2007 vidding meme
First off, thank you to everyone who sent me Christmas cards, and to snarkist for her OMG!AWESOME mix CD, which I am pouring over right now. (*hugs* You rock!) The mail's been slow here so I keep getting cards every day. *bounces* At this rate, Christmas will last til Easter... :)
I also got b'day prezzies in the form of fic! daybreak777 posted the first part of a very intriguing BSG fic called Circuit and smact46 wrote me a little Kara/Lee ficlet. I am very lucky. *g*
And it's not a present, but it may as well be because it's so scrummy and because I got to beta it... brokenmnemonic posted a lovely new Kara/Lee vid.
I wasn't going to do this, but I got inspired by boom-queen's 2007 vid rec post and bradcpu's 2007 round-up, as well as bananainpyjamas's post (from which I snagged the format). Also, I'm procrastinating.
Videos I made this year:
Jan
Feb
Life for rent (FNL, Tyra character study)
Like a friend (Smallville, Clark/Lex)
March
April
Road rage (BSG, Kara/Lee)
May
Southside (BSG, all pilots)
June
July
Aug
Sept
Middleman (BSG, Lee character study)
Oct
Nov
Samson (Smallville, Clark/Lana)
Dec
Total vids: 6
I'm happy with the number of vids I made, considering it was my first full year as a vidder. I didn't feel very productive at the time though... for 2008, I'd be happy with another 6 vids if the quality was a lot better. Or alternatively, I could just go for quantity... :D
My favourite video this year (of my own):
Middleman. I put most into it, it means the most to me at all sorts of levels--emotionally, meta-wise, intellectually, creatively. The fact that I actually completed it is a serious mark of my creative dedication, given how I've traditionally bailed on anything creative the minute it felt 'hard'.
My least favourite:
Like a Friend. It sucks that my least favourite vid is my Clex vid, but there you go... I was never satisfied with how this turned out--a case of biting off more than I could chew too early in my vidding career, I believe.
Most successful video:
Southside. I was blown away by the reaction to this vid and I believe it garnered the most recs. But 'successful' is subjective: Middleman scored a great many comments as well, and the depth of the feedback made it feel like a real success even if the audience was more limited. I was suprised to see that Like a friend has been played almost as many times on imeem as Southside. And Samson brought me a wider audience--it's done well on YouTube (*lol*).
Video most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
Life for rent. What can I say? I know it's a very simple vid, but I love Tyra and I made this vid so fast that I never get sick of watching it. It's my little private treasure, and I still mourn the loss of the fcp file that meant I couldn't submit it to Vividcon...
Most fun video to make:
Southside, Southside, Southside! I started it as my 'light' distraction from Middleman, and ended up discovering a love of action vidding. I can't wait to do another action vid. Even in the final stretches (I finished it in a fandom-angst-enduced all-nighter), it was the most enjoyable 'ride'.
Hardest video to make:
Middleman. Words can't even describe the pain. If I gathered together all the meta, LJ comments, and transcripts of IM chats, conversations and internal monologues that I drew on for this vid creatively, they'd be the length of a decent novel, I swear. And if you look at the year summary, you can see how it totally ate the middle of the year for me.
The things I've learnt this year
HAhahahahahhahaha. Pretty much everything I know about vidding I've learnt this year so I don't think I can possibly begin to describe it all. I feel as if I've developed a basic understanding of cutting to the beat (or knowing when it's ok not to) and timing internal movement to the beat or other musical inflections. I've made a start on using cross transitions and fades effectively (in Samson), and I've got ok at playing with speed, movement and existing effects in the source. I *think* I'm ok at basic storytelling and I at least managed to move away from linear work and But I know practically zip about effects and still frighteningly little about some basic technical stuff: I have my method and I stick to that, and I find once I stray away from that the idea that I can vid crumples as fast as a tower of cards...
Things to work on in 2008
Effects. Sigh.
I really want to put in some time reading some vidding meta and practising from some tutorials. I find it really hard to just mess around in FCP without a plan, but I think it would really help to get me to loosen up and learn how to use some effects.
Vid projects I definitely want to get finished this year:
- The all-but-exported Clois vid (*eyes harddrive nervously*)
- BSG 'Unfinished Business' episode-based vid
- The 'Smallville is actually just thinly disguised porn' vid
I have plenty of other vid bunnies nibbling at my brain, including:
- an epic Lex character study (yeah, that could be the 'Middleman' of 2008...)
- a fluffy schmoopy Pushing Daisies vidlet
- the Smallville 'coffee' vid (don't ask! but it's quite far advanced so amusingly enough is probably the only one that will actually be finished)
- a Casino Royale action vid
- the Dead Like Me vid I've always wanted to make (if I get a new harddrive with more space for ripped files).
So for all my talk of wanting to improve and learn in 2008, I might just wind up banging out average but possibly amusing projects. ;) Striking a balance somewhere in between would be good.
Many people have done great round-ups of their favourite vids of 2007. I'd love to do the same, but I wouldn't know where to start really. So I'm putting that on my goals list for 2008--to keep a better record of the vids I watch, give feedback diligently, and post a 'best of' round up in addition to more regular vid rec posts.
I also got b'day prezzies in the form of fic! daybreak777 posted the first part of a very intriguing BSG fic called Circuit and smact46 wrote me a little Kara/Lee ficlet. I am very lucky. *g*
And it's not a present, but it may as well be because it's so scrummy and because I got to beta it... brokenmnemonic posted a lovely new Kara/Lee vid.
I wasn't going to do this, but I got inspired by boom-queen's 2007 vid rec post and bradcpu's 2007 round-up, as well as bananainpyjamas's post (from which I snagged the format). Also, I'm procrastinating.
Videos I made this year:
Jan
Feb
Life for rent (FNL, Tyra character study)
Like a friend (Smallville, Clark/Lex)
March
April
Road rage (BSG, Kara/Lee)
May
Southside (BSG, all pilots)
June
July
Aug
Sept
Middleman (BSG, Lee character study)
Oct
Nov
Samson (Smallville, Clark/Lana)
Dec
Total vids: 6
I'm happy with the number of vids I made, considering it was my first full year as a vidder. I didn't feel very productive at the time though... for 2008, I'd be happy with another 6 vids if the quality was a lot better. Or alternatively, I could just go for quantity... :D
My favourite video this year (of my own):
Middleman. I put most into it, it means the most to me at all sorts of levels--emotionally, meta-wise, intellectually, creatively. The fact that I actually completed it is a serious mark of my creative dedication, given how I've traditionally bailed on anything creative the minute it felt 'hard'.
My least favourite:
Like a Friend. It sucks that my least favourite vid is my Clex vid, but there you go... I was never satisfied with how this turned out--a case of biting off more than I could chew too early in my vidding career, I believe.
Most successful video:
Southside. I was blown away by the reaction to this vid and I believe it garnered the most recs. But 'successful' is subjective: Middleman scored a great many comments as well, and the depth of the feedback made it feel like a real success even if the audience was more limited. I was suprised to see that Like a friend has been played almost as many times on imeem as Southside. And Samson brought me a wider audience--it's done well on YouTube (*lol*).
Video most underappreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
Life for rent. What can I say? I know it's a very simple vid, but I love Tyra and I made this vid so fast that I never get sick of watching it. It's my little private treasure, and I still mourn the loss of the fcp file that meant I couldn't submit it to Vividcon...
Most fun video to make:
Southside, Southside, Southside! I started it as my 'light' distraction from Middleman, and ended up discovering a love of action vidding. I can't wait to do another action vid. Even in the final stretches (I finished it in a fandom-angst-enduced all-nighter), it was the most enjoyable 'ride'.
Hardest video to make:
Middleman. Words can't even describe the pain. If I gathered together all the meta, LJ comments, and transcripts of IM chats, conversations and internal monologues that I drew on for this vid creatively, they'd be the length of a decent novel, I swear. And if you look at the year summary, you can see how it totally ate the middle of the year for me.
The things I've learnt this year
HAhahahahahhahaha. Pretty much everything I know about vidding I've learnt this year so I don't think I can possibly begin to describe it all. I feel as if I've developed a basic understanding of cutting to the beat (or knowing when it's ok not to) and timing internal movement to the beat or other musical inflections. I've made a start on using cross transitions and fades effectively (in Samson), and I've got ok at playing with speed, movement and existing effects in the source. I *think* I'm ok at basic storytelling and I at least managed to move away from linear work and But I know practically zip about effects and still frighteningly little about some basic technical stuff: I have my method and I stick to that, and I find once I stray away from that the idea that I can vid crumples as fast as a tower of cards...
Things to work on in 2008
Effects. Sigh.
I really want to put in some time reading some vidding meta and practising from some tutorials. I find it really hard to just mess around in FCP without a plan, but I think it would really help to get me to loosen up and learn how to use some effects.
Vid projects I definitely want to get finished this year:
- The all-but-exported Clois vid (*eyes harddrive nervously*)
- BSG 'Unfinished Business' episode-based vid
- The 'Smallville is actually just thinly disguised porn' vid
I have plenty of other vid bunnies nibbling at my brain, including:
- an epic Lex character study (yeah, that could be the 'Middleman' of 2008...)
- a fluffy schmoopy Pushing Daisies vidlet
- the Smallville 'coffee' vid (don't ask! but it's quite far advanced so amusingly enough is probably the only one that will actually be finished)
- a Casino Royale action vid
- the Dead Like Me vid I've always wanted to make (if I get a new harddrive with more space for ripped files).
So for all my talk of wanting to improve and learn in 2008, I might just wind up banging out average but possibly amusing projects. ;) Striking a balance somewhere in between would be good.
Many people have done great round-ups of their favourite vids of 2007. I'd love to do the same, but I wouldn't know where to start really. So I'm putting that on my goals list for 2008--to keep a better record of the vids I watch, give feedback diligently, and post a 'best of' round up in addition to more regular vid rec posts.