Vexercise 1 Drops! (2021 Edition)

[lola]

Hi all!!! Here we go, the first vexercise of the 2021 edition! We're so excited to play in this sandbox again, and hope you are all as well!

For this first vexercise, we decided to keep it simple and stay with the original version of the vexercise. We've found that this vidding pechakucha variation has been a terrific exercises for people new to vidding to learn the ropes of editing, and for old timers to try out new media sources, new ideas, or to embrace the limitations and to see what you can do within them. So many amazing and inspiring videos came out of these vexercises last year. You can see them on this YouTube playlist that bonibaru  put together, plus others that were not posted to YouTube at the Vexercise collection on A03. 

Here are the instructions/guidelines for this first vexercise: 


1) Pechakucha 2 ways

Create a video edit of exactly 60 seconds consisting of precisely 10 video clips from your chosen source text, each lasting precisely 6 seconds, assembled with straight cuts. Make two versions of your pechakucha, with 1 minute excerpts from two different songs as audio. Fade in and out on your audio at the beginning and end of the audio clip.

[Word to the wise: Most six second clips that you use are bound to have in-clip cuts--you don't have to go looking only for clips that have no internal cuts. But you can make those internal cuts work for you rhythmically or thematically etc!]

[This exercise is inspired directly by the first of the videographic criticism exercises, but modified here to be vid/fanedit focused with the inclusion of music from an outside source. You can see some examples of the original videographic pechakucha’s here and a more vidlike one Lola made here. !!And now you can see way more wonderful vidding pikachus on this YouTube Playlist (as well as examples of the other O.G. vexercises at the vexercises collection on a03! 

If you have any questions about this vexercise, either before you start or as you get going, feel free to post them here!

Stay tuned for a post about technology, resources, etc., and a check in next saturday. This vexercise will be "due" in two weeks, so March 27

Comments

[teyla]

Oh lmao I love these song choices for your theme; I could see an entire multifandom Wuxia vid to either. This was really fun! :D

[teyla]

Omg the two versions are so good (esp The Fog; I really love the spooky energy it has), and then the Banana Phone had me in tears. Absolutely genius, thank you so much for that.

[teyla]

Thank you so much! I saw "long clips" and went for the slowest bit of the show, which in retrospect probably meant I made it harder on myself, but otoh the location is so pretty. :3 I'm glad you enjoyed them!

[actiaslunaris]

These are very cool. I feel like I just wandered into a museum, that was showing a multimedia abstract presentation. I like the kaleidoscopic colors and the music was very immersive.

[lola]

aaahhh!!! how are these so perfect! the lyric matches for defying gravity were So Perfect in every case, and I loved the shift in mood with Don't Stop Me Now. What an opening gambit as the first 20201 vexercise posted :D :D :D

[avawatson]

Thank you! I also had a lot of fun with that paperman. XD

[avawatson]

Ahh thank you so much!!

[scytale]

Oh, thank you! <3

I'm also so glad you enjoyed Banana Phone! :D I had a lot of fun making it; it was very nice to not have to worry about being serious.

[seasaltmemories_14]

Thank you!! Kyousougiga takes a lot of inspiration from Lewis Carroll works as a whole, less picking specific iconography, but going for an off-kilter daydream-like feeling, so there is a lot of fun imagery to play around with, this exercise got me thinking more abstract as well

[lithiumdoll]

Another last-minute (ish) participant - this was fun! And so much harder than anticipated. But fun!

https://archiveofourown.org/works/30103782

[extrapenguin]

Okay, so this vexercise is always the one where I do the vid to a music, pick another music, and then get stuck in an infinite loop slapping other music on the clips to see what would be the most hilarious result possible. I did spare you from the worst, but I did end up with a pechakucha 4 ways... AO3 link with all 4 embeds. All clips from the 2018 Guardian TV show!

My original idea was "CPR music", since there are exactly two songs that get shared as having the right BPM to do CPR to: Stayin' Alive and Another One Bites the Dust. I wanted to do a bit of an experiment wrt using the same clips for both and seeing if it'd work exactly the same.
Another One Bites the Dust (this one, the music didn't have a 1-minute segment, but rather a 1:01 segment, so I bent the rules a bit and added an 11th clip fading to black to make it look less silly)
Stayin' Alive

Then I went into the weeds of my music library and various nostalgia choices, and eventually settled on Tiktak - Sankaritar ("Heroine"), which fit the contents remarkably well:
Sankaritar (engsub on the video)

And finally, the name of the prior band reminded me of Kesha - TiK ToK, and splatting that on the video made me LOL, so, uh, I decided to subject y'all to that as well:
TiK ToK

[scytale]

I really loved those!

CPR music for the BPM is such a great idea, and I liked how "Another One Bites the Dust" and "Staying Alive" have very opposite subjects. :) I felt like "Another One Bites the Dust" was darker and took you more into the killer's perspective, whereas "Staying Alive" was about, well, trying to stay alive.

"Empty Battlefield" felt the most epic and superhero-ish to me (and it's such a catchy song!).

I actually clicked the Kesha one first, and...I almost spit out my coffee at the first line. After that, I wised up and stopped trying to drink so I could laugh.

[nu_breed]

I had so much fun with my first lot and it was a crappy week so I made another lot. This time I used episode 25 and 26 of The Untamed and made a bamf!WWX pechakucka (including the archery scene that my beta always laughs at me for shamelessly inserting into my vids - because...well... I could. Shameless!)

Again, couldn't choose so I am including all three that I made.

Go | Rattlesnake Smile | Fire Woman

[scytale]

Those are gorgeous and fun! I love the choice of clips, and the archery scene is great. :) It goes well with each of the songs, and it's really illuminating seeing how the different songs change the meanings/emphases within that six seconds.

[scytale]

The two POVs definitely come through! And I noticed myself tracking WWX more in in the first vid and LWJ in the second vid.

"Call Me Maybe" was so light-hearted and fun -- I was grinning all the way through it, and I burst out laughing in sheer delight at 0:45. "I've Got You Under My Skin" had me in a more serious mood, in comparison.

[nu_breed]

Awwww thank you! I'm so thrilled the combos worked! Yeah, I can never resist that archery scene lol - my beta lovingly teases me for it because it's in probably half of my vids so far in some form or other :D

It's so fascinating to play around and see how much the music changes the ways that we view the visuals - I think that's why I find this exercise so addictive!

Re: I am doing WandaVision this year and I honestly hand to god have no idea what constitutes spoile

[lola]

These were so so wonderful. I haven't watched Wandavision, and these firmly have convinced me that I must. So so interesting!! These four together gave me I feel like a really nuanced taste of what this show is about, and now I'm so excited to watch!

Re: Vidding Gravity Falls this year.

[lola]

What wonderful music choices!! And I thought the use of internal movement was so, so good--honestly, I wouldn't have known at all these were just 10 shots because there's so much rhythmic internal movement that just makes it all feel so orchestrated! Also, this has convinced me that I need to return to Gravity Falls and see it through so I can experience the craziness of where I know it does eventually go (I only know vaguely, not specifics...)

[lola]

These were awesome!! All the song choices were fabulous. The Fog is absolutely gorgeous, and Banana Phone hahaha wow it really worked so perfectly. Loved these!!!

[lola]

Wow, this is kind of amazing!! Same edit, different songs, and the POV change between the two was so clear---and they were both so very very much the two characters. That's, yeah, amazing! I loved these :)

Also side note I really liked your opening image explaining the exercise, and then marking the shift from one to the other. That's really clever!

[lola]

Oh wow, Naye, do these ever demonstrate how different music can create a completely different interpretation of the text! I hadn't read what you wrote and so after watching Bad Romance, I somehow thought that it must of been the first one that was showing a sweet version of a darker story--Bad Romance totally had me convinced that those two are dangerous for one another lol :D
This made me very curious about The Yin-Yang Master, also--it looks quite beautifully shot!!

[lola]

aaah these were gorgeous! I don't know the source but these were totally intriguing; they had quite different feels but both really made me want to know more and watch. Yes, long clips are so hard! I thought you used internal movement really well to keep up a sense of tension and flow. The first one felt intimate, the second one edgier (well, Billie :D) but also more epic somehow. I loved these!

[lola]

Okay, first of all, I absolutely must watch Kyousougiga immediately. Not only is it clearly *gorgeous* but I just read a description of the plot and woah. Yeah, that's happening.

Secondly, I loved these! I mean, all vidding is art, but these really felt like *art* (lol and now I see that Actiaslunaris said something similar!) These felt so creative and like wonderful visual rides/experiences.

[lola]

Okay, so I don't know this source at all... so how did I get so invested that by the time I finished watching the second one, there were literal tears in my eyes? :0
So good!!

[lola]

Ahhhh these were all amazing! My favorite I think was Another One Bites the Dust--the rhythmic editing was so tight! (which is crazy in a pechakucha with the timing limits!) But they all worked so well. What's the Sankaritar song by the way? (the link was blocked on YT)