Revised vid and documentary rec

[icepixie]

Some time ago, thuviaptarth recommended a documentary about film editing (The Cutting Edge: The Magic of Movie Editing) in a post about background knowledge for vidding. I finally got around to watching it this week and found it tremendously helpful for putting words to what I'm intuitively thinking when I vid, as well as for pointing out certain other aspects I hadn't considered, particularly about editing for emotional effect. One day I'll write up some further thoughts on it (this day will likely be after graduation), but for now I just wanted to recommend it to anyone who's interested in vid-making or vid-watching.

Watching that documentary also inspired me to spend a couple hours revising one of my Fred and Ginger vids (A Love that Won't Sit Still). I fixed some pervasive (though subtle) timing issues in the first two thirds that had been bugging me for the past six weeks or so, and I swapped out two clips for better ones. I'm not sure how noticeable the changes are to people not living in my head--I'm going to guess "not at all"--so I wouldn't suggest running over to watch it again, but the new version is streaming and downloadable at the link above if you're so inclined.

In RL news, there's a 90% chance that my 20-30-minute presentation on 2/18 is going to be moved to 2/23, to which I can only say, "HOORAY."

Comments

[eldivinomarques.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how noticeable the changes are to people not living in my head

It's your creation. You had an idea, you made it real through a video format, you spent hours in its creation... so, yes, it would be quite difficult to appreciate the changes the way you may do but! let's try it.

Right at the start you added a scene from Top Hat that I think improves the beginning as it helps to make the Guy Divorcee part shorter and helps to give to those first seconds more speed and make that part for fluid.
Other thing that I liked is that you didn't touch the 'climax' moments of this video. The whole part that goes from 0:39 to 0:44 is a beauty. The Never Gonna Dance bit at 1:55 is one of those moments that make you gasp. That's what I like of this video, the way you chose the right scenes for the right parts of the song. Other part that I find particulary well done, is the moment when you listen the violins around 2:45 to 2:59 and you use all the clips where they spin through the dance floor. Wonderful! And the end is just perfect, the climax of the whole movie represented by a kiss, a very short one that doesn't break the rhythm of the song and the video. I think a longer one would have spoil the whole thing.

Well, sorry for the long post, but I think the video deserved it. It's not easy to find someone that knows how to mix a song and clip well and make it work. It's not about putting song and scenes together, it's about telling a story and both, music and movement, must complement each other in order to achieve that goal, and I think you did with this video.

[icepixie]

Right at the start you added a scene from Top Hat that I think improves the beginning as it helps to make the Guy Divorcee part shorter and helps to give to those first seconds more speed and make that part for fluid.

Yeah, I was pleased with that addition. I had thought the original opening was sort of blah; this gives it more life.

Other thing that I liked is that you didn't touch the 'climax' moments of this video.

Thanks! I actually did recut some "climax" parts because the timing was just the slightest bit off. 0:55 through 1:08 all got readjusted by a few frames because I was originally cutting on the drum beats rather than at the end of Vienna Teng's phrasing (you'd think that would actually look better, but oddly, it looks better now that it's cut to coincide with her vocals). 2:27 to 2:50 actually had most of the clips adjusted by as many as eight frames. (Now the tapping at 2:40 and 2:49 actually coincides with a drumbeat, which makes me inordinately happy. :D)

The Never Gonna Dance bit at 1:55 is one of those moments that make you gasp. That's what I like of this video, the way you chose the right scenes for the right parts of the song.

Thanks. That's actually another part I adjusted for this one; I sped it up by 10% so that their heads would actually turn on "with" and "this," rather than whatever weird in-between moment I had them at before.

Other part that I find particulary well done, is the moment when you listen the violins around 2:45 to 2:59 and you use all the clips where they spin through the dance floor. Wonderful!

Heh. Violins and spinning seem to be forever mentally linked for me. I'm glad you like that part; it might just be my favorite sequence in this vid.

And the end is just perfect, the climax of the whole movie represented by a kiss, a very short one that doesn't break the rhythm of the song and the video. I think a longer one would have spoil the whole thing.

Yeah, it was hard to figure out what to end it with. I like that one because, as you say, it's short. My goal for that part of the song, since the last "am" has such a strong beat followed almost immediately by an even stronger drumbeat, was to find a clip that would have something visually interesting to put at the "am" but wouldn't look odd if I cut to black barely a second later. That it was that kiss, which allowed me to sort of come to a narrative conclusion, was just the proverbial cherry on top. :)

Thanks so much for your detailed comment! I'm so glad you like the video.

[eldivinomarques.livejournal.com]

As a said before, a fanvideo, a good fanvideo, must tell you a story, must get the viewer to feel the feelings and emotions the author tried to recreate through it... and you get it. Just look at the whole reply telling all the details, changes and subtle adjustments you did, when I read it, I see an artist that spend a lot of time to create a visual story, an author that pay attention to details and that thinks that subtle adjust of just a few seconds are important... because they are! That's makes the difference between an artist and a fan, and I highly appreciate it.

[jesse_the_k]

Oh. That. Documentary! It dragged in parts (yeah, I know) but it taught me so much, as a viewer. It helped me understand why vids take so long, not from a technical standpoint (although that, too) but because there's all sorts of careful thinking and planning going on. Sometimes that thinking & planning is totally non-conscious and may feel like intuition, but any road it takes time.

[icepixie]

I really need to watch it again, because I remember so little of it now; the last few months of grad school pretty much crowded everything from earlier this year out of my mind. It did make me start paying more attention to editing in TV shows and movies, definitely.

I find that my planning tends to go on before I start the actual vidding process, and once I get into iMovie, it's mostly by instinct. I make myself an Excel file with the lyrics and musical beats of the song on it, then write out what clips I think might go where. Once I get all my source gathered together and start putting it on the timeline, it becomes a matter of matching movement to beats, watching the characters' eye movements, and the other things in the documentary that I remember thinking "Ah, yes!" about but can't recall now. :D