Author: jhuang12

I enjoyed watching Brandon Li’s  Hong Kong Strong. It is a film about the madness and beauty of this seemingly incredible city in the days leading up to Chinese New Year. Recently, Brandon joined YouTube and started posting cinematic vlogs. If I had to describe what kind of editing skills I’d like to learn in the future, this video would be a perfect example.

His Baja Vlog starts with a beautiful beach drone shot. At 0:06, an L-cut let the audio leads the picture and continues playing over the beginning of the Mexican Music band sequence. Through the first 10 seconds, we acknowledged where he was, what he did and what is his vlog about.

Start from 0:28, he cuts one shot to another where he uses flip and zoom transition to make the sequences change dramatically and smoothly. I saw a lot YouTube tutorial about how to make this particular transition. We can definitely use it when we switch locations from point A to point B.

A 0:43, he filmed his girlfriend from the back (medium shot), flip-flops in her hand (close-up shot) and arriving at the beach (wide shot). In his tutorial video, he explained how he does the fast zoom effect by using Beholder gimbal. From 0:57-0:58 is a perfect example of his signature zoom-in effect.

At 1:03, Action / Reaction shots heighten the action of the scene, as the camera shifts POV between Brandon’s camera and the tortilla making process. If you listen carefully, Brandon added Whoosh Transition Sound Effects when the tortilla was flying/flipping.

At 1:09, he slows down the speed of throwing and flipping the tortilla. At 1:25, he cuts back to the Mexican Music Band. With the acceleration of the music, the film becomes more rapid and compact. At 1:34, the music suddenly came to an end, the video flips to another sequence.

Instead of using slow-motion, he chose fast motion to speed up the road trip with fast zoom/swipe effect. I have to say, “wow, so cool.” However, the fast motion did cause some dizziness.

From 1:53, he cuts between the running and a variety of different scenes (roof, goats, cactus and sunset). At 3:58, with further accelerate the rhythm of the music, the film becomes faster and faster with fast zoom-out effect.

Brandon uses a lot of editing techniques that are not always needed for a simple video blog or a low budget documentary video. However, those stunning effects could help us to create a beautiful cinematic effect video.

More about Brandon’s editing style and gears:

What frame rate he used in his cinematic vlog:

Hong Kong Strong: Director’s Commentary:

 

Gioacchino Petrpnicce: ” The terminal part of the human arm located below the forearm, used for grasping and holding and consisting of the wrist, palm, four fingers, and an opposable thumb. My purpose was to not cover the entire subject of hands. I think that the possibilities are way too wide. I was mostly interested in how hands inspire me.”

I choose this video for a blog post is because I absolutely love the combination of Slow Motion, Fast Forward, and Normal Speed Effects along with the beautiful detail shots. One takeaway from this video is to rethink the value of how to use close-up shots effectively to a beat.

This video starts with a detail shot of the typewriter. Each click matches with the beats of the background music, In the Hall of the Mountain King. After it finished typing the title of the video, it fades to black.

Followed by a close-up shot of lighting the matches. At 0:16, L-cut let the audio leads the picture and continues playing over the beginning of the Polaroid camera scene.

0:19, POV of the hand. It cuts back to the guy’s face with the shadow of his hand.

This video uses a lot of detail shots and super tight shots to demonstrate different hands activities. The natural light in this video is amazing. It also shot in various viewing angles which make this video fascinating and unique. At this point, you get the director’s point, “This video about hands is awe-inspiring.”

There are a lot of match cuts in this video. No matter you are rotating the basketball or spinning the globe, the director cuts from one shot to another where the two shots are matched by the action or subject and subject matter. Another takeaway from his video is the effectiveness of matching cuts, we can definitely use this technique for sports video, music video, cooking video, etc.

At 2:17, with further accelerate the rhythm of the piano, the film becomes faster and faster, almost three different actions in one second. With the piano performances come to an end, the film also comes to a close.

I absolutely love the detail, close-up shots in this video. What struck me was the director’s editing skills: the face-paced match cuts with the beats. This film deserves me to see it again and again.

If you enjoy watching Petronicce’s video, here is another one for you !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=et3j-ZsZ-k8

BBDO New York has always been on my radar for great ad videos. Deceptively touching Judo Kid from “Dad Insurance for Fearless Dreams” embraced the reality and takes us back to remember our first dreams. The reason why I want to write a blog post about this video is because the relationship between the father and son speaks to me. In this less than 3 minutes’ video, it created an emotional bond between the story and the viewers. Absolutely a bonus point for this ad video.

The video starts with a scene, the father carries a package walking into a house with police car’s siren in the background.  It foreshadows for the neighborhood bullies and judo uniform. We can see the director is building the story arc.

The first sequence is about the boy Mateo watches flamenco dancing video in his bedroom. A wide shot illustrates how much he loves flamenco dance with all kinds of posters on his wall. At 0:05, a close-up POV of the video Mateo is watching. At 0:08, camera shifts back to Mateo.

At 0:24, the dark, scary music starts playing in the background after Mateo realized his father bought him a judo uniform instead of a flamenco outfit. We as the audience know how much Mateo loves flamenco dancing. However, every story never goes as what protagonist or the viewer wanted.

At 0:29, neighborhood bullies’ voice over the soundtrack. We watch his father protect him as he walks past the bullies. The arc of the story is climbing. At 0:36, POV of the moving bus. Camera shifts back to a medium shot of Mateo’s mixed feeling face. At 0:39, a wide shot of Mateo and his father on a bus heading to judo practice.  We all know how we Mateo’s feeling, to do something we don’t want to. This story creates a strong sense of emotional connection between the story arc and the viewers. 

At 0:44, the rhythm of the video becomes faster follows Mateo through his judo practice, where he struggles at first, to bigger and bigger competitions.

 At 1:29, a wide shot shows Mateo’s unremitting efforts to train judo. At 1:58, the story takes an unexpected turn. After Mateo has gained enough skills, strength, and confidence from his judo classes and competitions, his father gives him another package, flamenco outfit. Here it is, the peak of the story arc : a father gave his song the greatest gift anyone could give another person – he believed in his son, Mateo. #dad’slove

After the father and son’s hug, the mood and rhythm of music changed dramatically. From the dark fast beat into a high pleasant pace. Mateo heads down the sidewalk again, he’s walking by himself without fears.  

In this two minutes and thirty seconds’ short film, it brings an emotional demonstration between a father and a son. We often asked our story, “is this a story.” This typical father-son story comes from real life, bit by bit it creates a strong emotional connection along with the story arc.  Sometimes, there is no need for us to use a lot of dialogue or superb post-production. What we need is to bond with people and dig into the humanity.  Show don’t tell.

More : http://creativity-online.com/work/american-family-insurance-dad-insurance-for-fearless-dreams/47809

Marcus Yam is a staff photographer at Los Angeles Times. I followed him on Twitter during the San Bernardino shooting in 2015. I was gathering photographs online for my religious study class’s daily news presentation. Hyperlinks and mouse clicks got me on Marcus’s Twitter page. Ever since that day, Marcus Yam as a visual journalist inspires me to continue pursuing my dream in photojournalism¹.

Marcus was born and raised in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. He left his science career in Aerospace Engineering to start a new life as a visual journalist. Before he moved to Los Angeles, Marcus was part of The Seattle Times team covered the deadly landslide in Oso Washington and earned a Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting in 2014. From 2012 to 2013, Marcus worked as a contributor to The New York Times and a short film included his feature in,  “The Home Front” earned him an Emmy Award, a World Press Photo multimedia grand prize, an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award, a Pictures of the Year International Multimedia Award and a DART Award for TraumaCoverage².

I conducted an email interview with Marcus during his preparation as one of the keynote speakers for Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar on November 08, 2016.

• I remember your Twitter Bio used to say, “former rocket scientist,” what makes you want to be a visual journalist? 

It’s a long story. I stumbled into photography by accident. Being a foreign student in the US meant that I needed English credits to graduate with my engineering degree. Yes, I was in school for aerospace engineering. Long story short – the college newspaper back then provided the English credits I required if you wrote or took pictures for them. So out of sheer laziness, I opted for the latter. I bought the first my first camera and started taking pictures. It was mostly very amateurish stuff: Concerts, friends, and athletic events. The work that I did for the college newspaper ended up on a photo editor’s desk at the Buffalo News who was the advisor for it. I guess he liked what he saw. He tracked me down, and we had a conversation about what I wanted to do with my life. I told him I didn’t even think photography was a career and I was adamant about fulfilling my dream. He then offered me an internship, told me that I ought to at least try it out. He said, if I didn’t like it, I could return to doing engineering and forget this ever happened.

So I took his offer and fell in love with it. Three or four weeks into the internship, I decided that this was what I was going to do for the rest of my life.

• What is the hardest part about your job as the visual journalist?

The hardest part of my job is coming up with fresh and relevant ideas that contextualize what’s happening in the news cycle. And making necessary personal sacrifices that come with this profession. (I don’t have much of a personal life)

• What steps did you take to get the job as the visual journalist for Los Angeles Times or your pervious job at NYT, Seattle Times?

There aren’t any steps to how I came to be where I am. Everything I’ve done – are mostly steps taken with the philosophy of doing what others are not doing. When they zig, you zag. That’s something someone told me early on when I was first starting out.

When I was first starting out, I knew I needed additional foundation as I didn’t know anything about photojournalism. So I applied and was accepted into the Ohio University Visual Communications School. It was an immersive documentary photojournalism program meant for mid-career photographers to get retooled and retrained – so that they can re-enter the industry. Me and my roommate Peter Hoffman were the youngest graduate students in the program as everyone else was about 30 then. It was a fantastic boot camp. Before I could complete graduate school, I got an internship offer to the New York Times. I had the time of my life there.

After my internship, I then transitioned into a full-time freelancer. From there, I decided that I needed to work on my vision and execution more because I wasn’t growing fast enough as a freelancer working to make a living, paycheck-to-paycheck. So I decided that I needed to be in an immersive environment where I could spread my creative wings more. I applied to the Seattle Times and got accepted there. From there, the Los Angeles Times recruited me down to work for them a year and a half later.

• How long did it take for you to get where you are?

Long. Longer than I had wanted it to be. I would count it since 2010.

• Was it hard finding a job as visual journalist/ photographer in the field?

No, I wasn’t really looking hard enough. I think opportunities will open up when you least expect it but only if you are ready for it.

• What advice can you give me to share with my classmates?

Yes, don’t just think about making a nice box to fit in the world full of boxes. Think about what-other-shaped-container you’d like to enter the world with. In a round about silly way of describing things: hone your vision and execution. That matters more than affirmations or validations. At the end of the day, it’s about what you are adding to the conversation and doing something to create change.

Article about him:

Who Does The New York Times Follow on Instagram?

His recent works:

A huge Trump head is burned an effigy in front of city hall #dtla (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ Twitter).

Tonight feels surreal. Protesters, megaphones, cops, helicopters, jammed freeways and a ton of people LIVE STREAMING every second. #dtla (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ Twitter).

Ashley and Carol embrace each other as the election results continue to stream in – in favor of Donald Trump. #Elections2016 (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ Twitter).

Meanwhile, in Los Angeles: Libertarian candidate for President, Gary Johnson, makes a campaign appearance on Sunset Blvd (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ Twitter).

Eerie: Burned cars on Hwy 138 sit in the glow of the full moon as #BlueCutFire rages on (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ Twitter).

“WALL OFF TRUMP” protest outside the #RNCinCLE (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ Twitter).

Single (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ website)

San Bernardino shooting (courtesy of Marcus Yam’ website)

1. Photo by Damon Winter. Courtesy of Marcus Yam’s website.
2. Yam, M (2016) http://www.marcusyam.com

 

With the development of science and technology, in today’s world, we can use our iPhone to shoot 4k video clips and cut into a beautiful low-budget cinematic film. However, the quality of the film characters’ on the image resolution, the subjects and themes determine the value of the film. “Splitscreen: A Love Story” was shot entirely on a Nokia N8 Mobile phone in 2011.This two minutes and twenty-five seconds’ film directed by James W Griffiths and produced by Kurban Kassam. Five years ago, the cell phone’s camera lens did not have the 4k quality or f 1.4 apertures, what they do have is the idea and the editing skills for this unusual love story.

It starts with an L-Cut.  We can hear the alarm sound before we see the title “Splitscreen: A Love Story.” The graphic title uses the effect of the alarm clock screen which matches perfectly with the alarm sound. It is smart and neat.At 0:07, the story starts with two evenly split screens, the female character is on the left, and the male character is on the right

In the following thirteen seconds, the videographer shot four different close-up shots of showerhead, egg, coffee and newspaper.Two split screens were edited perfectly to illustrate the character’s morning routine. At 0:23, the camera as the character’s point of view shows what they see while they are walking to the subway station. There are two color tones in this video separated by the screen; the left side is warmer and right side is colder. At 0:28, we realized the female charter is in Paris (Tolbiac Station), and the male character is in New York City (168 Street). At 0:29, the train arrived at the subway station; two different trains was edited perfectly as one matched shot.At 0:32, we can see the differences between the color on the left and right. More importantly, the picture is edited entirely as one neat screen. Every scene matched evenly and delicately, from graffiti to bridge to the subway station to taxi, etc. At 1:00, the most iconic cut/edit: a male from the right screen walks into the left screen, male with hat transited to the male with glasses.  

The camera continued to be the point of view presented two characters who were doing the exactly same thing in two different cities. At 1:22, we realized two characters of this love story is a plane. At 1:31, double-decker bus arrived on the same frame and edited evenly for the two split screens.In the next series of jump cuts, we realized two characters might meet up in London.

At 1:48, they are both walking on the same bridge, from one side to another. At 1:53, a vertical panning shot from maps to two character’s face, cameras continued to be the character’s point of view. Finally, this long-distance relationship couple met each other in London.The story ends with a medium shot of this couple smiled at each other on the bridge. At 1:59, film faded to black.

“Their smiles were the garrets of a fairy palace where the real world would never come.” A beautiful love story shot by Nokia N8. The whole story does not use any words, dialogue or narrative. It used two separate screens to illustrate the love story of a long-distance relationship couple finally met each other in London. It is simple and well executed.

 

I discovered Food From Home series on Vimeo this week. It is a two minutes and fourteen seconds short film about Christine Ha, a chef, an author and the winner of MasterChef Season 3. It documents a real story about to preserve on film, to share Ha’s touching story about her mother’s cooking and passion behind recreating her dishes.  This short film was produced by Andrew Gooi, a filmmaker, and creator of Food Talkies.

In each of the Food From Home series, it begins with a four-second long “FOOD | TALKIES” title, a white plate spinning on a white background. Then the film fades to black and started the story about Christine Ha. The color tone of this film is warm. It highlights the family’s warmth and reflects the relationship between Ha and her mother. At 00:10, this film began with a soundtrack music and a blurry image of Ha cooking in the kitchen. Two seconds later, Ha as the main character starts talking about her mother’s cooking and her homemade Vietnamese food. Along with the audio, we can see different close-up shots of her hands cutting garlic, onions, and carrots.

There are three different audio layers in this film, Ha’s voice, soundtrack (starts at the beginning) and sound effects (cutting garlic, water boiling, deep-frying, etc.) At 00:20, film shifted from close-up to medium shot, we can see a clear, focused image of Ha in the kitchen making food. 

This story uses an A-Roll and B-roll technique to tell Ha’s story. A-roll is Christine as the chef making spring rolls in the kitchen.  B-roll as the supplemental footage intercut with the main shot, and it transitioned into the touching story of her mother’s cooking and her passion behind recreating her dishes. At 00:26, the film shows a face-to-face interview of Ha talking about how her parents came to the United States in 1975 as refugee right after the fall of Saigon, Vietnam. It uses parallel editing cuts between her interview to her process of making spring rolls. This film has a lot of close-up shots during Ha making the eggrolls, peeling, stuffing, dipping, etc.

At 1:01, Ha started talking about her mother who passed away because of cancer. It transitions to the second phase of making food. It slowly tells the audience how Ha learned to cook and why she learned to cook. The loss of her mother inspired her to recreates her mother’s dishes and flavors.

At 1:22, Ha explained what spring rolls mean to her, “guilty pleasure,” happy time with her family during her birthdays and Vietnamese’s New Year. Instead of building establish shots or wide shots, this film used tons and tons close-up shots to show the details of Ha making spring rolls.

At 1:35, we can see the detail shot of the oil and a slow-mo shot of  Ha lifting the eggroll from the oil. The shallow depth of field, music and the motion combined together perfectly.

At 1:45, we see the final product of spring rolls and Ha’s story toward the end, “Food of my mom is showing she cares about us and see the joy of food she produced in the kitchen.”

At 1:53, it transitioned to a medium shot to illustrated the family value means to Ha, “in the way of creating food in the kitchen with her, in a spirit.”

At 2:01, a close-up detail shot of the freshly fried spring roll. Then it fades to black as the ending.

Overall, Food From Home: Christine Ha is an intense and detail-oriented film. The director uses two minutes and fourteen seconds to illustrate a touching story behind Chef Christine Ha’s cooking and her passion behind recreating her dishes. Kakehashi: A Portrait of Chef Nobuo Fukuda is another fascinating piece made by Andrew Gooi.

If you are interested, you can find more :  https://vimeo.com/182023749