Posts tagged i make stuff

Everybody Hurts

The band at Crossroads performed R.E.M.’s classic song, “Everybody Hurts” recently and we decided we wanted to make an original video to play behind the band as they performed. I’m really happy with the look of the piece above - it’s not terribly inspired, but it sets the right tone and mood, I feel.

I recorded and edited the piece in HD and then encoded it down to standard def for the weekend since our church projectors aren’t HD. Since I’m still relatively new to all of this, self-trianed, and something of an idiot, it never occurred to me that detail-rich dark footage is possible in HD - but in SD is just a muddy mess. So, thirty minutes before the service I had to go in and jack with the picture levels to get something watchable. It didn’t look too awful in the service, but skin tones we’re a lot redder than I would have wanted.

Lesson learned.

The actual track playing on the video was there for reference while editing - obviously during the service, Crossroads’ band was playing

Big thanks to Kat Vaughan for doing such a great job as my actress and to Jennifer Turner for being a very able assistant.

Recent Project: Imagine A World…

Recently, the director of the Children’s Ministry, here at Crossroads, came to me for help brainstorming a volunteer recruitment video. By the time we finished talking about it, I was begging him to let me film and edit the piece.

I was excited about it because it was a chance to get a little more cinematic than I’ve been so far at Crossroads.

Here’s the video. It features some really talented and really cute staff kids and the extremely talented Matt Hadley, Jason Koerner, and Griff Ray. Below the video is some very self-indulgent process stuff that I recommend skipping unless you’re a masochist.

One of the things I really wanted to try with this piece was directing the viewer’s eye by using a rack focus. That kind of thing is fairly easily done if you’ve got the right equipment - namely a follow focus. While that kind of thing is on my “to buy” list eventually, I came up with an idea to try and accomplish the same effect on the cheap (and when I say, “came up with” I mean “was probably the last guy on the planet to figure this out”).

A follow focus is basically some gears and a knob that allow you to move easily from one pre-determined point of focus to another - on some professional shoots, there’s actually a guy other than the camera guy in charge of operating the follow focus, I’ve read. Below is my shoe-string solution:

Yeah, that’s a rubber band and some tape. Basically, each ink mark on the rubber band represents a pre-determined point of focus. When the mark on the rubber band lined up with the mark on the tape, I knew that particular point was actually in focus. So to move my focus from say, an actor’s face to a set of keys, I simply moved from one ink mark to the next. Simple. Amateurish. Effective.

This was also the first time I’ve attempted any sort of color grading with a video. Specifically, I wanted to give this piece a highly saturated, blue-heavy look kind of like a modern action flick. I was pretty fascinated by the whole process and clearly have a lot to learn. Curious what a little color grading can do for a piece? Well, here’s a nine second video to give you a little idea.

Neat, huh?

Okay, that’s enough rambling. Thanks to Jason for letting me work with him and the kids!

Patrick’s Favorite Things

We showed this at Crossroads on Christmas Eve.

Actually, now that I watch it, this is a longer version than what we played on Christmas Eve. So this is the director’s cut, I guess…

Going viral

Crossroads Viral Video (via xroadschurchky) Crossroads made this video as part of our Viral Virtues series and we’re trying to make it go viral. Send the link to all your friends. And if they have questions about Crossroads, send ‘em to me!