Video & Sound Production - Exercise
Video & Sound Production
Jason Junior Lim Yung Hsin (0340 569)
Instructions
Week 1 - Stop Motion Animation
The class began with the lecturer's introduction to the module. We were briefed about the minor projects following the class as well as the final project of which to come. We were assigned to search the web for 3 stop motion animation videos of which we found interesting and can serve as inspiration for our final project video. We were also asked to pair up with a partner for the final project. For the audio portion of the class, we were advised to purchase a pair of studio headphones, with suggestions provided by our lecturer, to help in audio editing as regular headphones cannot provide the proper or adequate audio capabilities for audio editing use.(I purchased the Audio-Technica ATH-M30x for the class)
I actually went to the store that sold the headphones our lecturer linked with address provided by a classmate. I tried many different headphones by a few brands to determine the difference between a studio headphone and regular headphone. The biggest difference i could detect was the clarity of the audio in studio headphones. I tried all available Audio-Technica headphones in the store, and my findings are, the M20x could differentiate levels of sound but lacked power and low notes, the M30x had good balance in differentiation, however compared to the M20x the base was a little heavy for me (this could be due to the audio settings on my phone which were set to non-studio headphones), and lastly the M50x had great balance in overall performance, larger speakers felt more comfortable as well. However the M50x was out of my price range so i settled for M30x. M40x was out of stock in the store, so i didn't get a chance to test them. But as the store sales person said, the only difference between the M30x and M40x is the detachable aux cord on the headphones.
The following are the videos i chose as inspiration for my final.
1) Coin Pizza - Stop Motion Cooking ＆ ASMR by Bebop
I liked this video mainly because it was animated with very smooth movement between frames. Glitching or gaps between frames were barely noticeable. I was also very intrigued by the unique use of other materials to represent different things, such as the coins used as water and batter for the pizza dough. The video itself is visually appealing with the use of bright colours and interesting stop motion concept. However, there is not much to say about the storyline as it's not really interesting, only that the stop motion was done well.
2) Richard Watterson Stop Motion Claymation | The Amazing World of Gumball by Cartoon Network
This video is quite short, but i was intrigued by the smoothness and great movement of the stop motion animation. The use of clay as a medium provided the animator with unlimited possibilities, which is found that he put to good use as the fast movement and effect of falling was greatly amplified by the clay and how it was molded to form exaggerated movement. As the video shows during the making process, the parts such as eyes, tongue and ears were made to look longer to emphasise the falling movement. Story wise it, it doesn't really have anything special of a storyline, but i choose this as inspiration for its dynamic claymation.
3) Western Spaghetti by PES
This is one of the most known and iconic stop motion that's on the internet. We have all seen this but I included it as it is one of the most dynamic and visually appealing stop motions out there. PES films has always been unique in their stop motions, and this is no stranger to that. Not only is the movement exceptionally smooth, but their use of everyday objects to represent foods in the stop motion really puts the video at a higher level of creativity. It is very interesting to watch their videos as the effort and thoughts put into the video can be seen. Even though there is also isn't a story in this video, i think i can serve as a good bench mark for creating stop motion videos of my own.
Week 2 - Video Editing
Part 1
Learning to edit a set of clips into a sequence to form a video on Adobe Premier Pro CC.
Multiple clips being cropped and put together in sequence to form a video with reference to the original short clip as given by lecturer.
The one major issue with editing i found was the time limit or to be specific, to cut and crop all the video sequence down to 50 seconds. It's difficult to cut everything down without loosing the original script of the video.
The 1st finished draft edit.
Part 2
For the second part after sequencing, cutting and cropping, was colour correction. We were assigned to manipulate the overall colour of the video to match a reference image.
This being the reference image, it had high contrast and strong green hue.
Achieving the green hue was the easy part in my opinion, it was balancing the lights and darks as well as making sure the skin colour doesn't get too orange i find a challenge.
We were thought to use an adjustment layer to change the frame colours, and use the lumetri scopes as a reference to check the colour balance in comparison to the image.
The final edited video. The audio throughout the video was not edited as this exercise was for video editing.
Week 2 - Audio
Audio Exercise 1
The goal of the exercise was to learn the difference between the high, low and midtones of the audio track. We were asked to compare 6 different manipulated tracks of the same audio to its original audio. Then using adobe audition, change the equalisation of the audio until it matched the original as much as possible.
Importing all the audio tracks of the exercise into adobe audition for the editing. We used parametric equaliser in the effects rack to manipulate the levels in the tracks.
Track 1 - results. Track one had a weaker low tone and bass so to change that i pushed up most of the low tones.
Track 2 - results. Track two had a softer high tone making the audio sound very bass heavy. To change that the high tones were pushed all the way up to make it feel more balanced.
Track 3 - results. Track three was a bit difficult to detect the problem but after listening most of the track i found that it was the mid tones that were too low.
Track 4 - results. This track was quite obvious from the 1st listen the base was bumped all the way up. Not only was it too loud it made using headphones painful. To combat that low tones were turned down.
Track 5 - results. Track five to sounded like it had more issues with overall balance. For the most part it was the high tones that were too loud. But at the same time some parts of the mid tones sounded a bit too low.
Track 6 - results. The mid tones and some parts of the high tones in the audio were very strong. As a balance i turned most of it down.
Week 3 - Video
Exercise - Types of video shots and framing
Results of the test shooting.
Exercise - Story telling in film
Based on this short film, we were tasked to write down the break down and parts of the story.
Act 1
- Introduction to protagonist, autistic and very stimulated by sound. Scene ends in bedroom when brother offers main character job.
Act 2
- Start with protagonist going around markets in search of “perfect glass”. He misses appointment when he gets distracted. But he found the glass cup that he wanted. Brother confronts him about missing appointment.
Act 3
- Protagonist finally plays music on the glasses that he has found and enjoys the sweet sound that he has created.
Plot point 1
- Brother tell him of job vacancy, time and place to meet
Plot point 2
- Protagonist finds perfect glass to match the sound he was looking for.
Climax
- Brother yells at protagonist for missing job interview
Original sample audio.
1) Telephone sound
Results of the editing.
2) Closet sound
3) Stadium sound
Results of the editing.
Week 3 - Audio
This audio exercise required us to try to shape all the sounds to sounds like they are coming from different sources, telephone, a stadium, and a closet.
Original sample audio.
1) Telephone sound
Results of the editing.
2) Closet sound
Results of the editing.
3) Stadium sound
Results of the editing.