I'm going to check it out too, but I'm sure I'll be impressed(definitely not helpful).
I still need to go thru Douglas Spotted Eagles(SPOT) tutorial/article for this topic:
http://www.creativecow.net/articles/vegasvideo.html

....and your question IMHO, is most definitly suited for this forum :D

Hi Shon,

Thanks for sharing your work. (You are a brave soul to do so.) It is excellent.


Here are some thoughts:

The look is great, the shooting is very good. The track is strong and driving.

Keep the editing pace up. The number is Yahoo-Wahoo Night!, go for it in the cut... get wild! The edits are on the beat, but they are are at roughly two measures, go for one or less. I know, its a lot of cuts, but this is an up-tempo spot, and you've got great footage and a great editing program to do it with. On the same note, kill the dissolves... they slow it down. Same with the title: it looks great, but bring it in over the opening shot to keep things moving.

It is common to establish the band in the first verse/chorus. I like to see each member to establish the band, before seeing a lot of the crowd. (Remember, you're showcasing the band.)

Play a bit more off the motivations in the music, those little guitar fills between phrases deserve a closeup. When the singer has a line about folks dancing, show the dancers. When the second singer first harmonizes, give closeups, especially at the chorus where the singers are looking at each other.

The closeups of the lead guitar solo were good, again faster cuts from CU to med and maybe even some reactions from other band members/crowd.

There was a cool segment in the buildup, when you could pace some fast cuts of the dancers moving in opposite directions onscreen and fast cuts to closeups of each band member to build visual pace with the musical pace. It's a crescendo... The edits can get faster and faster there.

As the director/editor of the clip you are like a member of the band, playing the visual instrument... play as fast, fun and hard as the folks onstage using the images as your riffs. I hope you catch my drift. You have some fantastic stuff to work with.

I'm probably coming off as too critical, I hope I don't offend. I love where you're going with this and the fact you're opening your work to public comment while in progress. (I really wish I had this kind of resource when I was starting.) So many folks like you are becoming great editors faster, because you have usergroups like this, and you are willing to "suffer the slings and arrows" of public comment. (For other pro-editor opinions, you can tap the creativecow.net "Art of the Edit" forum... there are good, helpful folks there.)

The .wmv file was a good size/quality for sharing, BTW.

Thanks for inviting us to comment.

Kudos, MPH

"I'm probably coming off as too critical, I hope I don't offend"


Not at all. This is the feedback that I wanted. I can't thank you guys enough! Keep it coming -Shon

As an amateur you put me to shame, but the Yahoo Wahoo was instructive, including the critique of martyh. I'm just curious. How many cameras and what make and models?

Paul,
We used two cameras for this shoot. I don't know the model # off hand but they both were Sony. One was a three 1/2" chip professional DVCAM jobby that I checked out from the local CTV access and the other was a consumer minidv model. all the band shots were from the pro camera and the dance scenes were about half and half. -Shon

Nice work Shon! You put the wedding video I'm currently working on to shame. I think I will take Marty's suggestions for quicker scene changes my project to liven it up. Man, weddings are boring!

Anyway, I was wondering how many takes it took to shoot all the different camera angles? Also, what did you use for the audio, a prerecording?

HeeHee,
We did in the area of about 20 different takes. This includes band shots, dance shots and tracking shots. The audio is actually from their released CD. When we were shooting we would play back the audio on the club's system and the band would lipsync and instrument sync to the music as we were recording. I used the audio I picked up from the camera's mics for syncing reference only. Tip: its much easier to sync music to music than movement to music. I found it extremely helpful to have that reference audio from the camera. But again the final output is ripped from their CD.

sr_c
first of all it's a great video
secondly, i can appreciate you asking people to critique it.
that is the only way you will get better
i agree 100% with marty--you need faster edits
you have to break up the monotony of the song
your edits are almost predictable--on this beat, on that beat
also, maybe you should think about using picture in picture?
i like tic tac boards or borders for music videos

secondly, i have shot 3 music video using vv3
i always had a storyline--just like an mtv music video
boy meets girl, gets dissed, switcharoo, etc.
i always find plain performing to be boring...unless it is the rolling stones
the best part of a music video--for me--is you get to be creative and have fun in a video and get to see another side of the band
sometimes the bands are posers---sometimes they are cool--the music video shows that
but it's fun seeing them act or in situations when they are not on the stage
maybe you can quickly direct a scene for this
i especially like when directors inject humor into their video
my favorite video of all time is "dirty vegas"
great storyline, great dancing, great song
anyway, your video is awesome and the band will certainly love it
but....storyline is king
look at michael jackson video---you don't have to create the next THRILLER but i like seeing something other than the band on stage
my 2cents
but for your 1st or 100,000 attempt the actual shooting is great.

Hi Shon
Your editing is good. If you had a storyline, like sonicboom suggested, you'd edit differently, accordingly. Anyone can see that.
We don't know what story you are trying to tell, we only know you're trying to promote the band. And I guess you have used the footage available. So there's no point in suggesting storylines that would require additional shots?
But what about the reminding five videos, maybe you could introduce little stories to them? Basically, you want someone getting into trouble and out again. Like a dancer being out of step and fixing it. A guitar player having trouble with his strap or loosing his pick - something big enough to attract interest and forward movement but still small enough to allow the band to shine through the whole thing.
I don't agree with the guys who want quicker cuts. I'd like a bit of sideways movement on the band's part, but that's not for the editor to create. Or maybe you can, to a point?
In a real situation the flashing coloured lights will be more on the crowd than on the band, but in a promotion video perhaps they should be more evenly distributed. I watched your video three times with no sound and it made me think it was rather good. But, if you have more shots of band and crowd together, throw them in, use them. Those are the real "party-time" shots. And if you can liven up the band shots with a bit of flashing colours, do it. They're a bit quiet as it is.

Well, I'm new to all this video stuff, but I've been in bands for more than 30 years. And whenever I hear a song or watch some film or video, I'm always looking for the story. "What are they trying to tell me and why?"

Good luck when you show it to the band. If you can find a polite way of saying it, remind them that one of the irresistable things about rock and roll is the unpredictable (stage) behaviour of its performers.

Tor

I liked it! I think you were limited in that you shot it in that saloon---and it was pretty dark everywhere except on the stage. I wanted to see more of the dancers---their faces, attire, movements etc---but it was difficult because of the darkness. You know--more of a play between them and the band members. The only other thing I could say is that it would have been nice to see some ECU's of the lead guitarists face and hands as he played--he was damn good.

Keep it up, you did a great job.

Thanks again guys, this is exactly what I was wanting!

About the storyline: I do plan on creating more of a story with the next videos we do (acting, scenes etc..) For this one, we just wanted do do a performance video of the band playing in this club. The idea behind this video is to demonstrate the look and feel of the band, something they can give to promoters to help land gigs.

About the lighting: This has been the biggest challenge of the video so far. I wanted more light on the band shots so that the camera could pick up more detail on the band (Their look, outfits, actions etc...) at the same time I needed to darken the area behind the band for cosmetic reasons and also try not to wash out the colored lights of the club too much. I used a technique that I picked up in a lighting specific forum to light the band and I was happy with the results of the band shots, I didn't pick up as much of the colored lights as I would have wanted but all in all I was pleased. For the dance shots it was the opposite. We only had the club lighting to use. The raw footage is actually pretty light and you have no problems picking up the detail on the individual dancers, the problem is the color is washed out. When I adjust the color curves and HSL I can get the colors to be where I like but the result is darker than I want causing a loss of detail in the dancers. Any ideas?

About the cuts: I am going to shorten about 1/3 of the existing cuts and I noticed that some where off beat. My main goal here is to not have a standard cut length, then it starts to resemble a slide show. I noticed that I have very few cuts that are 2sec or less, and like stated, this song's tempo is up so I do think it calls for the change.

Again, I can't thank this group enough. This is more helpful than you know. And again....keep it coming -Shon