My final choice of video editing program: Final Cut Pro X

The cries were fierce and seething. What did Apple do to my Final Cut Pro? It has been a little over two years since Apple software engineers upended the video-editing universe with the release of an “all new” Final Cut Pro X version of the proverbial video-editing program. Not long after the initial discussions as to whether it is called “X” or “Ten” subsided, did the bitchin’ and moaning among the ranks start.

Me? Well, I just dove in with gusto. Unfortunately, many fine editors made one big mistake. They tried to use the program without investing the time to learn how to use the new features—many of which were either a totally new way to edit (magnetic timeline) or ran counter to the way they worked in FCP 7 (dual viewers, bins etc.)  They complained. Then they complained some more. Change was tough, especially for editors that lived in the old FCP paradigm since version 1.0

Before I even tried to edit my first project, my first stop was IzzyVideo’s excellent free FCPX video tutorials. I watched each several times until I began to grasp all the new concepts–connected clips, skimming, magnetic and secondary timelines, keywording and so on . I  made sure I knew what each button in the interface did.

My first story edit went off without much fanfare. Still, I wasn’t totally convinced FCPX was better than my beloved FCP 7. The magnetic timeline drove me nuts, the single view monitor was strange and all that skimming took some time to get used to. I soldiered on and by the end of my third or fourth project, I started to jell with the program. Having to edit something in FCP7 now felt foreign. I kept wanting to skim clips in the browser.

My foray into FCPX was not without a hiccup that almost gave me a heart attack. Since its release, Apple has moved quickly to restore some of the lost features in the previous version. Multi-cam editing, XML export and dual viewers to name a few. But with all this updating, some versions became show-stopping unstable. Discussion boards were full of “FCPX didn’t save my project and now it is gone” type posts, which drove many editors over to the Adobe Premiere or Avid camps for good.

I was just completing a week-long editing project in version 10.05 when I started to trim a black slug at the tail end of my video. All of a sudden, poof, my entire project timeline turned gray. All the clips just vanished. A trip to the Apple discussion boards turned up many angry folks in the same boat as me. In typical Apple fashion, they shrugged their shoulders with silence and it took a user to figure out a convoluted solution to restore corrupted projects.

It made me realize at the time how much more FCPX needed to germinate before it was ready for real world work. That was a year ago and things seem to have smoothed out. My editing speed has accelerated dramatically the more I use FCPX.  I feel much more comfortable and trusting of the program. I taught a video storytelling and production class at a community college and I found the students learned the basics much faster than they did in Final Cut Express.

So for now, Adobe Premiere sits in my applications folder unused. I have chosen FCPX as my video editing program. I continue to suck up as much information on how to use the program as I can. Lynda.com has really stepped up and provided some of the best FCPX tutorials around. If you invest the time, I believe you will become much more comfortable with FCPX. It truly is video editing reimagined. I look forward to what future upgrades bring.

Know your story

A friend of mine asked me to read the first 200 pages of a novel he is writing and give him some feedback. I’m not a wordsmith (as you can tell) but I gave it a shot.

On critique day, I took a big sigh and gave him the bad news.

“I have no idea what your story is, nor do I care about your main character,” I told him. “You’ve written in so many dead ends into the plot that I’m not emotionally invested in the storytelling. I don’t think you know the story you want to tell,” I said.

Several weeks later we got together for breakfast and he told me my advice of know your story changed everything in how he approached writing his novel. He admitted that he was creating the plot as he was putting pen to paper. This, he realized, produced a lot of dead ends for the characters’ and storyline.

Know your story is fundamental to video storytelling too. Yet, time after time, video stories I review or judge in contests (and some of my own) are filled with meandering plotlines, too many characters, and failed endings.

Know your story

Before you shoot, it is important to have in your head, a solid framework of the story you want to tell.  Identify what the conflict in your story is,  then shoot it. Ask yourself: What is my opener? What do I need to shoot for the guts of my story? What’s my ender or resolution? You might not have all these worked out before shooting, but you better have by the time you finish pushing the record button. Few great stories are found in the edit afterwards.

Editing

Know your story. It will make editing a breeze. Focus on telling a story where you set up questions for the viewer, but then make sure you answer them. Intimacy and emotion rules with video, so edit those in not out. Keep focused. Tangents and redundancy are death in a short video.

It’s easy to get lost in all the small edits on the timeline. Make sure you always have a big picture of how your story is unfolding on the timeline.  When you’re done, ask several people to watch your video and tell them to be honest as to whether it holds their interest.  If your story does not work for them, then it probably won’t work for most viewers.

Mastering Multimedia useful tips roundup

Many of may old posts that deal with tips about how to do video storytelling and audio slideshows get linked on a lot of blogs used by college professors who teach digital media classes. Most of these posts are buried amongst my pontifications about the changes facing the newspaper industry. So for anyone interested,  here is a roundup of my best multimedia suggestions and useful tip posts in one place…

How to make your audio slideshows better

Great audio starts in the field

How best to approach a video story

Sequencing: The foundation of video storytelling

How to make your video editing easier

Get creative with your video camera

Opening your video: How not to lose viewers

Random Final Cut tip: Lower thirds titles

What we can learn from TV new shooters

A better Final Cut lower thirds title generator

 Final Cut Pro and Express users have long been frustrated with Apple’s lower thirds title generator for it lack of features. Many of the problems have been fixed in this free Final Cut plug-in by Alex Gollner.  It provides more typeface, position and design options for adding text to productions. Simply download it and drop it in your Final Cut plug-in folder here: Your Startup HD/Library/Application Support/Final Cut Pro System Support/Plug-ins. It’s not to fancy like a Motion template, but for quick lower thirds on deadline, this will to the trick. 

I haven’t really explored the many options for plug-ins for Final Cut. Anybody using a plug in that they can’t live without? Please share your comments…

Two approaches to daily newspaper video

 

Reflections Med Spas of Spokane host Botox parties to entice woman to use their cosmetic services.

The great thing about shooting video for newspapers is that you don’t have to fit the storytelling in a confined format like TV news does. The last two videos I have produced for Spokesman.com were done with totally different  storytelling approaches. The first video I did was on a local day spa that hosted a Botox party for women. Here, I let the subjects at the party tell the story. I shot it in one evening and then futzed around with the edit for couple of days in between daily still photo assignments. The other video was on a snowboarding competition held at a local college.  I tried a totally different approach with this video. A daily story planned for the page one, so I didn’t see the need to do the same print story in video. Time was tight and I really wanted to get home in time for dinner.

Watch the thrills and the spills as snowboarders and skiers from around the region participate in the Cricket Wireless Campus Rail Jam Tour

 

The Botox story was all about people. Getting them to tell me why they felt the need to get Botox injections was key to my story. I did interviews with a doctor and the director of the spa, which gave me the narrative framework for my story. Then I just filled in my timeline with other quick-hit interviews. From a low angle, I did a fun interview with a woman who was face down in a chair getting a massage. With my raw video, I edited a story that was fairly linear. I opened with women socializing with wine and hors d’oeuvres as my beginning. Then moved on to them getting free massages and facials for the middle. Finally, I shot copious amounts of footage of several people getting facial Botox injections to lead me out of the story.

With the snowboarder story, I ditched all my normal storytelling conventions. My Sony EX-1 video camera has the ability to over crank video for ultra smooth slow motion. This was the first time I have experimented with this feature and I am mesmerized by it.  My video is two minutes of snowboarders riding the rails. A music track is my only audio. Many boarders fell on their butts and heads, which the slow motion effect made it fun to watch. I think there is lots of room left to experiment with different storytelling methods. My two daily videos will probably not win any awards, but I hopw the viewers, who took the time to watch, were at least entertained by what they saw.

Free Video editing tutorial

For anybody who has edited video in Final Cut Pro, you know that there are many different ways to perform the same tasks. Recently I watched this free Apple seminar on how to rapidly edit news and sports packages. This tutorial is geared primarily for TV shooters and editors transitioning from tape-tape and into the world of non-linear editing.  The video seminar is taught by long-time TV news shooter and editor Joe Torelli, who really knows his stuff.

I found the most useful information comes in the second video where Torelli shows an interesting way to edit clips on the timeline verses setting in and out points in the viewer. His techniques, geared for deadline productions, are something I will try when I need to edit something in a hurry. As newspaper websites use more and more video, learning to edit efficiently will only become more important.

Opening your video: How not to lose viewers

Finding a good opening to your video is critical.  Far too often, newspaper produced video fails to quickly grab the viewer’s attention. Online viewers are a fickle bunch, where the click of a mouse button will lead them to some other cooler destination. The key is to smack ‘em upside the head and wake them up. Your first 15 seconds better be good or they won’t stick around long. Here are some of the things I do to let the viewer know that my video is worth watching:

• I avoid at all costs, opening with a talking head. That is the kiss of death. You have to warm the viewing crowd up some before you bring in narrative. Use strong visuals from your b-roll instead.
• One of my favorite things to start my video with is a series of quick sound bites interspersed with nat sound pops. A nat(ural) sound pop is a quick hit of sound like a ball hitting a bat, the sound of a shovel digging into a sand pile, the closing of a car door.
• Try using the classic literary device of opening your video by teasing with the middle or end of your story.
• One of the suggestions I learned at the Platypus Workshop is to lead with your strongest, or second strongest video first. Works great in breaking news videos.
• It’s important to define your story in the opening 15-20 seconds. If viewers have to wait too long they’ll be gone. If needed, use objective (facts) narration to move the story along.
• Or…don’t define the story quickly. Instead make your opening vague and mysterious. But be careful with this. Don’t try the viewer’s patience or they’ll bolt.
• Open with great natural sound. I sometimes open my video with black and just play sound. It’s mysterious and hopefully makes the viewer want to follow the sound into your story.
• Finally, look at picking up the pace to capture the viewer’s attention. Long (five seconds or more) clips won’t stimulate the viewer’s brains—especially the ones with ADHD.

Colleague Dan Pelle’s videos connect emotionally to viewer

In 2005 I attended the Platypus Workshop, a nine-day intensive video boot camp in Ventura, California. The not so subtle battle cry of this workshop was to “tear down the still shooter and build you back up as a videographer.” That did not quite happen to me as I continue to covet my still camera.  I did gain some career altering video storytelling skills though. When the 2007 Platypus approached, I was asked by my newspaper’s editor who I would suggest in the newsroom to send?  Photojournalist Dan Pelle was my quick reply. I already had given it some thought. Pelle’s qualifications were perfect. He’s a strong still photographer with a great eye for composition and moment. Though Pelle is not a gear geek like me, I knew he’d take care of a video camera if given one.

A couple months before Platypus, Pelle got a shiny new Sony HVR V1U, a Sennheiser wireless mic, and a decent fluid head tripod. As he shot his first few stories, I tried to teach him the fundamentals of video. A perfectionist, Pelle agonized over every missed shot and technical glitch.  I just smiled knowing that all that fussing over edits and shots would eventually make him a better video storyteller and editor.

When Pelle arrived back from Platypus, he was tired, and a little bit shelled-shocked. They jammed so much information into his brain he did not know where to start. Slowly he began to find stories that fit his groove. His first, and one of the most popular videos of all time on Video Journal, was a story on a paraplegic dog.

Pelle has a great sense of story in that he is able to connect to the viewer on an emotional level. I helped him with the edit, but the story is all his. As time passed, the editing training wheels came off and Pelle was able to fly solo in Final Cut Pro. I now look forward to each story he does. Every one of his videos is an intimate portrayal of a subject. He took to heart Platypus instructor’s Dirck Halstead’s mantra that a video story “is not about an event, it is about a person.” My only wish is that Pelle could do video storytelling full-time. But alas, the newspaper photo grind keeps him busy. His recent story about a group of neighborhood kids that help a woman struggling with Lou Gehrig’s Disease, is one of his best. It makes me miss shooting full-time. My video I just posted pales in comparison. Way to go Dan!

The times they are a changing

Thursday was kind of a milestone here at The Spokesman-Review. It was a busy day for everyone. Our MoJo (mobile journalist) Thomas Clouse called me over to his desk. He was working on a video he’d just shot of a railroad crossing emphasis patrol by local police. He was ready to export his movie, but before he did, he wanted me to view it. Clouse made the classic error of burying the lede of his video. A quick reedit made his story a 100% better. As I stepped back from his desk, I was taken aback by what I saw. Two web producers were all working in Final Cut Express producing their own videos.

Andrew Zahler was editing a piece he shot on a new local restaurant, which used unusual works of art in their decor. Thuy-Dzuong Nguyen was editing a story shot by an entertainment writer on the strange Juggalo hip-hop subculture. Both Thuy and Andrew have only been using Final Cut Express since January, but they’ve taken to it with no fear.

A few minutes later I ventured back to the photo department. In my old editing cave sat photojournalist Dan Pelle engrossed in his dual monitor setup working on a story about a high school student who is painting a mural on large fiberglass cow for a national art competition. Four people, working simultaneously, editing video for Spokesmanreview.com. I just had to smile.

For the longest time I was a videographer of one. An anomaly at my paper. Now, I’ve pretty much put myself out of the shooting business. I can no longer cherry pick the assignments that have good video potential. There are now eight people in our newsroom able to use a video camera to tell a story. It is a number that is growing–one person at a time.

A year ago, I looked out in the newsroom and asked myself what would it be like if everyone, not only had the ability to shoot and edit video, but also do it well? What would be the impact? As our website grows in reach and content, I know that multimedia will play a bigger role in how we tell stories. Mojo Thomas Clouse remarked the other day how his news video communicated the story much better than anything he could have written. This from a former word-only reporter—wow.

The next item on my plate is to reinforce the training these budding videographers already have. I need to show them ways they can be more efficient in Final Cut. How they can learn to edit in-camera so the video they shoot can be quickly edited into an engaging sequence of images. The video religion is spreading. Three more photographers are now learning Final Cut. We have capital budget for 4 more Mojo setups this year that include a laptop, video camera, and Final Cut Express.

With a coming redesign and a growing cadre of multimedia journalists, the newsroom at The Spokesman-Review is becoming a very different place from what it was just a year ago.

It’s called Final Cut for a reason

Want your videos to have that polished professional look to them? Of course you do. When I view a video produced by someone inexperienced, I see all the little things they could have fixed before they exported. Since I seem to be fond of top ten lists, here is my How to final cut your video before you compress.

It really is the final small fixes that can make or break a video. I often find myself, after posting a video, going back several times to fix things that bug me. A dissolve that’s too long, an audio level that’s too low or high. It is a perfectionist curse that I live with. It’s best, though, to fix your video before they’re posted.

• Start by listening to your completed project with your eyes closed. Hit pause when you come to something that doesn’t sound right and fix it. I find, by not looking at my time line, I’m much more able to spot (hear) audio issues.
• When you’re listening with your eyes closed, do it twice, once with headphones and once with your computer speakers. You’ll be amazed at the difference in the subtleties of what can be heard between the two. Music is a case in point. A subtle music sound bed might sound great with cheap speakers, but be overpowering with headphones on. You have to find a balance for both ways the viewer will be listening to your video.
• Watch your audiometers— Yes, with your eyes open now. You want each edited clip to peak between –12db and –6db. Adjust accordingly.
• Have an audio clip that has really low levels? Don’t jack the audio levels up to the point of hearing hiss. Instead highlight the clip and duplicate it, several times if necessary, until it builds the sound back up to a decent level. Try it! It really works.
• Use lots of audio cross fades. I can always tell the iMovie productions because the bumps in audio between clips. Cross-fades work much like an video dissolve does by blending the outgoing clip with the incoming clip. Fades work best between clips that have consistent audio sound. An example would be an outgoing clip of traffic noise transitioning to a clip of crowd noise. Because you can get cross talk, be careful of cross fading dialogue.
• Always use split edits. The split edit separate the professional editor from the amateur. The way I define a split edit is that you want to hear the person before you see them. Split edits, also called L-cuts really make your video flow smoothly between a-roll and b-roll. Just watch a video where a person appears and starts to talk. It can be jarring to the viewer. You can fix it by unlinking the video and audio track, roll the talking head video back about four seconds, then tuck the exposed audio on a separate track under the outgoing b-roll clip. You now have a smooth transition viewers will hardly notice. There are a half a dozen ways to do a split edit. Find the way that works best for you.
• Using photographs in your video? Try to fill the canvas window so there isn’t any black bars above the and below the image. It just looks better, especially if you’re adding motion on the photo. What I do is drop the photo onto my timeline and load it into the canvas. With wire frame enabled, I hold my option key down (to constrain proportions) and grab a corner of the wire frame and scale up the photo until it fills the frame.
• My personal preference is to fade up a video at the beginning and to fade out at the end. Many videos I see just start, which I find jarring. I like to use Final Cut’s video transparency feature. This is that black line on the top edge of video clip. You can key frame it just like audio. If not, just use a cross dissolve. Also, try an audio cross fade on the opening audio clip and have it fade up with the video. It will be smooooth as butter.
• Speaking of cross dissolves, ask yourself if you really need one. I find editors who use too many dissolves are the ones who failed to sequence their video with wide, medium and tight shots. Remember, a dissolve is best used for transitions of time or place.
• Color correct your video. It’s really simple to do in a professional video editor like Final Cut Express or Pro. It is the last thing I do before I export my video out of Final Cut. The easiest thing to do with the color correction filter is to use the highlight eyedropper. Click a neutral white in your video and presto instant colorcast correction. Usually that is all I have to do to a clip. It’s a great way to take a cool color balance and instantly warm it up. Bad color in your video makes it look like a You Tube production.

Any other tips? Please share…