Video Wall Tutorial for Motion

I recently posted a tutorial on how to make a wall of photos in Motion. The effect is nice, yes, but wouldn’t it be nice to have videos instead of pictures? Well, its your lucky day.

Motion: Video Wall with the Replicator

Controlling FCP with your iPhone

The new iPhone was released yesterday, along with the much awaited App Store. Now, without going through the tedium of jailbreaking your iPhone or (in my case) your iPod Touch, you can install third party applications.

Over at The Editblog, Scott Simmons had some ideas for filmmaking applications for the iPhone. One of his ideas was a Final Cut Pro remote, similar to the iRemote for iTunes. It would allow you to control playback remotely.

You’ll need to install VNSea or TouchPad, both of which have not been added to the App Store yet (sorry). VNSea seems to work a lot better for me. Both use the VNC protocol, so you’ll need to set up Screen Sharing in your System Prefs. I also had to set up my router to handle it. Here’s a video tutorial on how to set it up.

Once you’re all set up and are connected, launch Final Cut Pro, and set the Video Playback to Digital Cinema Preview Main. Hit CMD- F12 to turn on All Frames. The video should be full screen. Now, bring up the keyboard on your iPhone in the VNC program, and go to town. J,K,L keys are good for playback. Set markers with M. Also useful will be I and O for setting the in and out points. Key combinations with shift also seem to work.

So once a VNC viewer comes out in the App Store, definitely try it out. Or don’t upgrade, and jailbreak it, and try it there.

Good idea, Scott!

UPDATE: Although I have not tried this program, Mocha VNC has appeared in the iTunes App Store. It is $5.99, but there is also a free Lite version. I assume both will be adequate for controlling FCP.

Sites I find helpful

Sorting through the massive amounts of sites online can be intimidating, especially when trying to find good info on editing and video stuff. So I’ve come up with a listing of the sites that I subscribe to, or at least frequent. They’re mostly Final Cut related, but there is a good variety. Check it out, and if you’re a FCP user, definitely subscribe to Larry Jordan’s FCS Tip of the Day.

Sites I find helpful

Multilingual Video Process, Part 2 (Writing/Editing)

This is part 2 in a series of articles on how to create Multilingual Videos. The first part covered shooting. This part will cover what happens up to the point when picture is locked.

First of all, organize, organize, organize!

The first thing I do on a project is to capture all of the interviews. I then have the interviews transcribed in their native language. Every word should be transcribed.

If the writer for the video is capable of writing a script in the native language, then they can start writing. If not, let the translation begin!

For the translation and transcription processes, I’ve found it helpful to use a program such as InqScribe. It’s a great tool for transcribing, with variable playback speed, timecode stamps, and even options to export to Final Cut XML and for DVD. For collaborative projects, I’ve also used Google Docs, as it allowed multiple people access to the same file, a central location for file sharing, and file security.

After the writer has finished, they pass the script off to the editor. If the editor can speak the languages of the interviews, great! If not, there are a couple things to make the job easier. Make sure the editor is given accurate and tight timecode info. They should also have a side-by-side transcription/translation, so they can easily find certain clips. Some editors will find it helpful to lay subtitles over all the interviews so they know what is being said at a given point.

Also very important – especially with an editor who isn’t fluent – get someone who is fluent to come in and listen. They’ll hear the parts of words the editor accidently cut off, the extra filler words that can be cut if necessary, the quotes that don’t make sense.

Important points to remember:

• organize, organize, organize!
• The writer must have a complete transcript or translation in a language they can write in before they can start.
• Give the editor good info on the interviews

Check back in soon for part 3 in this series for how to deliver the final multilingual video to the audience.

Multilingual Video Process, Part 1 (Shooting)

Making videos is an exercise in story telling, and most videos use words – spoken or written – to help tell the story. These words are powerful, and a good video producer/writer/director/editor usually needs a good grip on language.

But what happens when you are working on a project with languages you are not completely familiar with?

@patchets recently posed this question on Twitter-

anyone have a good workflow for translations? I’m editing a Chinese language doc and I’ve got a translator using a PC. Any suggestions?

My quick reply was suggesting a particular program, but I quickly realized that a longer answer was in store, one that would not fit in the 140 character of Twitter. So, I will be writing a three-part series on creating videos where language is an issue. In this post, I will talk about the shooting of the video. Next up will be editing the project, then finally, I will talk about the finished product.

I’ve worked on seven documentaries with languages other than my first language of English. I’ll draw on those experiences as examples of how I learned what works, and of course, what doesn’t.

Interviewing takes a high level of fluency
I was working on a video on a group of coffee growers in the Dominican Republic in the Spring of 2007. In addition to making the video, I was training, Ivory, a student at the local university on how to make documentaries. We would generally discuss an interview beforehand, and then he would ask the questions as I manned the camera. It worked well.

Then, one day I had to conduct some interviews, as we were on a short schedule and Ivory couldn’t make the shoot. Although I was able to communicate very well in Spanish, I found I still wasn’t good enough to interview. My fumbles made the subjects more agitated, as they were more intent on understanding me than on answering the question. Some interviews were almost useless because I couldn’t get the subject to relax. Since then, I’ve made sure to have fluent people available to interview for me.

Know what style of translation you need
There are two main ways of translating for the final project: subtitles and voice over.
I was helping to shoot a documentary in South Africa in Spring 2006. In a whirlwind of a week, we went from coast to coast across South Africa, crossing through many different ethnic groups. We had interviews in English, Afrikaans, Khosa, and Zulu. There was no way we were going to have (or perhaps more importantly, budget for) translators in the U.S.

The main editor/videographer decided to go with a BBC-style voiceover. We had only the main interviewee in the shot, but had mikes on both the interviewee and the translator.

Here’s the process:

1. Interviewer asks question (English)
2. Translator asks same question (Xhosa, for example)
3. Subject responds (Xhosa)
4. Translator translates the response (English)

(This round robin can get extreme- once I had to add a second intermediary to get between me and a rare Mayan dialect).

In post, the translator’s voice was put over the interviewee’s voice, so subtitles were not needed.

But I’m not a fan of voiceovers. The content, yes, is delivered, but I think a lot gets lost. The person’s inflection can add a lot of emotion that may not get translated. It feels more honest to me to hear their own voice. But that’s a matter you can have your own opinion on. So I’m a fan of subtitles. If you will have access to translators for post, or can do it yourself, only make sure that the interviewer is fluent.

So what it breaks down to:

• know your end product
• the interviewer MUST be fluent

Check back in soon for parts 2 (writing/editing) and 3 (delivering the video).

Motion: Script Text Write on

I’ve posted a new tutorial for Motion 3. I’ve been wondering how to do this for awhile, so I gave it a shot! Enjoy.
Motion: Script Text Write on

Welcome to AppleMotion.net-ers

Thanks to the Mark over at AppleMotion.net for linking to my new tutorial on making vines in Motion.