You made a potentially very dry and boring subject flashy and smooth. Nice voice over too. Good job.

Looks nice.
Whoever shot it... gave you some pretty good angles to work with and you used them well.
Your Animated Lower Thirds really adds a lot to.

Good Job!

Looked very good, with just a two caveats

substantial variation in saturation between clips and the VO was very nice and pro sounding, however a little overwhelming for the subject matter.

I think that I might have gone with a softer sounding VO. But that is more a matter of oppinion, and mine isn't worth as much as your clients :D

Overall, Very nice. I liked most everything about it.

Dave

Thanks guys for the positive feedback... I needed it on this one.

I agree Dave that the VO is a little strong for the subject and (the script is a little too wordy), but if the clients like it, then I like it. I still need to color correct as you pointed out too!

Oh, I technically shot it (thanks for the comp on my camera work) but much of this is still pictures, so someone else takes the credit there... I was just hand a CD with jpgs and told "here make a video."

Thanks!

I agree with everyone above but one comment on the lower third. The logo is fine but the animation across the lower screen was a little distrative. I found myself watching it instead of the content. Have it come up early and place some text over it, then have it disappear (leave the logo), then maybe bring it back at the end to remphasize the name. Not a big thing but thought I'd mention it.
Randy

Visually interesting!
I liked the flow.
You have a feel for editing.
You told a story with pictures holding my attention.
I have to honestly say the lower third didn't do it for me.

Music was a bit too dreamy sc- fi for my taste and the narration was a tad 60s.
I think some punchier upbeat music next time and a narrator with a bit more personality and warmth in his voice to connect emotionally with the trade show viewer.
Matter of fact I would liked to have heard a cheery female voice for this one.
Hope these points are received as they are intended,---as constructive suggestions.
And of course as Kent mentions, there is the issue of personal preference.
It's obvious you have talent and will suceed in this biz.

Wonderful work. Pace is great. You mix up the transition types well...even though you've used a bunch of different types, I did not get the feeling they were over used...you know how you can tell when someone gets that new video editor they want to use every star wipe in the book... yours looked really sweet and tasteful.

The transition form the sketch to the photo was pretty slick... did you actually have a sketch that matched a photo that well or was some photo trickery involved?

I agree with the above comment about the saturation. I noticed the rich colors in a few of the first cafeteria scenes and thought, nice colors..then immediately noticed the contrast to the less saturated shots.... I'd boost those first.

The VO didn't bother me...sort of industrial video style...wonder if a little thinning might just take a bit of the boom out of his voice? Never play much with the equalizer myself (sign of a real amature - that's me)

Thanks for sharing.

Nice Job...

Having stood for far too many hours staffing tradeshow booths, I feel qualified to say it is perfectly appropriate for that environment.

It's visually attractive and I think the voice will stand out in the noise of a tradeshow environment.

The purposes of a tradeshow video are to associate a product offering with a company name, and to get someone to stop long enough to make personal contact with the booth representatives. I think this would fill both purposes.

RalphM

Thanks everyone for the feedback and compliments. I'm a little punch drunk right now and have to turn a rough edit into the client in about 8 hours. I'm not loving the voice over and that voice will haunt me in my sleep, but it'll have to fly.

Have a good night.

Jeff

looks good for a tradeshow. The real issue will be the sound system and display size. Since location of booth in the tradeshow will affect the sound because of noise, traffic,etc... you may want to have optional sound tracks with addition boost to ensure the VO can be cleanly heard, what sounds good in editing room will not sound the same on the floor. I like your work, trans look good, but its really ok to push colors on features that the clients wants remembered vs not pushing the curves on secondary marketing issues.

That was really a very nice ad. Flow was smooth and interesting and the only thing that was distracting was the lower third. The VO wasn't that bad at all IMO, but a female VO (as suggested above) would probably have been better.

John

>>The transition form the sketch to the photo was pretty slick... did you actually have a sketch that matched a photo that well or was some photo trickery involved?

JimH, it was the same photo: one with a hand drawn effect and one straight. There is a new plugin coming out soon for Vegas by a third party company that did the "pen and paper" look of the above mentioned effect. They asked for beta testers on another forum and I signed up. I guess I can't say anymore or someone will break my knee caps.... but it's really nice set of effects... Also, I know VASST has a similar plugin that can be purchased.



Craftech, do you think the lower thrid would be less distracting on a bigger screen? I guess it's hard to say without seeing first hand, but I was planning on running a news ticker over the lower 3rd with info about the company. The final video is about twice as long, btw.

Thanks.

apit... the screen is two 42" plasma screens mounted at eye level on the outside corner of their booth. I met with them today and watched it on the screen that will get used and I do have some concerns about sound. The speakers are behind the screen and point back so the sound will be reflected and not real loud. There is no bottom end, so I don't know if I should boost lower freq and risk over loading the plasmas speakers, or leaving as is.... maybe I need to tell them to invest in better speakers. It seems to have speaker jacks, so I assume it can drive external speakers.

Thanks for the input.

Very cool - great job, really liked how stuff was flying around. Particularly liked the circle/zoom into the guy thing, lot of motion but it was very tasteful. As for plasma speakers - A couple months ago I was involved in the exact same situation - tried to use little tv speakers at a trade show, it was a disaster.

Here is my .0000002 - You need something with a lot of punch and volume, trade show floors can be incredibly loud. If during set up in the fairly quite convention hall you can't rip your head off from 6 feet away you need a louder audio set up.

Great stuff and good luck

Jkrepner, I would suggest to your client to buy an external amp and good speakers and feed the audio from the display to the amp,( made sure that the amp as an equalizer, for adjustments). As traffic volume changes, so well the demand on the audio, so have the floor staff knowledgeable in operating the sound. The display height should be rised to a height and viewing angle that will catch the eye of "future clients" that are walking in the middle of the aisle, in a crowd. Also maybe phase in and out lower thirds may help, keep the company logo on at all times.

apit, thanks. I have mentioned the situation to the client and I think they will go for the better sound system. I mean, it's a drop in the bucket compared to their 30'x30' booth at the National Restaurant Association show.

Great work! The only thing I didn't like was the lower third also. I kept waiting for text to appear in it, but since it didn't, I thought it was a little distracting and slightly disruptive to the footage IMO. I imagine you were trying to make it a little more interesting by adding that? Very good work though. I also loved the way you transitioned between pix and footage, especially where a pix came out of another one or was seated into the next one. Hope I'm making sense with that. :o) Nice job! Derek

Thanks Derek. In fact, there will be text in the lower third; stuff like the company's website, key words, and their slogan.

Very nice work. Only issue I can see (hear) is the music drops out/skips at the :46 mark. Even if intentional, to my ears it sounds like a mistake.

Thanks. I caught that drop and fixed in subsequent versions.