I watched the video you posted...had some cool effects but I would never watch it again. Not my taste - too busy for me.

If all you have is a midrange camcorder and Vegas, so what? You can do A LOT. Quality not quantity. I bet if you made a video that tells a good story or has a good message I would watch it more than once.

Are you limited? Yes, technologically, but no matter what equipment anyone has, they are still limited to what they can do. Your creativity has no limits.

No need to feel like crap. That's a really engaging video, but...

1) It's a montage of different work - no different than a "greatest hits." Just by the nature of what it is, it's going to be much more exciting than a "trip to ocean city." (At least it should be.)

2) It's heavily animated. A trip to ocean city isn't (and probably shouldn't be).

I really liked the Matrix. I really liked As Good As It Gets, too.

Just remember, success as a video editor is knowing what you NEED to do to accomplish the job successfully. Sure, a trip to ocean city doesn't have laser beams and rockets in it, but it SHOULDN'T (and I bet I'm not the only person in here who has experienced AE freaks who try to put SFX in EVERYTHING they do). I once knew this guy who shot a whole commercial on green screen so he could use Ultra & Poser to "create" a dining room. Of course, if he had just chosen to shoot it in a REAL dining room, it wouldn't have taken him 4 days to cut and actually would have looked "real..."

Visual FX are great. Apps like AE & Ultra are great. If you'd like to do stuff like you see in that video, dig around, read stuff, soak it all in and give it a try. Just because you can't "do it' now doesn't mean you're "bad" or will never be "as good." -- and it certainly shouldn't take away from how you feel about your work. It's not easy to make good video, regardless of what the content is. Be proud of your efforts.

Just my .02...

thanks i'm feeling that. I was kind of joking...I really don't feel like crap but it did make me feel like i got a ways to go. I know there is so much stuff you can do with vegas and I'm barely scratching the surface. I look at tv and see these commercials and think! DANGIT! i have access to the same tools as the people who did this commercial why can't i make something look this good.

but anyway....speaking of green room I had a question. Is there anyway to cut someone out of a video for like 5 min and having him in a different background. I'm pretty sure this is impossible without the green room technology but it's worth asking. I plan on doing interviews and I want the classic matrix white room feel....where it's just the person standing in front of a room of enless whitness in the background...

anyone on here ever achieve that look, i'd like to hear how you did it...

Masking talent or an object for 5 minutes will be the closest thing to pure hell you've ever encountered. If they're not moving much, even 10 seconds is rough. You're talking 30 times that. I find that to get the best mask possible, you're masking AT LEAST every other frame of video. 24p is one thing but if you're masking 30 frame interlaced (60i), you're almost sure to do every frame. If there is someone here that has masked for 5 minutes, its probably a given that they're on something.

Mike

Cheno is right masking this is a pain. So you have two options of doing this.

One is do it on in green room like they did in the matrix. The other is to carefully frame the scene. For example, you have the talent sit in a high backed chair and make sure they don't move their limbs outside fo the chair. Keep the camera stable. Now you are talking about static elements to mask and not a moving person.

Also even with Vegas you do not have to tools to create that reel. What you are looking at is not so much editing as motion graphics. They are motion graphics by someone with a very strong design background.

No . . no actual solutions here .. but some feedback on your honest and open reaction . .. .

" . . but it did make me feel like i got a ways to go. " . . THAT'S where you start . . don't loose that "itch" . .It is what drives the very best creators - and no mistake! Oh yeah, plus a large dollop of fun and excitement.

Honest answer? To start with - keep everything very simple, from filming to delivery of project. Analyse adverts on tv, DVDs, websites and yes hard copy magazines. Really "see" with your eyes.

We take using our hands and fingers as a learnt process. And yes it is. We manipulate stuff with our hands all day. We walk around and climb stairs, we have "trained" our limbs and muscles - BUT one of the most important learnt and learning processes is that which works between the eye and brain. Train your brain using your eye to see through that which you think you are seeing.

Now you start, "but it did make me feel like i got a ways to go. " . . was it always thus! And if anybody says otherwise? I wanna meet them . . in a bar .. over a few cold ones!

As I said, "no actual solutions here " . . .

Keep the faith ..

Grazie

I have only been editing for a couple years but due to there really being a lack of good editors in my city ..I Have been able to create a decent income with editing/web design/graphixand recently finished a docu. Ive been writing for 5 yrs but looking at the reels from the link you posted made me realize how far I have to go...But after shaking myself back to my senses I thought about the equiptment these dudes have ..considering the level of thier clients you can bet they render in real time have all the latest super computers with super high end programs...Ive only recently started working in vegas from final cut..And believe me your starting in the right place...If your looking for a program that will give you the kinda text animations(and images as well) that were used in those reels try swishmax..It will let you dump as an avi..Similar to Macromedia flash just alot more user friendly...

oh and if you decide to try swishmax..the link is http://www.swishzone.com
theres a free full working trial..You have to set the avi composite mode to screen...

oh boy. did the masking thing in vegas. it was only a 3 sec clip for a football game sponsor placement. i could've gotten done faster if the client didn't keep changing his mind. but let me tell you, that was some work. (receiver catching ball, and running in to camera for a customized wipe) took 2 weeks of tweeking.

they liked it so much, they want me to do it with a girls soccor broadcast. if i didn't love it, i would pass.

good luck learninator.

What it takes to look Professional???

The best clothes from.....................................................Old Navy!!

And if you are balding......................................................a beard!!

John

Yes, that is why people who do that sort of work all the time, use different tools for it. Specifically they use tools have motion tracking and rotoscoping.

Boris Red and Adobe AfterEffects among others.

Also the reel you are looking is from a very famous designer, not someone who is working in a local market.

the learninator, yes, you can mask out footage to remove background. If this is your first time, then First, I would convert your video I. frames to progressive frames. Then check for large seqs of frames where simple masks can be use to remove background. Then render to new track with alpha then mute old tracks. Now do your fine masking or rotoscoping as needed on the new track, repeat as needed. You'll be able check your work this way quickly.

My wife and I did a wedding recently. This was her first time doing a very important shot.
She was worried about framing the shot (the wedding
party was very tall) but when it came time for the bride to enter the
sunlight created an angelic look with light behind her.

I had not planned this in the shot but was the highlight shot.

I always enjoy learning from others, esp SPOT (EDIT: DSE). I don't feel bad about
my earlier jobs because each provided happiness to the customer.

You did a fantastic job and recorded some good memories. Enjoy this
fantastic art form and learn. If married, invite your spouse to tradeshows.
(thats how I could get her to ok the big checks)

cool, thanks for the responces. Yea i know the website I got the reel from was the expert of experts. They are almost on motion picture level. to me there are 3 levels:

- novice, amature, steady learning (most of us are on this level)
- professional, experience, comfortable in higher end design
- the 3rd level is motion picture, like matrix the matrix using 3d modeling like Newtek lightwave along with Video.

I thought about learning Lightwave but even before I dare do that I want to totally master this Sony NLE from top to bottom.


QUESTION:

Film is supposed to be the best right (24frames)? i rendered some of my camcorder DV which is 29frames to 24 and didn't really see a difference..so i guess my question is

does it make a difference in the long run? i didn't see a differnce so why do the movie experts always go with 24?

24fps is an econ decision, doing the minimum but still look good. remember 24fps is very old tech but uses film which has great picture imagery.

Film uses 24 frames because long ago film was standardized on 24.
Your video is at 29.97 because long ago NTSC was set at 29.97.

Changing film to 30 frames or 45 frames would involve massive changes. New Cameras, new projectors, possibly new stock, etc. So for massive economic reasons, film has not changed.

Some folks like the look of 24 some don't. Rendering to 24P can be a good look for DVD. Do a search on this board for film look and you should find a bunch of posts.

You seem to be a particularly visually oriented person. I say that because you put that designer as at the motion picture level. However there are a lot of great motion picture makers who could not do that level of work. That is because they are gifted as storytellers and focus on the dramatic. I doubt any of the editors up for an Oscar this year could do that because it's not what they do. I think that would be considered special effects.
The stuff you pointed out is more in touch with the design world and the visual arts. I'm not putting that down by saying that. Within motion pictures, they are a lot of niches and places for people with different skills. However few people who have those skills also have the talent to work with screenwriters and with actors that is required of a director. Occasionally you will find people with that mindset/skillset that do become film directors. Spike Jonze and Michel Gondry come to mind. Both of whom come from music videos. Are you aware of the Director's Series DVDs of their work. Cool stuff.

They have been other directors who have come from the visual arts who were terrible film directors. Cindy Sherman whose photos are in museums worldwide, made one of the worst movies I've ever seen. She claimed she learned what not to do when making movies when she watched her artist friend Robert Longo make Johnny Mnemonic.

My favorite filmmaker Akira Kurosawa, started out as a painter and used to storyboard his films by doing watercolors of the scenes. He also had a deep education in literature and read works from the high culture of Shakespeare, Dostoevsky and Gorky to the low culture of Daschiel Hammett and Ed McBain.

Also regarding The Matrix, the Wachowski Brothers already showed their directing chops in Bound, that has virtually no special effects though blood splashing into white paint does look very cool.

no doubt. look @ this site.

http://www.avenuez.com/play_video.php?video=AmountBoyz.mp4

tons of videos for inspiration. they focus more on the cenimitography than visual effects....

it looks low budget lol....like something I can do....looks like it was done with a camcorder & VV

Even if you or I had those same tools we don't have the 100s of year of experience that is bought to bear on those sorts of productions. At the same time today a recent client rang me to thank me, my very simple demo reel of his 'performance' has got him 4 paying jobs and he's more than made back what he payed for my talents.
This was really simple stuff, locked down camera, clean audio and a decent mix if I say so myself. None of it rocket science stuff, apart from CC and a few pans and crops NO FXs (well apart from the audio). He's shown it to 4 agents so far and every one of them was blown away by it, we shot it in 3 hours, they all reckoned it should have taken two days.
So what am I saying here, ignore what can be done with $5M worth of kit and 1000s of hours of post and CGI, there's good demand for people who can shoot simple in focus, well lit video with good audio. Buy yourself a bit of good audio kit like I've done and even shooting with my lowly D8 camera I can get excellent results. You know why, well shot low def video with hi def audio beats the pants off hi def video with low def audio and it is a lot cheaper to boot.
Look at it another way, unlike us, not many people actually watch every pixel of video, even if the image gets a bit ugly they can look away. It's harder to block out horrid audio.

End of my rant for today!
Bob.

. . . a really great thread, here. I, too, have a long way to go, much more to know. But, I agree with the replies here about maximizing results with whatever tools/expertise you have at the moment.
I particularly like doing multi-cam shoots. Usually, I have to make do with volunteers to run the other two cams, and that can be quite challenging. Even so, it amazes me how much more appealing my videos of musicals, etc are as compared with the results of some of the more "professional" videographers in the area who take their XL1's or PD150's to shoot a musical producton without any prior knowledge of the show, no feel for the flow, and they come back with this flat, "one-dimensional" look that misses those special dramatic highlights, interplay between characters, etc.

My equipment isn't as fancy, and, often, my "assistants" lose interest at the most inopportune times, but, my strength as a mucician is that I know the shows, can anticipate from knowing the music, who is going to come from where, how long they will hold the center of attention, etc. My videos of music production make sense, capture the essence of story telling, and so, are more enjoyable to the casual viewer (amongst whom is the person paying the bill).

Add some nice titles at the beginning and detailed scrolling credits at the end, and my clients seem to be blown away.

While, like learnimator (great name - think I'll change my handle to earnimator, LOL), I am amazed at what must go into some of the busy, animated, FX pieces I see at the movies or on TV, I am also amazed at how little knowledge and equipment it takes to really get results that blow away the average person who probably has neither the interest, time, or basic video/computer skills to work with this stuff.

Be in awe of those who have better skills, equipment, more experience, etc than you, aspire to those elements of their work that strike you as useful creative tools, but, don't be so quick to put your own strengths down.

And, I totally agree with farss regarding audio. I'm in the process of shopping for a new cam. The first feature I check out is the cams audio features. Can I control gain manually Some cams give you a manual control to increase/decrease audio gain, but, no way to turn off the auto-gain control, so, even though you've set a level that accommodates the loudest passage in a piece, the cam will automatically increase gain in silent/quiet passages, then, be so far "open" that it gets surprised by a sudden loud burst of sound, then, overcompensates in shutting down the gain . . . net result is a ruined passage. I gotta thing this sort of design is some sort of oversight by the mfr's, not just a cost cutting measure. They would never offer manual focus settings that allowed the autofocus to jump in and override the user's manual settings, why so with the audio???

Oh, well, I've ranted long enough now. But, I must say, one of the reasons I find this forum so valuable is that questions just like this one, posed by one who professes to be a "beginner" tend to elicit helpful responses from everyone here, from beginner to super-pro.

I find it most instructive and very enjoyable.

Thanks to all.

Caruso

>You seem to be a particularly visually oriented person. I say that because you put that designer as at the motion picture level. However there are a lot of great motion picture makers who could not do that level of work. That is because they are gifted as storytellers and focus on the dramatic.

I like Buster's posts. He always makes me think.

I guess I would almost always choose the story as the most important thing that makes a film work. I'd define that as a blend of the script (most important) and the acting (which occasionally can make a bad script ok). The visual part is a whole other depth. It can improve an ok quality movie but can't save crap. Really bad film work can mess up a good story. Sometimes a movie with a bad story but great cinematography will get a limited audience. On the rare occasions a good story, good acting, and good cinematography all come together -- the watcher comes out of the theater in an altered state.

I wish it happened more often.


======
[Edit - Just checking for Caruso]
changed "excellent cinematograpy"
to
great cinematography

PS: I hope Sony fixes this board so that one can edit messages that have been posted. That feature isn't working!!

BTW, I didn't mean to put down XL1 or PD150 (or you name it better cam) owners. My point is that the cam doesn't make the piece. With regard to most stage pieces (or athletic events, or you name it), three decent cams will, IMHO, will result in a better end result than a single perspective from any cam, no matter how magnificent the equipment.

Both the cams mentioned are on my short list of consideration for a new cam, although, having looked at the Canon, I'm thinking that it is really big and heavy, probably too much for me. The PD150 has been updated to the PD170 - I'm looking at both, and the GL2 seems to be a really nice piece - good feel, not to large/heavy, etc.

I'm still looking - getting the right cam is more important to me than getting the least or most expensive one.

I don't (can't) invest often, so I have to do my best to get it right the first time around.

Thanks again, L, for a great question and to all for a great thread.

Caruso