Asking for feedback on video

Jephyr wrote on 4/12/2011, 3:45 PM

Hi,

Long time user of the old Sony ScreenBlast. Just moved up to Vegas Pro 10 and am loving it.

I just finished a 4:24 minute video as part of a contest to promote the school I'm going to. It's too late to make changes to the video but I'd be interested in feedback on things I can do better in the future.

I had very limited time to put this together so I'm a bit afraid to ask for crtiques : O but I'm willing to learn from this experience: timings, transitions, effects etc.

It was all done in Vegas using Acid for the music track while the voice over was done directly in Vegas.

Thanks in advance!!

Jephyr

Comments

musicvid10 wrote on 4/12/2011, 4:53 PM

Some takeaway thoughts:

-- Don't put down your early work in the beginning of your narrative. It's a put-off.
-- Take the apostrophe out of "Photo's". It's a plural, not possessive.
-- "Color Theory" slides go by too fast to be appreciated.
-- Displaying vertical aspect art in a horizontal space is always a problem. Instead of staging everything dead center, divide your screen into a 3x2 grid, and try a blackbox approach, where you bring up the lights on a piece in one sector, then move to central focus, then fadeout and fadein to another, etc. Consider the screen aspect as a stage, and use all of it!
-- In the same sense as above, the slow pan and zoom became a bit "same" after a while, use some more variation, with a bit more track motion and / or compositing, maybe even complementary backgrounds.
-- The narrative seems to waver a bit between a testimonial and an advertisement, which are not necessarily the same thing. Settle on a core idea (I like the self-referral the best), then expand on it. Overall temperament is a bit understated. Some excitement sells (but don't make it a used car ad).
-- Closing with a campus shot and overlaying the credits will tie it all together.

On a technical note, you will actually get better vertical resolution back from Youtube if you upload 720p than 1080i. It's a shame about the splotchiness in the crossfades, but there is nothing on our end as uploaders we can do about that (except don't use fades).
You may benefit from some of the tech notes on this page:
http://www.jazzythedog.com/testing/DNxHD/HD-Guide.aspx

Your artwork is terrific, and we will enjoy seeing more of it on the forums. Best of luck!

Laurence wrote on 4/12/2011, 9:16 PM

I always like seeing young guys coming up who still have a bunch of stuff they need to learn from some of us, yet show potential of going way beyond us once they pick our brains. I particularly like your boxing artwork.

NickHope wrote on 4/12/2011, 11:28 PM

First of all your artwork is really great and you have a very good voice for voiceover too. The audio was very clear.

Some of the titles came and went too fast. Too fast to really read/absorb them. Perhaps bring them in and out at the same time as the image. The title style was effective but a little dull. Maybe spruce up the colour/font and add some movement to those.

Also the slow zoom in/zoom out and dissolves got a bit monotonous. It just needs mixing up a bit more, but not too much. Apart from what musicvid suggests, you could try creating a procession of images whereby they enter screen from the right and exit to the left, butted together. Or panning across some of your artwork with the whole frame totally filled by it.

Jephyr wrote on 4/15/2011, 11:03 AM

Thank you for the replies! Wish I had all of your eyes on timing, typos etc BEFORE I had to submit it!! : ) The school may repost this on the ART Dept. site so I may recut it and will keep all your helpful suggestions in mind.

musicvid: Thank you VERY much for a detailed response! I will definitely think about the "stage" for future vids. I discovered the "smooth" zoom towards the end of making the vid and "fell in love with it" so much I went back and changed all the zooms to it right before I uploaded the video. Now since you and Nick pointed it out I see that wasn't necessarily a good thing. : )

Thanks for the resolution tip. I spent quite a bit of time trying to get the audio right and will give that a try on future uploads to see if it smooths out those fades. I appreciate the link too and will no doubt spend a lot of time on the tech notes page.

Thanks for your kind words and encouragement about my artwork too!

A word about talking about my earlier work as amateurish: I’ve had people comment that they could never do what I’m doing and wish they’d been drawing/painting etc all their lives like I have. I even had an instructor say in a class recently for other students not to compare their artwork to mine since I’d been an artist my entire life. : )

So I thought it was important to say to anyone viewing the video that a few short years ago I started out as a beginner too and really applied myself to get where I am…so they can too!

Thanks again for all you feedback...it is very appreciated!!

Jephyr wrote on 4/15/2011, 11:05 AM

Thank you Lawrence! I really appreciate finding such a good response and helpful forum!! Glad you liked the boxing pieces...I enjoyed making them!!

Jephyr wrote on 4/15/2011, 11:10 AM

Hi Nick,

Thank you...I appreciate both the positive feedback and the suggestions.

I've been watching TV and noticed that it's cut very fast 2 to 3 second cuts!! But I agree that the text goes by too fast. As I said to muscivid...if I recut this I'll stretch those out to match the images as you suggest and jazz up the titles and text in general.

I really appreciate your suggestions about the transitions and panning etc. I really see what you and muscivid mean!! : )

Thanks again to each of you...I'll repost this if I recut it and will post other video as I finish them as well!

Thanks!

Jephyr wrote on 4/28/2011, 12:07 PM

Hi,

I noticed today that I'm still getting a view or two on this from here...but went lloking for it and it was quite a few pages back.

So I'll give it a bump.

Any additional comments are welcome!!

Woodenmike wrote on 4/28/2011, 5:51 PM

I thought you did an excellent job with this! I'm an old dog learning new tricks and think that the input you've already gotten from this forum to be positive and constructive...MusicVids comment about vertical orientation and making the space a stage was spot on. I received the exact same criticism on photographs i used in a documentary I did a couple of years ago and making that change really improved the look of the final product.. I have one audio criticism and that is the amount of simbilance present in the narration...I felt it could have been tuned out a bit. You do have an excellent VO voice...I wish some of the folks putting up tutorials had voices as clear and concise as yours! I felt the pacing in your presentation was very good also. Good job overall!

DGates wrote on 4/28/2011, 6:55 PM

Overall, it looks pretty good. A tad over-produced for my tastes, but you get your point across well. Also, your voice is good and that's always a plus.

Next time, strive for simplicity and don't worry about how many ways you can throw text around or transition from image to image. That doesn't mean to make it boring, just more streamlined.

Jephyr wrote on 5/9/2011, 6:00 PM

Thank you very much Woodenmike!

I may recut this for the school...they want to embed it on both the main site and the art department page...if so I will definitely use more of the "stage" as you and MusicVids have pointed out.

After reading your post...I also did some thinking avbout my audio. I had been doing most of my audio in Cubase VST 32/5 on another PC. It crashed and in a mad dash I moved everything to this PC and did the audio in Vegas.

I forgot to connect/use a fantastic Aerco mic pre-amp that I'd always used in the chain before. That would've really added to the overall quality of the sound. Plus since reading your comment about the sibilance I did some surfing and found some excellent articles on EQing for male VO. I will also look into something like SpitFish (I think that's the one) to help knock some of that sibilance back.

Anywho...thanks for taking a look and for boh the positive comments and criticisms...which will help me improve!

:thumbs-up:

Jephyr wrote on 5/9/2011, 6:06 PM

Thank you DGates!

Pro 10 is new to me and I have to admit I had maybe a bit too much fun with the pan/crop keyframe abiltity of it!

As I said above...thanks for taking a look and for both your positive comments and constructive criticism!

farss wrote on 5/9/2011, 6:47 PM

Just a quick tip about your sibilence problem from my audio guru.
Mic placement and direction is probably the key. Although you can tame the problem in post better to get it right to start with. Once you've found the right place for the mic turning it off axis a bit will reduce the high frequency pickup, especially the sibilance. You can then add a little HF shelf to bring in some air.
When turning the mic off axis it's important to keep the mic element in the same place, only change the direction not the location.

Bob.

Jephyr wrote on 5/17/2011, 10:11 PM

Hi Bob...thanks so much! Yes I had a LOT of trouble finding the "sweet" spot on my mic. I'll try the pre-amp in the chain as mentioned above and then see how much off axis I can move per your suggestions...plus add in a bit in the HF shelf.

I appreciate the good advice!

Jephyr