vidding and my linear brain

[frayadjacent]

This is in principle my last question for the vidding meme, but I'm happy to take more questions and will probably do a few more on my own just because I like them.

colls asked: Do you work mostly from start to finish, or do you vid sections out of order?

Bit of both, but my orientation is very much to go from start to finish, and I've had to train myself out of that. Even though I use a non-linear editor! A number of people have talked about how when they get an idea for a vid, there are a few spots that are clear in their minds, and those are the parts they make first. And of course I also have some very vivid ideas for a few spots in the vid, but for some reason I often wait to put those down!

So, anyway, I do vid out of order, but I find that I get major mental blocks if the first ~15 seconds of the vid aren't solid. This made "Become You" a major headache cause I never could work out how to open the vid. Even after I submitted it to Wiscon I continued to fiddle with the opening.  But apart from that I do vid out of order, according to where I have ideas/what I'm excited to work on/what I've already clipped.

So, like right now my WIP has a ~75% full timeline. I imported the episodes directly into Premiere, but since I'm not super duper familiar with the source I'm scrubbing through the episodes chronologically. However when I started the vid there was one part I was pretty excited about that involved clips from the last episode, so I vidded that first. Ironically I am now planning to change that section! Anyway, I have a pretty solid structure planned for the vid so as I scrub through the episodes and find relevant clips, I drop them directly onto the timeline and fiddle from there. And I alternate between doing that and making changes to sections I've already worked on, according to whatever is most appealing at the time.

Comments

[colls]

I'm always interested in how people actually sit down and get the work done. It seems so arbitrary the way I do it and I secretly wonder if everyone has been let in on a trick I don't know - haha!
I started vidding on iMovie, which is a linear editor in that you can't really jump ahead unless you drop in placeholders or something. I almost can't imagine vidding like that now.

Off topic, but how long have you been vidding with Premiere? I'm impressed that you can get whole episodes into it.

Also, how was your move?!

[frayadjacent]

Yeah, I made my first vid on iMovie, but I realized pretty quickly that I needed a non-linear editor! I know it's possible to make great vids on a linear editor but I sure don't want to do it.

I started using Premiere about a year ago when I got a new laptop to go with my new job and for some reason it has all of CS6 installed! I used Final Cut prior to that and on the whole I like premiere slightly better. In large part because it's easier to import a range of file types and codecs. So for my WIP I'm importing episodes that are H.264 MOV format (I'm still on a Mac BTW), but I've experimented a bit with importing .vob files and that seems to also work fine. I'm keeping my fingers crossed because that could revolutionize my Buffy vidding plans! :)

[beccatoria]

YES! I'm the same. I think that not putting down major moments on the timeline is something I do - in some ways - because it gives me motivation to keep going. Like, I'm not sure what I'm doing with this bit here but if I just keep going, soon I'll get to that bit which I have a clear idea for! Whereas if I do that bit first, I'm left...with no propulsion, I guess? Anyway, yeah, I also have a much more linear brain.

[frayadjacent]

Haha, yeah it's like eating my vidding vegetables before dessert.

I'm glad to know linearly inclined brains like ours can still make great vids! :)