Exam: make one, talking the whole time, helping us see everything you see about how the clip works, using every film term you can muster, but also noting foreshadowing, themes, closures, colors, rhythms, etc. (You might go back and review what you know about film conventions.) Your overall goal here is not to entertain us by your personality — it is to help us see and understand things we would not unless we have been enlightened by your insight.

Take care to make your voiceover clear and easy to hear and understand and use ducking to keep a little of the actual soundtrack audible.

Sign up here — pick a five minute block, watch it many times until you find a one-minute block within it that will let you show off best, most observant, insightful, and film-informed self. Clip the one minute block out, using MPEG Streamclip if you want and haven’t updated to Mavericks yet, or using QuickTime Player’s trim function if  you have updated or if find it easier. Then slam it into iMovie and add your voiceover.

Assignment: Make a short video, 1 – 2 minutes, using the built-in camera on your laptop (File > Import from Camera…), that shows you (or somebody) telling a stupid/scary/funny story with at least some of it done in a toilet paper+laptop slider shot, using two kinds of cutaway, multiple times: slider 1  slider 2   slider examples

1. One in which the protagonist keeps talking while the camera cuts away from the protagonist to the thing he or she is talking about. See this page for instructions on cutting away to a video, and this page on cutting away to a still shot, like a photo (maybe that you grab from your Facebook account).
2. One in which the camera cuts away (maybe for a flashback or a flashforward) to a different scene with different audio, and then cuts back to the initial scene.

This is not about making a “good” movie — it’s low res and silly. It’s about getting quickly comfortable with two very important editing skills. If you want to work with a partner, with only one of you actually in the film, that’s fine, but each of you need to edit separately.

Probably will work best with the subject NOT looking at the camera, but instead seeming to tell the story to somebody to the side of the camera.

If you are skilled/comfortable with cutaways, you might try to incorporate a multi-cam sequence.

Due October 28

Due on Monday, September 17: two YouTubes downloaded, two MPEG Streamclipped clips exported out of them.