1st exercises drops! vidding pechakuchas

[lola]

Hello all! Today's the day we kick off our first exercise. This exercise is designed to be reasonably accessible to all... if you're new to editing, then it's a doable way in, and if you already know your way around editing software, then it's addictively fun to make these pechakuchas and surprising how well they turn out! 

Here's the description: 

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!]

Then, when you're done, come back here to this post, and post a link in the comments to your completed exercise(s) when they're finished! 

[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 videographic pechakucha’s here: http://videographicessay.org/works/videographic-essay/videographic-pechakuchas?path=videographic-exercises and a more vidlike one Lola made here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ls9x7shBjDY.]

For all of these exercises, the rules are hard and fast, unless you don't want them to be :D Some people work best with really specific restrictions, others work best as rule breakers <3

So edit, share, question, mess around, and experiment! Have fun!

Stay tuned for posts & discussions on various video-editing softwares & on choosing your source.

Comments

[caramarie]

That certainly is a contrast! It's cool how different they are. Jump Around is really fun, but I like the tone of the Sound of Silence one a lot too.

[caramarie]

I vidded Ateez for this exercise – both versions are here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23251462

I found the restraints quite relaxing!

[lola]

So I made another pikachu set... still really feeling my way around the BTS footage and what it means to vid music videos. I think I like the first one quite a bit... or at least the visual/song match, I sort of want to make the whole video! Not so sure about the second one....

v1: Only the Good
v2: Hello Earth

Both on a03

[lola]

These are both mesmerizing! And I love that you're working with kpop MVs too! Glad I'm not the only one :)

[lola]

Yay!! You joined us!! And you're vidding Guardian! And oh my Shen Wei feels!!

[bonibaru]

Relaxing is a good term - I found it ironically freeing to have a set of guidelines to work within.

[caramarie]

Thanks! Kpop vidding is a lot of fun :D And nice to have things in small units to work with too!

[goodbyebird]

The first one made me go "awwwww", and the second put a big smile on my face before also making me go "awwwwww" :DD

[extrapenguin]

I'm glad it worked even for someone not in the fandom! Thank you for the handholding and encouragement. :3

(In case you're interested: Guardian is a Earth-set science fiction procedural that turns into world-saving. The guy with the glasses/briefcase is an alien. It's also a bromance due to censorship, but the bromance paint is very tenuous. It's available for full on YouTube via Youku, the production company.)

[brokenmnemonic]

I'm a huge fan of Ever After, for various reasons - and it was handily available on my PC, because it's one of the sources used for the group vidding workshop at the moment ;)

A part of me wants to go back and tweak all of the clips to make the visual and audio beats align more closely, but I was surprised at how many kind of line up already. I'm not sure I've ever made a Sparkle Motion dance party vid, though - what are the requirements? I'm kind of intrigued by the idea of getting to pelt the prince with more apples...

[bonibaru]

The requirements are: you can dance to it :D

[brokenmnemonic]

Ever After is very dear to my heart :) It is a Cinderella remake, you're right - Angelica Houston does a marvellous job as the evil stepmother. Drew Barrymore makes a great Cinderella, and gets to injure someone with a knife, pelt the Dauphin with apples, make friends with Leonardo da Vinci and basically go around throwing gender roles out of the window. I think it's delightful :)

I was surprised at just how sombre the Sound of Silence as, when I was putting the pechakucha together - I remembered it as being a very still song, but I wasn't expecting it to feel as melancholy as it did.

I think Jump Around is closer to how I feel about the film than Sound of Silence, but it was more fun than I expected to do this exercise :) It did make my brain itch a bit, because I kept wanting to tweak things to make the beats fall closer together...

Thank you for the lovely comment! :)

[brokenmnemonic]

You've got me wondering now if I've ever made anything that might qualify, that I could use as an example to work from. Would something like this be suitable for dancing to? (I really, really have never danced, and when I worked events it was in the headbanger section, so I have very little sense of judgement on these things.)

[brokenmnemonic]

After I'd put the first together and was working on rendering the second, my first thought was "this could be terrible", but I'm surprised at how the kind of ... work? It makes me a bit wary of going for such random songs again, though - can you imagine trying to make this with an 80s thrash metal track, and the theme tune to the Howard the Duck movie? :)

This has definitely made me think I should try and vid Jump Around to something though...

[brokenmnemonic]

Drew Barrymore should get to play with swords and punch princes more often, y/y? :)

[bonibaru]

Yes, this 100% qualifies as a dance party vid if I was putting one together!

Fanworks has their 2019 show programming online & streaming for free right now, so if you want to see what other people have done, you only need to create a free membership. There's an example here too by Sparkle Motion https://fanworkscon.com/events/

This is one I did for a recent con https://archiveofourown.org/works/22841431

[naye]

Thank you so much for setting all of this up! It was SUPER helpful as a way to get started. ♥

[sarashina_nikki]

This was fun! Two Nirvana in Fire vids, starring Mei Changsu and his twenty caravans of baggage.

Version 1 - World on Fire by Sarah McLachlan
Version 2 - My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark (Light Em Up) by Fall Out Boy

Choosing clips that would work for both songs at the exact same moment was really interesting! Letting each clip play for 6 whole seconds made me want to scream lol. I think I'm too used to fast cuts.

[bonibaru]

Letting each clip play for 6 whole seconds made me want to scream

Me too! It made me start looking for scenes with enough internal cuts that I could tweak on either side to make myself feel better lol

These are great!!

[sarashina_nikki]

Thank you! I'm glad you liked it. It makes me want to do full versions of both songs, without the 6-second rule. I wonder how close I could keep the vid itself between the two versions, even with clips adhering more closely to the beat...

[bonibaru]

I, too, am having these thoughts. These vidlets are addictive.

[seekingferret]

Two Pikachus on the first episode of Grey's, since I am trying to figure out how to vid the whole damn 16 seasons and this seems like a nice way to dip my toes in gently. I was trying for a pretty sharp contrast in the music, but I think I only got half there- the two vidlets feel very different in mood, but not in message.

Song to the Moon from Rusalka by Dvorak, performed by Joshua Bell

Make Them Gold by CHVRCHES

[jinkyo]

Very nice!
The footage is so visually striking and strong and works with such a striking and strong song like Hello Earth - that all looked and sounded beautiful together.

[sholio]

This was fun and also SO challenging! :D I decided to do a Nakia/T'Challa vid since I already have all of Black Panther imported into Final Cut and there are a relatively limited number of scenes featuring both of them, so I wouldn't have too many clips to choose from, but STILL. omg. I did cheat a little and let the last clip play out for an extra second or two so I could fit all of the Survivor chorus without losing the first few words of the lyrics.

Version 1: High On You (Survivor)

Version 2: Amacala (Siphokazi)

[lola]

Thank you!! I knew that the lyrics of Hello Earth didn't really match in a precise way at all, and yet somehow I felt it would fit feel wise. I'm glad you liked the combo!! <3