Editing Blog

Last class and the class before that, my partner and I edited our music video. First, we used an SD card reader and plugged it into the computer. We then dumped all of our footage onto the computer. I made sure to also put the footage on Google Drive just in case something happened. After that, we tried to open Pinnacle Studios. We waited for it to load, and it wasn't responding. This had happened before, and last time we had to restart the computer. We tried that, and Pinnacle studios still didn't respond. Because of this, we decided to get another computer. We started it and tried to open Pinnacle Studios again.

Thankfully, it worked on this computer. The only problem was that because it was a different computer, the footage we dumped on the desktop wasn't there. In this scenario, I was very glad that I had decided to upload the footage onto Google Drive. Because of this, we were able to move the footage back onto the desktop. We also were able to get our song (the audio) ready to put into Pinnacle Studios. Unfortunately, by this time it was time to switch classes so we had to stop editing for now. We came back the next class and had to repeat the same footage transferring process because we used a different computer. Once that was done, we were able to import our footage and audio into Pinnacle studios. We had to go through all of our takes and find the right ones we wanted to use because each scene had multiple takes. We referred to our storyboard and began putting the clips in order.

After we put all the clips in order, we put in the audio. We had to trim it because our videos had to be 1:05-1:15 minutes long instead of the full song. With the full clips of all of our footage, we had more footage then audio amount. Because of this, we had to trim a few scenes. This was fine because we were planning on trimming things anyways. After we trimmed all of our footage, it was time for things like effects and transitions. Our music video had a lot of POV shots so we used the fade in or fade out transition in between those scenes. This was to simulate blinking, or flashing through memories. We also decided to fade the audio out at the end of the video. Overall, I am very content with how the video turned out as well as the editing process.

Music Video Filming Blog Part 2

Over our thanksgiving break, my partner and I got to film the remainder of our music video. I went to my partner's house in the evening. When i got there, she had already kindly set up everything we needed. I brought with me my different costumes (clothes and shoes), SD card, and storyboards. I changed into a dress, and we started filming. The first scene we filmed was a scene of me eating a fancy dinner. This scene took about three takes to film. This is because we were experimenting and trying to make the scene look as natural as possible. We tried different lengths of time and movement because we didn't want it to look awkward. I ended up looking down at my plate until the camera panned towards me. I then looked up and smiled.

After we finished filming the first scene we needed, it was on to the second. I was still in the same costume for now, and we had to go outside. This was a scene of me opening the door to go into the dining room. In the music video, it will come before the actual dining scene. This scene took about five takes to get right. This was because I had to make it look like I was pulling the camera or person who's perspective it's from into the dining room. We also had to experiment with timing and movements to make it not look awkward. Just after we finished filming that scene, the camera died. We went inside to plug it in for a little while and once the camera turned on we had to check if that scene had saved. It did and we were relieved and able to move on.

We were now ready to film the final scene. Before this happened, there was some preparation that needed to be done. First, I had to change into another costume which consisted of sweatpants, a large t-shirt, and a messy bun. After this, we had to microwave the meal we were using and pour a glass of water to put on the table. We were now ready to film and were able to plug the camera in while filming. My partner had to sit on the couch because it was a POV. In this scene, I had to turn on the TV and start to eat the microwaveable meal. This scene took three tries to get how we wanted it. This was simply because of accidents occurring while filming. In one take I dropped the napkin and a noodle fell off of the fork as I was trying to eat the food. Overall, the filming process went very well and took about an hour for these three scenes.