Grassroots Video - 2008 Horizon Report
"our notions of what constitutes useful or engaging video have been redefined – and more and more, it is a two to three minute piece designed for viewing in a three-inch browser window or on a mobile phone”
“easy for amateurs to get good results without investing in expensive equipment, software, or training”
“the effect of all these developments is that the capacity for video production has been distributed to the grassroots level”
More options than ever before to incorporate video into the curricula
Student produced clips
Faculty produced clips
Abbreviated history of motion picture production
Chemical film stock
Recording camera / projection camera
Editing process – cutting film
Making physical copies for distribution to theatres
Television – non-physical distribution system
Recording involved film camera pointed at the screen
Videotape
Magnetic recording/editing
Physical duplication in real time
Portable video – _”Umatic, VHS, 8mm
VCR to VCR editing
Usually VHS distribution
Digital video recording on tape
miniDV, Hi8, DVD
non-linear computer-based editing
postage-stamp online video
distribution on DVD
tapeless digital video
HDD, memory card
Computer-based editing
Online distribution
Production process overview
From The Director in the Classroom – Nikos Theodosakis
Development Idea
Pre-Production Plan
Production Action
Post-Production Edit
Distribution Show
Over the last 100 years:
equipment costs have gone way down (hardware & software)
duplication & distribution costs have gone way down (virtual distribution)
training requirements for production and post-production have gone down a little
- people are still expensive, but there are more of them available
- hardware & software is easier to learn – mostly due to ease of access
Development & pre-production planning costs have stayed about the same
- pre-prod may have declined a bit because of more flexible equipment and computer-generated effects
- word processing, e-mail & online collaboration tools make it easier
consequence: stuff gets made that, in the past, never would have gotten past the development stage
- comparison: desktop publishing revolution produced a lot of unreadable newsletters.
Theory: When equipment was expensive and complex and took a long time to learn, people had time to develop aesthetic judgment along the way. Now we don’t.
Production process in action
Come up with an interesting idea
Determine the distribution format (audience)
Find an editing process that will give you that distribution format (online, DVD, ???)
Find a shooting process that will feed your editing process (format)
Plan the shoot
Shoot
Edit
Distribute
Production Gear
Camera
Tripod
Audio (microphones, headphones, mixers)
Lighting
Other kinds of content:
Still images (photos, full screen or superimposed graphics)
Animated still images
Computer screen capture
Audio recordings (live and pre-recorded)
Special effects (green screen, compositing)
Camera formats
Tape-based (DV, miniDV, DVCPRO, DVCAM, Betacam, HDV …)
Disc-based (DVD …)
Memory-based (internal HDD, external HDD, flash card, P2 …)
Analog conversion to digital (firewire converter, D8 or miniDV camera)
Other possibilities:
Digital still cameras often have movie capability
Webcams can usually record direct to the computer (direct to youtube?)
Time-lapse with digital still camera
Stop-frame animation with digital still camera
Computer screen capture
Tripods & variations
Stability vs. weight
Removable mounting plate
Fluid head
Audio
Getting good sound – see DJTV audio tutorial - http://www.digitaljuice.com/djtv/
On camera mic
External handheld mic (adapters for mic input on camera)
External lav mic
External shotgun mic
boom pole
mixer to combine multiple sources
Lighting
3 point (portrait lighting) – see DJTV 3point lighting tutorial - http://www.digitaljuice.com/djtv/
Using available light
Reflectors
Found light sources
Qualities of light
Direction
Intensity
Colour
Texture
Shooting techniques
Why is there a zoom rocker?
Still vs moving camera (consequences for compression)
Shot vocabulary: wide, medium, tight, close-up, long shot, establishing shot
Sequence of shots – see DJTV punctuation tutorial
Change angle, framing between shots of same person
Have subject move in or out of shot
Do not cross the axis of action
Compressing time with a sequence of shots
Post-production
Get content into edit software
Capture in real time from tape or drag files
Gather other materials (stills, titles, audio, music)
Simple assembly on a single video track (movie maker, imovie)
Multi-layer capability (FCP, premiere, vegas, avid)
Online editing tools (editing can mean a lot of different things)
Complexities:
DVD footage – frames must be recreated to edit
AVCHD – sometimes captured in intermediate codec
Distribution
DVD burning software
Computer-based video format
Online video format (youtube specs) – see DJTV encode4youtube tutorial - http://www.digitaljuice.com/djtv/
Projects:
The rant
How-to video
Abstract animation
The remix
Examples:
http://techtv.mit.edu/ - provides free video hosting to mit community using blip.tv
http://www.youtube.com/ucberkeley - UC Berkeley’s youtube channel
http://au.youtube.com/user/unsw - Sydney
http://www.jove.com/ - journal of visualized experiments
http://www.video24-7.org/ USC School of Cinematic Arts – Institute for Multimedia Literacy – the future of internet video
Free resources:
http://www.archive.org
- extensive collection of moving images & audio
http://cogdogroo.wikispaces.com/StoryMedia - links to content
http://cogdogroo.wikispaces.com/StoryTools - 39 - 46 are video tools
Editing & processing tools:
http://www.fixmymovie.com
- designed for cell phone, webcam and low res digital camera footage
- sharpens image quality
- max size 15MB, max resolution 352x288
http://eyespot.com/ - upload, remix
http://www.jumpcut.com/ - upload, grab public clips, edit
http://www.veotag.com/ - annotate specific parts of video or audio
http://www.labnol.org/internet/video/best-youtube-video-tools/2104/ -companion tools for online video
http://mashable.com/2007/06/27/video-toolbox/ - more resources than you could ever look at in one lifetime
Distribution sites:
http://www.youtube.com/
- prefers: mpeg4 480x360 or higher, under 100MB – max 10 minutes
- Uploader option allows up to 1GB
http://video.google.com/
- mpeg4 or mpeg2, 640x480 30fps 4:3, de-interlace
- they output 320x240 flash in 4:3 (will letterbox if necessary)
http://www.viddler.com/
- 500MB limit per video
http://blip.tv
- prefer quicktime or wmv, recommend under 100MB
- option to show original upload format (not flash recompress)
http://ourmedia.org
- uses SpinXpress to upload – files stored at archive.org
http://www.metacafe.com/
http://www.revver.com/ - ad revenue split with producer
http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2006/11/25/video_publishing_online_where_to.htm - review of video publishing sites
live streaming – your own tv station
http://www.ustream.tv/
http://www.mogulus.com/ - live and pre-recorded clips
http://www.stickam.com/
http://www.justin.tv/
Online tutorials
http://www.digitaljuice.com/djtv/
- audio, lighting, camerawork, compression (techknow & take5 series)
http://blip.tv - Learning Center has excellent overview of web video storytelling
http://www.lynda.com/
http://makeinternettv.org/
http://www.ojr.org/ojr/wiki/video/ - Annenberg School for Communication at USC
http://ourmedia.org/learning-center
Ongoing discussion
http://horizon.nmc.org/wiki/Grassroots_Video_Questions - the 2008 horizon report wiki on grassroots video
http://www.pbs.org/teachers/learning.now/2007/09/youtube_101_yes_its_a_real_cla_1.html - teaching through youtube
http://mediatedcultures.net/ksudigg/?p=127 How to create a youtube mashup by M. Wesch
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