Most recent trailer
 

Just finished cutting a trailer for a couple who had a beautiful event at a gorgeous venue in Central Jersey. I have to say- I think it's the first time I've seen a sunset over the water (darn you left-coasters!). lol Anyway it was shot with XH-A1s, and cut in Final Cut, enjoy...

http://www.gmelliottvideo.com/alifranktrailer.mov

Good stuff, Glen. On the opening shot I couldn't help but notice you weren't locked down on a tripod. For those establishing "still" shots I think that's just about a requirement. I know how it is shooting run'n'gun, though. I'm just trying to make a rule for myself now not to cheat and try and shoot off the tripod when I should be on the tripod, ya know?

Anyways, the rest was great. I don't know if this couple was all about family, but you did an excellent job of capturing the faces and emotions of the people who were there. I thought you did especially well at capturing the boy, who I'm sure is pretty important to them.

You labeled this video a trailer, but it plays more like a highlights video to me. I expect a trailer to be fairly short (30-90 seconds) and really skip through the day quickly. Not a big deal .. just the length and format surprised me.

You mentioned A1's and FCP, so I have two questions.

First, are you using a preset with the A1's or shooting flat and grading in post?

Second, are you doing your titling within FCP or something else? I tried LiveType and it feels like more of a hassle than it's worth, especially when Motion actual has more variables/effects for type.

Hey Travis, thanks for watching and commenting. I do indeed get carried away when I cut "trailers" and they end up being quite close to a highlight. A highlight is usually an entire song (3-4 minutes) and use a great deal more audio- vows, toasts/speeches, interviews (if applicable). I need to limit the trailer lengths to 90 seconds- that way it wont take a work-day to complete them. Very good point you brought up.

Regarding the A1's- I think I'm very different in my approach as I like to get the image as close as possible to ideal right out of the camera. The only filters I used in this were an occasional vignette, and light sky grad (MB looks) on the beach stuff. Usually the only filter I use is a vignette when I feel the shot can benefit from it. Otherwise the colors and exposure are AS-IS directly out of the camera.

My workflow is this way because, as you see, I don't apply heavy filtering or color grade my work. I don't feel the heavy graded look is conducive to my style- which I try to keep light (not overly "cinematic") with an emphasis on shot progression and story-telling.

Regarding titling I keep it simple in this regard as well. I use the built in "text" tool in FCP. All in all in the past 2 years I've moved into a very straight forward, stripped-down approach to my work. I don't work with slow-motion, dissolves, or heavy filtering. So really I could be editing on pretty much any NLE out there, I just so happen to prefer OSX over Vista/Windows.

Hey Glen,
Fantastic job on the trailer. It did feel like more of a trailer as Travis pointed out but it was quite engaging. Love the transition you did to get to the reception with the sunset. Very goo cut of the bride feeding the cake. You hit that cut to the next angle seamlessly. Who helped you on this job? Was it Darrell or your other assistant? Thanks for sharing Glen. I always enjoy viewing your videos.

Monday

Hey Monday- both Darrell and my fiance helped out on this job. Thanks for the kind words.

Thanks for the info. I've been nervous about using presets because a specific preset might not work for a specific lighting situation, so I prefer to shoot flat and enhance the look later. Whatever you're doing is working great, though, so I wouldn't change it.

I've found that the text tool in FCP can sometimes not look good. For example, in my trailer I started out with FCP text and it looked fine. But once I added motion to the text via keyframes, the letters would bounce and flicker while they were moving. Bringing in text with movement from Motion solved that. Very odd that you can't get FCP text to move without issues in FCP. I don't use a lot of moving text, though, so usually the standard FCP text tool works fine.

I think you're other work looks great too by the way.

I know what you mean by this. I tried using FCP text but found my text to look better using motion. I normally take a preset and change it up for whatever I need and sometimes mix and match to get the look I want. I still have a hard time getting my work to look as great as you guys work.

Hey Glen....I thought this was nicely done and looked really clean. Did you light the church at all...it looked really good. The golden hour really made the beachfront home pop.

Travis when you animate text in FCP do not, and I repeat do NOT animate it by keyframing the text/font size. That will result in the appearance that you described. Rather animated it with the motion tab.

Thanks again for the kind words.

Hey John, how are you? No I didn't light the church at all- the church was pretty dark actually. Those shots at the alter were 1/24th with 12db of gain. Luckily the gain noise produced by the A1s is luma as opposed to chroma which masks it quite well. Especially on a downconversion for the web.

Wow..12db...I need to try that with my A1's. I would have expected a ton of noise. Way to push the camera.

We are doing well...hope to see you and the sidekick in Austin :)

Hey glen,
whats the name of that song, pretty cool sound track

Glen, when you have plenty of light are you using a 0db gain setting or a -3db gain setting?

@Robert: It's "Vive la vida" by Coldplay.
The whole album (which has the same name) is fantastic.

as usual, the reception lighting is perfect. loved it man.

I have to say this sample from Glen is worthy of my first post on this forum.
Excellent pace and cut together well with some nice smooth camera moves, what glidecam do you use Glen?

Phil

Great job, I always enjoy your work! I actually did a huge favor for close friends of mine to do the videography for their wedding. I agreed and it was my first time so I did a lit bit of research a found your samples which gave me an idea how to go about doing their wedding.

Anyways, I did their highlights awhile ago and used the same Coldplay song, and we ended it the same way with the B&G dance! I guess great minds think alike? Of course yours blew mine out of the water :)

Glen (great name by the way :P), I've noticed several times on these forums that there's a lot of copyrighted music used in videos. Are you not concerned at all with the legalities of doing so?

I assume that your client paid for the trailer, too. I was always under the impression that for free jobs, it might be okay to tread into the realm of copyrighted music, but always to go royalty free for any paid job.

Anyway, I was just wondering what your thoughts are on the matter. (Personally, I loved your use of the song!)

How's this? A 5 month bump for this topic!

I was sorting out some stuff on the desktop and came across this file which I must have downloaded a while ago and never viewed.

Glen - this is some absolutely beautiful work. Practically flawless IMHO. It's not very often that I get so totally immersed in watching a wedding highlights that I completely forget about the technical side of things, but this clip did it for me.

Beautiful camera movements, audio, story telling and colouring throughout. It looks like it was a great wedding and seems like you did it justice and more.

Cheers

Matt.

Very nice!
 

Very nice clip. Well done! I tried using that song for a trailer but decided wasn't a good choice but you nailed it :) The voice of celebrant works wonders with the smiles.

Santo

Glen:

Good job! You said that there was no preset involved? What were your camera settings? Were they 60I /HDV, wha was your shutter speed?

Unfortunately I won't be able to make it- you guys have fun. Make sure someone there vlogs it!

I typically shoot for -3db as it will give a cleaner image- however I'm sure several times I end up forgetting to change it to -3 and use the standard 0. Truth be told the difference between them is minimal. The biggest single thing you can do to clean your image up with high gain is turn your sharpness down as low as it can go. It doesn't affect the clarity and removes some of the noise the sharpening algorithm introduces and/or enhances.

Sorry for the late reply- and welcome to DVinfo! I used a Glidecam 4000 Pro, but have since upgraded to the 4000 HD unit.

Hey Andrew thank you for the kind words. I know where you are coming from- there were some edits I cut to certain songs that I've seen done previously by the likes of Patrick M. After the cut was complete I didn't feel I did it as much justice. Overall though, that's a good thing- keeps you hungering for growth.

Wow thank you for the gleaming praise- that's very flattering. I've been downing my work as of late- especially with the onset of all these 35mil adapter shooters. So much so that I plunked down 2k on the RedRock DSLR rig to allow me to use my mkII in a more natural way for shooting video. I'm trying to hold off until Canon brings out a camera based on the guts of a DSLR like the mkII. DVinfo isn't big on rumors- so I emphasize the fact that it's simply my "hope" that such a thing will come to fruition.

I don't recall the settings used- I know I crushed the blacks in-camera and used a Cinegamma preset. It was all shot in 24f with shutter speeds ranging from 1/48th to 1/24th. I don't believe I went higher than 1/48th in this shoot- however I routinely do so now if the light allows.

Glen, that was amazing I loved it. I have got to work on moving camera it really gives the video a professional look.

If your ever up in the NW corner of the state, please stop by.
Denny