anyway!

Colleen
FrigidNDEditing wrote on 11/2/2004, 10:01 AM
Perhaps an overall crowd shot would work if you have it.(just a thought)
Also, I might make it a little longer if you can,it seems kinda like, What the, where'd that come from. (again, just a thought)

And about the white balance, I didn't think it was the camera itself but the fact that the white balance on the cameras were different. just to clarify what I said before.