New Abilities Within YouTube

Not enough for our class projects yet, but something to keep an eye on.

Still Images and Premiere Pro

There is a lot of good info for this here from Adobe.

In this case, our video images are 640 x 480 pixels. How do I know?

I select a video clip on the timeline, and go to File> Get Properties For > Selection (or hit shift-command-H) and see my Properties.

So, if I'm making slides in Photoshop, or resizing them, I know the exact pixel dimensions to use.

Jump Cuts

There are two ways to end up with jump cuts in your edit.

1) Edit together two clips that are too similar.
2) Edit a portion out of a clip so that there is a jump.

Jump cuts are fine if you are making a video for Tool, but can be very distracting when you are trying to construct a smooth narrative.

So, one of the main reasons you need B-roll is to cover up your jump cuts. They also offer extra information and add dimension to your story. Not to mention earn you a better grade in this class.

In our example, we have cut at the beginning of the "um". We now cut at the end of the "um", too. If you hold down the shift key when you hit command-K, it will cut through the both the audio and the video clips, which is what you want.

If you hold down the control key and click on the little sliver of an edit we have made, you will see a menu.

Choose "Ripple Delete" and the program will take out the piece of your clip you have selected, and move the other pieces over to fill in the gap. Otherwise, you would have a moment of blackness and silence in that spot.

Now you have a jump cut. Let's grab some b-roll to cover it up.

Before we add anything, I like to use the page-up and page-down commands to line up where my b-roll should add. Otherwise, it's easy to accidentally have one or two frames in the wrong place.

I want to use my close-up of hands knitting as my b-roll, so I bring it up in my preview window. 

We want the video, but not the audio, so we can grab just the video off of the preview window. 

Drag it down to the timeline, and away we go. 

Now I can add more b-roll, and photos, and I'm on the way to being practically finished with my project. 

The Razor Tool

Now, I'm just going to start by saying that I know that the whole A-roll and B-roll thing is kind of old-fashioned. Single-track editing is faster, and, supposedly, makes more sense, but A-roll and B-roll is how I learned it, so that's sort of how I think.

And, actually, the way I edit is a sort of hybrid of the two methods. The beginning of my careful edit starts by listening carefully to the sound on my timeline.

My interview subject is a good speaker, but like most people, she does say "um" every once in a while. One of those times starts at just about 3 seconds into the piece.

Now, I can find the beginning and end of the "um" by moving my little cursor over the timeline track slowly and listening for it. But I can also look for it. To do that, I have to expand the audio track out so that I can see the waveform of her speaking. I do that by clicking the little right-facing arrow next to "Audio 4" in my timeline.

Now, I can actually look for the waveform (also I zoom in using the slider with the little mountains on it), and place my cursor exactly where her "um" begins. Then I select the razor tool at the top of my window. 

My mouse's cursor takes on the shape of the razor tool, and I then click on the timeline's video or audio to cut it. This is what it looks like after I have cut in the position of my cursor. 

Note: You can also just place your cursor wherever you want to cut and hit "command - k" on your keyboard. 

Preview, Review and the Timeline

File DSCN0515 has my interview, so I drag and drop the filename into the preview panel from the bin. Now, the preview window looks like this:

I use the play/pause button to play the clip for myself.

I don't want to use the entire clip, so I let it play to where I want it to start in my video, and hit "i", for in. My preview window now looks like this:

I play the clip to where I want it to end in my final video, and hit "o", for out. My preview window now looks like this:

I then drag the image of the video from the preview pane to the timeline, below. The timeline now looks like this:

I can zoom in on the timeline by sliding the slider with the mountains on it to the right.

The timeline itself has a little red line above it because the video has not yet rendered. It isn't a big problem, but if your playback looks choppy or the audio and video don't seem to be lining up, always check to see if your video has been rendered. You can use Sequence > Render Entire Work Area, if this is bothering you, but I tend to wait until the end or until it bothers me.

Oh yeah. Now is when I save. I like to save whenever I've added a clip to the timeline. It keeps me from having to do too much over again if the system crashes and I lose my changes.

Next Post: The Razor Tool, jump cuts and why you REALLY need b-roll.

How To Convert Movie Files Using VLC

There is a good description here. If you have trouble, just bring your source files to the video classes and we will go from there.

Lynda.com

Here is some info on Lynda.com:

Lynda.com Training
(on campus - ip address required)

About Lynda.com

• IT Services has joined our friends at IU as part of the Lynda.com contract.
• Lynda is an online training resource with video training ranging from Operating Systems to Adobe Photoshop.
• No authentication is needed other than an on campus ip address. (This ip-based authentication will work so long as Lynda.com servers see your request as coming from IPFW.)
• This training is available for all faculty, staff, and students.

Use http://www.its.ipfw.edu/lynda to go to Lynda.com

--

This is a great resource and you should take advantage of it. Lyndacom is a great way to learn new software or learn more about software you already know.

Adobe Premiere Pro CS4

Adobe has a great, basic workflow on their website.

Some PhotoShop Shortcuts

Curves: ctrl - M
Levels: ctrl - L
Save: ctrl - S
Save As (rename): shift-ctrl-S
File Information: alt-shift-ctrl-I

Adobe Software

Information about buying Adobe software at IPFW is here.

Either of the premium packages would be good for this class. What you're really after is Photoshop. Photoshop Elements is not the same thing as Photoshop Extended. Elements is a stripped-down version of the software. Lightroom is a great tool to make organizing your photographs easier.

Batch Renaming

Some workflows allow your computer to do all of your renaming for you, when you import. Others force you to do it yourself, manually. While I don't agree with everything Pete Bauer says in this story, I like that he has a clear description of how to batch rename files in PhotoShop.

If you can't, or don't want to, use PhotoShop, I've also used Photo Mechanic. It's available for both PC and Mac systems. It's a little expensive ($150), but it can simplify things, and there is a demo version you can use for 20 days.

I haven't used Aperture, which is made by Apple, but I've heard good things about it. You can get a fully-featured trial version for 30 days. The academic version costs $180. It is more powerful than Photo Mechanic, but it still doesn't (I hear) work as a complete replacement for PhotoShop.