End of Year Vidding Meme '08!
Dec. 24th, 2008 12:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccatoriaSo this is a little premature since it's not the end of the year and I currently have my last ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
thearchive2 vidlet going through redrafting so there's a small chance that may fall on this side of the divide. But I am an impatient person and therefore am going to post this NAO! SO THERE!
So, first a general retrospective. This is the first time I've done one of these because this is the first year where I've really felt like a vidder. I actually made my first vid at the end of '05 and between then and April '08, I made seven more. Which is a respectable number and yes, by the end of that time I'd stopped fighting the label "vidder". I felt it was technically appropriate and obviously I took pride in my vids and tried hard to improve and do interesting things with them. But I routinely went for like, eight months without making a single vid. It wasn't the primary way I engaged with fandom.
In the last eight months, though, I've made five vids and twenty-one (soon to be twenty-two) vidlets. I've engaged in two different collaborative projects, and vidded in more styles and tried to do more things than, like, ever before. And it's been glorious. Insane at times, but glorious. This year has been good to my creativity in that I spent the first half of it unemployed and doing this stuff to keep me from going mad with boredom, and the second half of the year in a bizarrely stressful job in a country where I can't even read signs properly and I do it to keep me from going mad from stress. Usually I respond to stress by shutting down. Apparently, though, I reach a critical point and just completely refuse to acknowledge reality using crazy vidding as a crutch in this regard. GO ME.
So. 2008. The Year Vidding Ate Me. I have no idea if it'll continue. It almost certainly won't at this pace, but I do hope I continue to interact with fandom as an active vidder.
Because I am freakishly monofannish (this year especially), these are all Battlestar Galactica vids.
January
None.
February
None.
March
None.
April
11 - Tomorrow -20: What kind of world? (vidlet; with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cyborganize)
18 - Tomorrow -19: In the Beginning (vidlet; withcyborganize)
26 - Tomorrow -18: Cartography (vidlet; withcyborganize)
May
2 - Tomorrow -17: Atom Smasher (vidlet; withcyborganize)
8 - Tomorrow -16: Era of Communication (vidlet; withcyborganize)
16 - Tomorrow -15: American Engineers (vidlet; withcyborganize
29 - Tomorrow -14: Reckless Driving (vidlet; withcyborganize)
June
5 - Tomorrow -13: These Divorces (vidlet; withcyborganize)
6 - Ghosts (vid)
16 - Tomorrow -12: Television (vidlet; withcyborganize)
26 - Tricks (vid)
July
7 - Tomorrow -11: In the Suburbs (vidlet; withcyborganize)
13 - The Ladies' Choice (vid; withasta77)
22 - there's a war going on for your mind, laura (vid)
August
24 - Scar (vidlet)
September
1 - The Book of Kara (vidlet)
7 - Somebody Told Me... (vidlet)
14 - Manifesto. (vidlet)
20 - Memo: Re: Revolution (vidlet)
29 - Traditional Cylon Lullaby (vidlet)
October
7 - Five Loves Six Found (vidlet)
14 - I Want to be Evil (vidlet)
23 - Saul Tigh: A & B (vidlet)
November
2 - Televangelism (vidlet)
December
12 - Sunday Bloody Sunday: Mambo Remix (vidlet; concept:cyborganize & original: tallulah71)
18 - Dolled-up in Straps (vid)
Ta-da!
Favourite
there's a war going on for your mind, laura. I really feel like I did something interesting with that and succeeded mostly, in bringing to life the vid I had in my head.
Least Favourite
Tomorrow -20 because I can see how rusty I was, and how I was still fumbling to work out how to vid that series and make the vid work with the odd spoken-word audio. I think the later stuff is much better, and in some ways I appreciate that this vidlet is so dire simply because during the Tomorrow project vidlet series I really feel like I can see myself improving weekly, just in terms of really basic stuff like timing, clip choice, etc. But it's a shame I couldn't have started at a point of greater awesome; the idea deserved it.
Most Successful
In what terms? In terms of popularity and personal satisfaction, probably again, there's a war going on for your mind, laura. But since I don't want to just post that over and over (because really, I feel a little like I'll never make anything that awesome again and that's mildly depressing), I'll also mention Manifesto. which I think was my most successful attempt at creating like...an actual piece of video art. Not that regular music videos can't be that, but I thought this one successfully stretched a little outside that definition too? (*worries about arrogance* *is vaguely british*)
Most Underappreciated by the Universe
The Tomorrow Project series in general, I think, didn't find an audience as wide as it deserved because it was so weird. That improved as the series went on (and my vidding got better), but still. DUDE. It's BSG to sponsored 1950s movies! Caprica six is the cyclotron! Leland has two Daddies! WHAT ABOUT THAT ISN'T AWESOME?
Ahem.
Most Fun Video
Oh, tough call! All of the vaguely funny and silly vidlets I've done were good fun. But I think I'm going to vote for The Ladies' Choice. Not only because I just rewatched it and it still makes me giggle, but because at the time I was making it I was also embroiled in two much more serious projects that were like...killing me with technical fiddling and stuff. It was like...the most crazy vidload I'd ever worked with and this vid was the one where I got to open up the file and just put hilarious clips of shirtless men on to the timeline.
So it was fun in two ways. Therefore it wins this category.
Video with the Single Sexiest Moment
Um... Tricks.
For the early time-toggle on Tory taking of her shirt while making out with Anders. I was really happy with that time-toggle and it took fucking forever to get it right. So I think that's a literally and technically sexy moment.
Hardest Video to Make
These weren't hard to make because of program crashes or glitches (that would be every I've made!) but they were difficult in that I had to do some real legwork to get WMM to give me the effects I needed and it was very time consuming.
It's a toss-up between The Book of Kara for the timed colour-fades (which I had to do without a custom colour-fade effect) and Televangelism because I literally chopped the whole thing up into ten frame segments and brightened every other one to make a flickering effect.
Yes. Yes I am nuts.
Most Unintentionally Telling Video
I'm not entirely sure what this one means. But if it means what I think it does then that would be Dolled-up in Straps.
Usually I have something to say about a character so I vid it. In this case, I couldn't articulate what I wanted to say about Baltar so I vidded it as a form of expression and made everyone else tell me what it meant in the comments. It worked surprisingly well on that front!
Things I've Learned
Just...so much. So much I'm not sure where to start. Or even how to explain it because basically I just got better at vidding through practice. Specifically I think I'm much better at timings. I also started working more with camera movement, time-toggles and synching movement in the clips. I'd done this very slightly previously but this year I really tried to work on it.
I started working on using more effects and using them more appropriately.
I learned much more about WMM and how to make vids that suck less in it, and also I started experimenting with using other programs when WMM couldn't do what I needed it to.
Perhaps the best thing I learned was the JOY OF THE VIDLET. Really, it's awesome. It's short enough that it's much quicker to feel like you've finished something, but can be long enough to really explore a topic or make an argument. The length can also mean it's possible to vid topics there otherwise wouldn't be enough footage for. It's the perfect length to experiment and try new things both technically and narratively without having to commit to a full-length vid.
Things to Work On
Just generally getting better, and improving things I started working on this year such as:
- sharper timing and better use of camera movement and internal clip motion; sometimes I'm sloppy and just figure...blah it'll do.
- continue trying to use effects appropriately and interestingly: I still feel I often miss the mark with when they're necessary, when they're not, and when I'm using them because there's a failing in the vid I'm trying to hide.
- be less luddite-like about using programs other than WMM, or alternately, shirk the legwork necessary to achieve good effects in WMM less.
Things I haven't started working on such as:
- getting better at actually editing down the audio when it involves more than just cutting a continuous chunk out of the song so I don't have to keep makingcyborganize do it for me. I currently don't even have a program that can do this with any finesse so I'll probably be lazy and not bother, but I would like to work on this.
- become less hideously monofannish about my vidding. I want to start vidding more shows and get into vidding as a fandom rather than just BSG vidding. Unfortunately I often don't enjoy watching vids where I don't know the source so much and...so much of the popular source I haven't seen. Hopefully BSG's imminent ending will push me in a less monofannish direction.
- getting better at instrumental-type montages rather than just sticking really closely to lyrics.
Also, I'll followkiki_miserychic's lead and include an invitation to anyone that if you have any questions about any of these vids, please feel free to ask! :)
thearchive2 vidlet going through redrafting so there's a small chance that may fall on this side of the divide. But I am an impatient person and therefore am going to post this NAO! SO THERE! So, first a general retrospective. This is the first time I've done one of these because this is the first year where I've really felt like a vidder. I actually made my first vid at the end of '05 and between then and April '08, I made seven more. Which is a respectable number and yes, by the end of that time I'd stopped fighting the label "vidder". I felt it was technically appropriate and obviously I took pride in my vids and tried hard to improve and do interesting things with them. But I routinely went for like, eight months without making a single vid. It wasn't the primary way I engaged with fandom.
In the last eight months, though, I've made five vids and twenty-one (soon to be twenty-two) vidlets. I've engaged in two different collaborative projects, and vidded in more styles and tried to do more things than, like, ever before. And it's been glorious. Insane at times, but glorious. This year has been good to my creativity in that I spent the first half of it unemployed and doing this stuff to keep me from going mad with boredom, and the second half of the year in a bizarrely stressful job in a country where I can't even read signs properly and I do it to keep me from going mad from stress. Usually I respond to stress by shutting down. Apparently, though, I reach a critical point and just completely refuse to acknowledge reality using crazy vidding as a crutch in this regard. GO ME.
So. 2008. The Year Vidding Ate Me. I have no idea if it'll continue. It almost certainly won't at this pace, but I do hope I continue to interact with fandom as an active vidder.
Because I am freakishly monofannish (this year especially), these are all Battlestar Galactica vids.
January
None.
February
None.
March
None.
April
11 - Tomorrow -20: What kind of world? (vidlet; with
cyborganize)18 - Tomorrow -19: In the Beginning (vidlet; with
cyborganize)26 - Tomorrow -18: Cartography (vidlet; with
cyborganize)May
2 - Tomorrow -17: Atom Smasher (vidlet; with
cyborganize)8 - Tomorrow -16: Era of Communication (vidlet; with
cyborganize)16 - Tomorrow -15: American Engineers (vidlet; with
cyborganize29 - Tomorrow -14: Reckless Driving (vidlet; with
cyborganize)June
5 - Tomorrow -13: These Divorces (vidlet; with
cyborganize)6 - Ghosts (vid)
16 - Tomorrow -12: Television (vidlet; with
cyborganize)26 - Tricks (vid)
July
7 - Tomorrow -11: In the Suburbs (vidlet; with
cyborganize)13 - The Ladies' Choice (vid; with
asta77)22 - there's a war going on for your mind, laura (vid)
August
24 - Scar (vidlet)
September
1 - The Book of Kara (vidlet)
7 - Somebody Told Me... (vidlet)
14 - Manifesto. (vidlet)
20 - Memo: Re: Revolution (vidlet)
29 - Traditional Cylon Lullaby (vidlet)
October
7 - Five Loves Six Found (vidlet)
14 - I Want to be Evil (vidlet)
23 - Saul Tigh: A & B (vidlet)
November
2 - Televangelism (vidlet)
December
12 - Sunday Bloody Sunday: Mambo Remix (vidlet; concept:
cyborganize & original: tallulah71)18 - Dolled-up in Straps (vid)
Ta-da!
Favourite
there's a war going on for your mind, laura. I really feel like I did something interesting with that and succeeded mostly, in bringing to life the vid I had in my head.
Least Favourite
Tomorrow -20 because I can see how rusty I was, and how I was still fumbling to work out how to vid that series and make the vid work with the odd spoken-word audio. I think the later stuff is much better, and in some ways I appreciate that this vidlet is so dire simply because during the Tomorrow project vidlet series I really feel like I can see myself improving weekly, just in terms of really basic stuff like timing, clip choice, etc. But it's a shame I couldn't have started at a point of greater awesome; the idea deserved it.
Most Successful
In what terms? In terms of popularity and personal satisfaction, probably again, there's a war going on for your mind, laura. But since I don't want to just post that over and over (because really, I feel a little like I'll never make anything that awesome again and that's mildly depressing), I'll also mention Manifesto. which I think was my most successful attempt at creating like...an actual piece of video art. Not that regular music videos can't be that, but I thought this one successfully stretched a little outside that definition too? (*worries about arrogance* *is vaguely british*)
Most Underappreciated by the Universe
The Tomorrow Project series in general, I think, didn't find an audience as wide as it deserved because it was so weird. That improved as the series went on (and my vidding got better), but still. DUDE. It's BSG to sponsored 1950s movies! Caprica six is the cyclotron! Leland has two Daddies! WHAT ABOUT THAT ISN'T AWESOME?
Ahem.
Most Fun Video
Oh, tough call! All of the vaguely funny and silly vidlets I've done were good fun. But I think I'm going to vote for The Ladies' Choice. Not only because I just rewatched it and it still makes me giggle, but because at the time I was making it I was also embroiled in two much more serious projects that were like...killing me with technical fiddling and stuff. It was like...the most crazy vidload I'd ever worked with and this vid was the one where I got to open up the file and just put hilarious clips of shirtless men on to the timeline.
So it was fun in two ways. Therefore it wins this category.
Video with the Single Sexiest Moment
Um... Tricks.
For the early time-toggle on Tory taking of her shirt while making out with Anders. I was really happy with that time-toggle and it took fucking forever to get it right. So I think that's a literally and technically sexy moment.
Hardest Video to Make
These weren't hard to make because of program crashes or glitches (that would be every I've made!) but they were difficult in that I had to do some real legwork to get WMM to give me the effects I needed and it was very time consuming.
It's a toss-up between The Book of Kara for the timed colour-fades (which I had to do without a custom colour-fade effect) and Televangelism because I literally chopped the whole thing up into ten frame segments and brightened every other one to make a flickering effect.
Yes. Yes I am nuts.
Most Unintentionally Telling Video
I'm not entirely sure what this one means. But if it means what I think it does then that would be Dolled-up in Straps.
Usually I have something to say about a character so I vid it. In this case, I couldn't articulate what I wanted to say about Baltar so I vidded it as a form of expression and made everyone else tell me what it meant in the comments. It worked surprisingly well on that front!
Things I've Learned
Just...so much. So much I'm not sure where to start. Or even how to explain it because basically I just got better at vidding through practice. Specifically I think I'm much better at timings. I also started working more with camera movement, time-toggles and synching movement in the clips. I'd done this very slightly previously but this year I really tried to work on it.
I started working on using more effects and using them more appropriately.
I learned much more about WMM and how to make vids that suck less in it, and also I started experimenting with using other programs when WMM couldn't do what I needed it to.
Perhaps the best thing I learned was the JOY OF THE VIDLET. Really, it's awesome. It's short enough that it's much quicker to feel like you've finished something, but can be long enough to really explore a topic or make an argument. The length can also mean it's possible to vid topics there otherwise wouldn't be enough footage for. It's the perfect length to experiment and try new things both technically and narratively without having to commit to a full-length vid.
Things to Work On
Just generally getting better, and improving things I started working on this year such as:
- sharper timing and better use of camera movement and internal clip motion; sometimes I'm sloppy and just figure...blah it'll do.
- continue trying to use effects appropriately and interestingly: I still feel I often miss the mark with when they're necessary, when they're not, and when I'm using them because there's a failing in the vid I'm trying to hide.
- be less luddite-like about using programs other than WMM, or alternately, shirk the legwork necessary to achieve good effects in WMM less.
Things I haven't started working on such as:
- getting better at actually editing down the audio when it involves more than just cutting a continuous chunk out of the song so I don't have to keep making
cyborganize do it for me. I currently don't even have a program that can do this with any finesse so I'll probably be lazy and not bother, but I would like to work on this. - become less hideously monofannish about my vidding. I want to start vidding more shows and get into vidding as a fandom rather than just BSG vidding. Unfortunately I often don't enjoy watching vids where I don't know the source so much and...so much of the popular source I haven't seen. Hopefully BSG's imminent ending will push me in a less monofannish direction.
- getting better at instrumental-type montages rather than just sticking really closely to lyrics.
Also, I'll follow
kiki_miserychic's lead and include an invitation to anyone that if you have any questions about any of these vids, please feel free to ask! :)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-12-24 03:51 pm (UTC)Ladies' Choice is so fun, right? I first moved into humour vids during some of the Tomorrow project stuff (Reckless Driving and These Divorces are both pretty funny I think/hope) but that was the first (and so far only) time I've had to sustain it over an entire vid. It was a great learning experience even if I don't think that "silly and fun" will ever be my default vidding mode.