SPN vidlet: oh snap, it's my first time attempting this!
I've been wanting to learn how to vid for a long time, and I finally decided that, just like writing a short story before trying a novel, I needed to do something small in order to figure out at least a little about how to use the program available on my computer (Windows Movie Maker). I started trying to think of short songs I could use, and then I remembered this one, and an idea of footage to go with it popped into my head, and it was just about cracked out enough that I decided it might work. It has absolutely no technical finesse, but at least I figured out the most basic basics of how the program works.
Song: Big Wolf On Campus Theme by Danny Smith
Footage: Supernatural
Size: 29 seconds long, 1.66 MB file
Summary: A ficlet about Sam's psychic powers, S1 style.
Link: spnbwocvidciaan.wmv
Things I learned, and things I still need to learn
1. I won't actually be able to vid until I get at least one of my computers working better. My desktop doesn't really have the firepower (WMM was processing slowly, and closed with unexpected runtime errors a bunch), the monitor is small and dark, and my speakers are shot to shit so everything sounds noisy and mushy. My laptop ought to have the firepower, but it's been having Inexplicable Technical Problems for ages now, and refuses to play well with any audio or video files. Since I can barely even watch vids currently, it's hard to make them.
2. I've only learned a few of the commands and menus in WMM, so I need to learn the rest. Once I get a working computer, I'd like to also learn Premiere or something. But I did install software and rip from a DVD for the first time! I might want to learn how to edit songs, too.
3. I need to figure out how to stop WMM from automatically making the vid have a really small screen size, and being all blurry and low-res (the original source was much higher quality).
4. I need to learn how to put in text, so I can do credits and a signature.
5. I'm probably not at all using an optimal process for creating and managing clips, so must sort that out more.
6. I have absolutely no idea how to do corrections or alterations to vid footage like I can do to images - work on saturation, color levels, color shifting, brightness, contrast, blurring/sharpening, textures, lights, anything like that.
7. I also don't know how to flip or rotate scenes, zoom in or out, pan around inside them, slow them down or speed them up, run them backward, stuff like that.
8. Nor do I know how to do overlays, transparency/opacity, infills and manips, split screens, or anything that combines multiple bits of source onscreen at one time.
9. Transitions: cuts, jumps, fades. The terms people use for the different kinds of transitions, what do they mean and how do I make them? The upshot is that I can't do anything technical or any effects at all, and all effects in this vidlet are only there because they were already in the source footage.
10. Obviously I need to get better at using the visuals, the shapes and colors and lights and motion, and matching them to the music, working with the beat and rhythm and various sounds. I think having some visualization of the music there would help, because while I could see the time count, the only way I could compare what the images and the sounds were doing was to watch the playback, and I'd like to be able to have more information on both of them coming through in the timeline, in order to better match frames and beats and work at really, really precise and close-in levels (ha ha, just like Photoshop - zoom in way too far and be very fiddly - gotta learn to work at the equivalent of the pixel level, but I don't know how to use the program to explore the music that close inside). There are a bunch of places here where I think if something were just a tiny bit over more it would make it a billion times better. Which, of course, means I need to put more time and effort into the next thing, even though it's shocking how many hours it took to figure out how to chop up and line up 29 seconds worth of footage to a song. And most of the best matches (Sam looking around confused to "figure out" and putting his hands to his forehead for "do you think", that sound that seems to go along with the flame burst, Dean almost running in on the extra drum rumble, Sam almost opening his mouth in time to the howl (and of course all these almosts would be better being actuallys, yes?)) were pretty much accidental (I didn't premeditate those juxtapositions, just noticed them afterward - I was thinking of it more in terms of story content and lyricism while I was matching). Maybe later I'll be able to do more of that on purpose. I just need to figure out how to pull in what I want to pull in from writing, graphic design, and dance, while also learning more about vidding per se so I gain new techniques and don't force inappropriate ones, and learning how to use all the resources of the program.
So, yeah, I know the vid isn't much of anything, but it was fun to do, and OMG, LOOK! Pictures moving to sounds and it's from something that I thought of!
And if you have any advice on my questions/comments, or anything else you want to helpfully offer, I would love that. I need to do more reading and playing around.
Song: Big Wolf On Campus Theme by Danny Smith
Footage: Supernatural
Size: 29 seconds long, 1.66 MB file
Summary: A ficlet about Sam's psychic powers, S1 style.
Link: spnbwocvidciaan.wmv
Things I learned, and things I still need to learn
1. I won't actually be able to vid until I get at least one of my computers working better. My desktop doesn't really have the firepower (WMM was processing slowly, and closed with unexpected runtime errors a bunch), the monitor is small and dark, and my speakers are shot to shit so everything sounds noisy and mushy. My laptop ought to have the firepower, but it's been having Inexplicable Technical Problems for ages now, and refuses to play well with any audio or video files. Since I can barely even watch vids currently, it's hard to make them.
2. I've only learned a few of the commands and menus in WMM, so I need to learn the rest. Once I get a working computer, I'd like to also learn Premiere or something. But I did install software and rip from a DVD for the first time! I might want to learn how to edit songs, too.
3. I need to figure out how to stop WMM from automatically making the vid have a really small screen size, and being all blurry and low-res (the original source was much higher quality).
4. I need to learn how to put in text, so I can do credits and a signature.
5. I'm probably not at all using an optimal process for creating and managing clips, so must sort that out more.
6. I have absolutely no idea how to do corrections or alterations to vid footage like I can do to images - work on saturation, color levels, color shifting, brightness, contrast, blurring/sharpening, textures, lights, anything like that.
7. I also don't know how to flip or rotate scenes, zoom in or out, pan around inside them, slow them down or speed them up, run them backward, stuff like that.
8. Nor do I know how to do overlays, transparency/opacity, infills and manips, split screens, or anything that combines multiple bits of source onscreen at one time.
9. Transitions: cuts, jumps, fades. The terms people use for the different kinds of transitions, what do they mean and how do I make them? The upshot is that I can't do anything technical or any effects at all, and all effects in this vidlet are only there because they were already in the source footage.
10. Obviously I need to get better at using the visuals, the shapes and colors and lights and motion, and matching them to the music, working with the beat and rhythm and various sounds. I think having some visualization of the music there would help, because while I could see the time count, the only way I could compare what the images and the sounds were doing was to watch the playback, and I'd like to be able to have more information on both of them coming through in the timeline, in order to better match frames and beats and work at really, really precise and close-in levels (ha ha, just like Photoshop - zoom in way too far and be very fiddly - gotta learn to work at the equivalent of the pixel level, but I don't know how to use the program to explore the music that close inside). There are a bunch of places here where I think if something were just a tiny bit over more it would make it a billion times better. Which, of course, means I need to put more time and effort into the next thing, even though it's shocking how many hours it took to figure out how to chop up and line up 29 seconds worth of footage to a song. And most of the best matches (Sam looking around confused to "figure out" and putting his hands to his forehead for "do you think", that sound that seems to go along with the flame burst, Dean almost running in on the extra drum rumble, Sam almost opening his mouth in time to the howl (and of course all these almosts would be better being actuallys, yes?)) were pretty much accidental (I didn't premeditate those juxtapositions, just noticed them afterward - I was thinking of it more in terms of story content and lyricism while I was matching). Maybe later I'll be able to do more of that on purpose. I just need to figure out how to pull in what I want to pull in from writing, graphic design, and dance, while also learning more about vidding per se so I gain new techniques and don't force inappropriate ones, and learning how to use all the resources of the program.
So, yeah, I know the vid isn't much of anything, but it was fun to do, and OMG, LOOK! Pictures moving to sounds and it's from something that I thought of!
And if you have any advice on my questions/comments, or anything else you want to helpfully offer, I would love that. I need to do more reading and playing around.