The mission: shoot and edit together a video documenting an event in one day to present the video to the client the next day for Day 2 of the event.
The setting: Hotel opening day celebration with their associates.
The equipment: Canon 5D Mark II, 50mm f/1.2L, 35mm f/1.2L, 135mm f/2.0L, Induro carbon monopod
The inspiration for this self assigned project: The Bui Brothers’ Same Day Edit Fusion Wedding Video
…and here we go!
When I say this was a project, this was a self-assigned project for me to improve my video shooting and editing skills. It’s the oldest Catch-22 in photography or almost any other discipline: “No Work Without Experience, No Experience Without Work.” While in some careers it might be hard to get experience as a rocket scientist on your own, for the budding photographer or videographer you can work on your own self-assignments and treat them as learning experiences. This was exactly my goal for the video I made. As someone with a keen interest in expanding into video I know I need more experience before I will even allow myself to take on an assignment where a client is depending on outstanding results that I know I must deliver on. Enter the self assignment and my goal of shooting a video and editing in a few hours to simulate the time limit of a wedding reception.
The hotel opening would be the ideal situation for this since it was much like an actual wedding with lots of people, a structured timeline of events, and general unplanned chaos of the day to keep me on my toes! Before the big day even happened I visualized how I expected the day to unfold and started piecing together the video, in my mind at least, so that I knew where I wanted to be and what I wanted to shoot when the day arrived. This was a key component to the success of the shoot – knowing what footage I wanted to grab and really having a plan for the day.
The day started and I started shooting. I brought three lenses, but kept going back to the 50mm and 35mm for video. Since this was more of an active walking shoot I didn’t have time to set up a tripod in the middle of a reception and using the 135mm introduced too much shake to the footage. Hand-holding the wider lenses or throwing them on a monopod allowed for the greatest flexibility. Imagining this event as a mock-wedding I wouldn’t be able to use a full tripod there either, so I wanted to keep working within my future limitations. Having shot a fair amount of video so far, I have continued to work on my handheld technique and keeping the camera level.
I am really interested in getting one of the Zacuto DSLR rigs like the Zacuto Target Shooter or Zacuto Striker which will give you a little bit more stabilization, but for those of us just getting into the game don’t worry too much about these. While they are nice to have and might be essential if you are getting paid for the footage, with a little practice holding the 7D or 5D you can get some pretty fluid shots. There is that key point again, practice makes perfect, and why doing a self assignment like this project is so valuable. It’s not always about the gear and with a little practice or using gear you already have like a monopod, you can still get some pretty nice video from a HD DSLR.
Another tip taken from the Bui Brothers that I put to use during this shoot was to ruthlessly edit in camera at the end. Instead of hoping to edit out the good parts later in post-production, I deleted a lot of footage right there in the camera if I saw the shot was going bad. This would greatly speed up the editing process later as I wouldn’t have to worry about going through as many clips to put together the final video. Now I say this but I also shoot with the edit in mind for each clip. Shooting with the 5D Mark II for example, I know that pressing that darn Record Stop button on the back will cause the camera to shake a bit, so I deliberately add a few extra seconds to clips knowing that will happen. That’s shoowing with the edit in mind, knowing that I will have to chop off the first seconds and the last seconds to make a fluid, stable video.
Now we’ve had an exhausting day of running around shooting video, what to do next? Fire up your video editor of choice and get to putting these clips together! Personally I use Adobe Premiere Pro which came as part of the Adobe Creative Suite but the basic editing tips will be the same. All told, the edit took only 2 hours at the computer, not bad for a first try at this same-day edit and I know I could speed up the process with a little more practice. My previous videos sat in “edit land” for a day or two.
My first step is to cull my clips down into the best of the best, the ones I actually want to use in the video, much like with your photos after a big shoot to pick the winners. I browse to the video directory after the files are copied off the CF card and take a quick look at each clip – importing the winners that have a chance of making it into the final video in some form or another. This process also slowly shapes the video if I have a really strong clip I need to work in, this will possibly affect the order of the other clips in order to draw attention to it.
Next, I need some more structure to the video and that part comes in the form of the background music. I grabbed a nice Creative Commons-licensed track from CCMixter that I felt fit the mood and laid the music down as the baseline. Why is this so important? I want the music to really flow with the videos and I feel this is one of the most important parts of a great video. Having a scene POP right when the music hits a crescendo is a really powerful effect, so I really want that background music down first to give me something to work off of.
Knowing the music tempo, I start playing around with my favorite clips and cropping them slightly here and there to fit the beat of the music and to work in with the overall length of the song itself. I don’t know if their is really much technique to this other than to keep thinking in your mind of what story you want to tell, and how does this particular clip contribute to that? This is another part of the editing process where photographers have an advantage and can use their experience editing a collection of photos to good use. Much like we edit out similar photos of the same subject, make sure each clip is unique and interesting and really worth the viewer’s time. Part technique, part trial-and-error, eventually the clips come together to form a whole.
Now that I have all of my clips where I want them to be, I start putting those finishing touches on the video. Does a transition work here? Would a transition ADD to the video or be a distraction? I admit that I fell into that same trap at first too… ooooo star wipe! Let’s checkerboard into every scene! Then think back to your favorite music video or movie, how often do you really see a transition? Hardly ever. Now for photo slideshows a transition may be the only thing that actually “moves” so in that case it can add to the presentation, but for an actual movie with clips try to keep your transitions to a minimum. To reiterate, think back to your favorite movies/videos and watch for the transitions, you won’t find many.
Two hours later and my video was born to the world! Final clean up also included a few watches of the video from start to finish to see if things really worked as a whole, to get a top-level view. Am I still telling the story I wanted to tell? Is the viewer engaged from start to finish? Ask yourself these questions as you watch and be your own worst critic – before someone else does!
Atlanta Airport Marriott Gateway – Associate Culture Day 2010 from Zac & Betty FengLong Photography on Vimeo.
Thanks for reading along with me as I made my journey to my first same day turnaround for a video. I uploaded the video to Vimeo the same night and we were watching the clips the next day for Part 2 of the Hotel Opening Orientation. While not my best work I was satisfied that it only took me 2 hours to work on. Sure, many parts could be improved and I really want to put together a slightly longer version – but for now, I am pleased with the results!
