BP07_OMM Xtranormal

Watch my Xtranormal Film - An Xtranormal Life.

For my Viddler Friends:

PE03_iMovie

The Final Touch

Some more final touches that I really liked were more effects and transitions.  I was able to change colors on the backgrounds of opening and closing credits.   I also played around with video effects such as “Old Age” footage or “cartoon”.  The one I tried on my clip was a speed up factor.  I used this to speed up boring walking parts that were necessary to put into the clips.  It also showed the chaotic, busy motion of preschoolers visiting the Pumpkin Patch.  I wonder if after I do several films if I will add more effects or less?  Right now, I’m kind of like a kid who wants to at least try out all the colors in the box.

Numerous Video Effects

 

 All types of Audio Effects -

My Certificate

I finished my training.  And yes, I have my certificate.  I did like the last final section on sharing my movie.  The iMovie program basically has publishing or exporting features for any site available, at lest the most popular.  And my favorite export is to Final Cut.  I am not sure why at the moment, I would work on a project in iMovie and then move it to FCP, but it is there.  We will see how my movie trailer turns out.  This might be the only reason you would work on the project and then move it.  I would probably work directly on FCP.  However, this is only because I have a little bit of practice.  A little bit is better than nothing.  Which brings me to my certificate…

I have now finished two one- minute iMovie projects and maybe a dozen Final Cut Pro projects.  With both programs, I am beginning, as you can tell by my projects.  I am learning new skills and refining old ones as I move along.  However, even though I have a certificate now, I would be no means put this information on a resume.  I feel it would lead a future employer to believe that I have skills that I do not.  I might say I have some experience, but that is all.  

My Final Video

Here is my final-for-now production.  I wonder if people ever completely finish their projects.  It feels like you could edit again, and again, and again.  I am an English teacher and it feels very much like an essay, never quite finished.  But at this point I publish.  I hope you enjoy – “The Pumpkin Patch”.

                                         The Pumpkin Patch

By the way, for any of my student followers, my You Tube channel is:

http://www.youtube.com/user/cheryleegruber

You can check out all of my crazy films and even subscribe so you will get an email to notify you of new posts.  If you ever want to see you teacher in virtual reality, or a horror clip, or even being sprayed with a water hose, this is the place.

My Movie Trailer

Lastly, the trailer.  I have to say that I was very excited about this feature, however, after going through the process, I don’t care for it that much.  The tutorial made it seem much easier than it really was.  In the tutorial it talked about running the template, inserting clips and you have a trailer.  However, it is very much like creating a short project.  I made mine according to the tutorial.  But there were things to make it a bit better, like all of the editing functions required for the project.  I probably should have cropped clips etc.  The only feature it does do automatically, is replacing sound with thematic music, which is easy enough to do to a regular project.  I wasn’t real impressed, but here is my trailer.

Summary

iMovie turns about to be a handy little piece of software.  It seems like it is great for someone to sit down and quickly learn some software.  It runs lightly on the computer and doesn’t bog down your computer.  Additionally, it seems to be perfect for a quick sit down, tape, and post kind of blog.  However, if given the choice, I prefer my Final Cut Pro.

PE01_iMovie

Welcome to iMovie –

During the first month at Full Sail, I hit upon briefly the use of iMovie.  If you check on my Wordpress site you will see the first attempts at video construction.  It is a distracting piece of film with little visual value and an overload of sound effects.  However, I leave it as such on my Wordpress because at the end of my program, it will serve as evidence of my growth.  With this short experience over, I quickly jumped to Final Cut Pro X.  You see, we had a group project and I watched our technology guru skillfully handle the editing software.  Since I had zero video skills, I attached to Final Cut Pro (FCP), instead of iMovie, and moved on.

So this month, I step back to iMovie.  I am sure it will prove more of a compare contrast as I go through the Lynda tutorials, since I have been using FCP.  My brief encounter with iMovie was the rudimentary Biography, which at the time I thought was fine, but little did I know.

Lynda.com

The first section of the Lynda tutorials covered the basics, including the interface and the organization of the projects assets.   This is where I started seeing immediate differences between the two formats.

imovie Interface

Final Cut Pro Interface

The iMovie interface was very clean and simple, primarily consisting of 3 boxes and a preview area.  The FCP interface had 9 boxes and several toolbars.  As for ease of moving around the software, I would say that iMovie is much more simple and new user friendly.  The asset organization is also very straightforward in iMovie.  It is also much quicker to load and work in projects.  It seems that the FCP takes quite a bit of time “rendering” and bogs down.  Lag, Lag, Lag… And I’m not even on the Internet.  This may be because I have a dozen or so projects in FCP and only a couple in iMovie.  But it may be due to the additional features of FCP.  It is definitely a heavier software package.  We shall check it out.  Additionally, the iMovie price cannot be beat.  I paid $299.00 for FCP and iMovie was included in my Full Sail Package – for free with the cost of admission.  My question is, do you get what you pay for?

As for the Lynda.com tutorials… I am a strong advocate for the use.  However, I am a bit against the requirement to watch the entire tutorial.   A professor once told me that I have “Swiss Cheese” computer knowledge.  I know a lot, but I have some holes.  I agree.  In this case there were a total of twenty clips in the first four questions.  However, there were only about five or six that I really needed to watch.  In contrast, with my Final Cut Pro tutorials, I have watched almost three or the five hours of clips available.  I don’t plan on watching the boring ones.  Which leads me to my point…

After watching the Wesch video, I ask why we can’t decide our own tutorials to watch.  It is a shame that we are required to watch three hours of footage with maybe only half being useful.  Instead, we should be required to watch five hours – OUR CHOICE.  Yes, we wouldn’t get a certificate… But is the certificate the purpose of education?

We will continue the investigation with the next blog where we tackle meatier topics.

BTW- Special shout out to Atticus.