UWOL #8 "Mountain Nature" by Trond Saetre
 

This round I had a hard time coming up with a topic. But when I finally found the idea, it didn't take too long to make the story.

So when the one day with sunshine finally arrived, there was no time to waste, so I grabbed my gear, and went hiking.

The purpose was to show how the nature or vegetation changes as I went higher and higher up on the mountain.
This is only a small mountain, with the top I went up to at about 350 meters. But still, the differences from the sea level and up to the top was really big. The forest dominates the lower half, but then as I went higher, the view of the surroundings gradually appeared as the forest became thinner.

Link:
http://www.uwolchallenge.com/challen...tainnature.mov

Youtube: (lower quality)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JM1J0svTfj4

Hallo Tond

Nice entery here, and wee was nerly in the same area in this entery.
I was a bit longer in the fjord.Was it Lyderhorn. You maked
a good film from this place.

Greait work!!

VJV.

_______________

Hi Vidar, thanks for the comment.
Yes I was on the mountain Lyderhorn.

Hey Trond,
What an amazing mountain & a great story. I would never have thought that you could have so much difference in the vegetation over that little elevation change. Your shots were great, all the shots were held for the right amount of time, & the music went well with it. The whole time i watched it i was thinking i wanted to be there.
On a technical note, your sound was quite distorted from the compression, would you be able to up the sample rate of the audio to improve it & still make it in under the 60mb limit? I'm not great on that sort of thing yet, but noted that your file was only 52.4mb so figure you may be able to up that a bit to improve the audio. Apart from that, i thought it was your best yet, well done.

Bryce

Hey Trond.

Nice piece. I like the premise a lot. I'm always intrigued to see how the environment change with altitude and seeing how spring arrives that bit later in your peice made an interesting story. Shots were nice generally although a bit more compositional thought might be needed here and there. One or two fading transitions used in the right places might help with some variety as well. Your VO was nice in content but the recording/compression brought down the quality of the piece.

Nice story...great stuff!

Bryce and Mat,
Thank you very much for the feedback.
I will check the audio compression settings. Seems like I might have used another audio codec and a lot more compression than I use to.

Tronde,

Nicely done!! I liked the theme of showing the transition in relationship to elevation!!!! Great idea!!
Some very fine footage. I realize you shot in HD, but I was curious how you compress it so that you still retain such nice resolution/clearity at 60 mbts!!

Favorite is the ice shot with traveling water behind the outer ice layer!!!


Second favorite is your opening shot!!


Keep up the great work.

Hi Dale, thank you for the feeback.
It was not shot in HD, but standard SD. My camera is the good old Canon XM2 we both are familiar with. :)
I use Sorenson Squeeze 4.5 to compress the avi file into quicktime.
Will check the settings I used for this video later when I come home from work, and let you know.

This was an interesting perspective on how altitude influences spring. Something I am familiar with- living at about the height of your peak, we had a brief snowfall a couple days ago here, while down in town, the cherry trees have finished blooming. I like your mix of shots, and you managed to convey a feeling of movement through time and space. As others note, the audio quality seemed diminished by compression, but that was the only technical problem I saw/heard. Great job!

Ruth

Trond!

This is your best yet! What a great interpretation on the theme! Well done friend. To have one good day of filming I'd say you pegged it.

Cat

Catherine, thank you for the comment.
I am glad you liked it.

Thank you for the comment, Ruth.
I did some testing with different audio codecs today after receiving your comment, and it seems like I got much better audio quality by using mp3 audio codec instead of the one I originally used.

Very pretty film, Trond, you Vikings are spoiled with beautiful scenery. It is always a treat to go on a journey through such lovely landscapes. I like the concept of transitioning through the ecosystems at different altitudes--Colorado is a lot like that, too.

My only suggestion would be to add a little more motion to some of your shots. It was a little bit on the photographic side. Nice composition and a good job of putting it together.

Very pretty place you have there Trond....

Like your panoramic shots from the top....I got a good sense of height and distance....

You used the theme very well....I'll watch this one again.

Bob T.

Trond:

Nice film and images and great idea to follow the announced theme.

You really brought me to the top of that mountain. The view was very spectacular and I think I saw a suspension bridge off in the distance. I agree the audio sounded like it suffered in compression, your voice sounded over-modulated.

Other than that, this was a very good piece of work and I'm sure the audio problem will be easy to sort out.