Creating a vlog or short video was nothing new for me. Although I have never actually produced a vlog myself, I was familiar with the concept and also had previous knowledge of filmmaking from “The Knightly News”, a high school news program I took part in while I spent a year in the United Sates. I like making something unique and funny, although my recent test-project is not. The idea came when I was watching videos on YouTube. However, I did not only want to show a clip of me playing the guitar.
I had some ideas and had a basic picture of how my vlog should look in my head as well as some scribbles on paper. When I finally got the camera, I immediately wanted to start filming. And I did. I started to film something which I wanted to input into my computer to see how it looked. This was when the first problems occurred.
Problem number one: Connection. After connecting the Camera to the Computer Windows Movie Maker told me that the connection was prehistoric. I tried to bypass this with no result. After finally giving up and upgrading my hardware I thought I could finally work with this.
Problem number two: Filming. Filming was easy, aside from the fact that I could not use a microphone which makes the sound of my recording rather sloppy. Also, I could not move the camera in a speed I liked, or even at a constant speed, this might be my own fault though. Nonetheless, the footage I shot was semi-useable and shooting was the easy part of this project, although I somehow regret not getting more footage.
Problem number three to fifty-five: Editing. It might have been less than fifty-five, but that was how it felt. Windows Movie Maker is a wonderful tool, if you have no use for the edited parts. You can not really edit with this program. I learned editing on VCR’s with the help of a jog-dial and after a while this was pretty easy to use. Moviemaker was not. I had a certain picture what I wanted to do and it could not be realized with this software. Especially the missing of an additional video track as well as the lack of accuracy deeply annoyed me after a while. The result was choppy cuts, sound inconsistencies, and it left almost half of my footage unusable for the sound of two recordings could not be matched.
All in all it was a fun experience and I just hope the group project will be the same. I think filmmaking on your computer is still relatively easy if you have the right equipment. Every day new internet stars are born. Who knows? Maybe some producer discovers our work and we will end up in Hollywood. The Oscar goes to…Me.
