Clip: what to do with bad footage
 

Hey all,

Just finished editing some of the worst footage I've ever seen. I was the second editor to get a shot at it, after the bride broke down in tears from viewing the first attempt.

I could go on for days about this cameraman, but will restrain myself unless you want details of what I had to work around.

It was rough, but interestingly, also forced me to change the way I think about looking at shots. So in a way, it was a good learning experience:

http://www.nosmallroles.com/tjp-highlights.wmv

All the stills are frames from the video. The song was chosen by the bride cause she liked its use in a demo I did. And yes, Travis, I know some of the shots lack contrast, but darnit! you should see the original!

Feedback welcome as always.

Wow, dirty lens, out of focus footage, low light issues galore, and SOME apparently usable stuff...

Looked great! Hope the bride appreciates the vibe, liked the way you worked with the imperfections to create a vintage mood!

Well, if you wouldn't have told me that the original footage was crap I would have enjoyed it because it was something completely different from the very polished and pro footage that you usually see here. For me it would have looked like the out of focus, the color en the lack of contrast were applied intentionally to give it some kind of 70's look.

It's like you said that being forced to look at your way of editing in a different way will make your footage more unique. After seeing this, I don't think the bride will have to look for a 3rd editor. :)

Tip of the iceberg, let me tell you. He was on auto gain the whole day, then kept stopping down, so gain (PD150) was usually at max, even outside. There were actual fingerprints on the lens. I've never seen that...

I made so many stills because he was the shakiest shooter I've ever seen. Most of them, I looked for a camera flash since everything was severly underexposed. Also, he used a photo tripod at the church that had no fluid pan/tilt head, just a photo lock down head. You can imagine what it looked like when he tried to follow movement.

Never mind that he had no conception of what a frame was. Anyway, like I said, I could go on and on.

Thanks, Dave. I'm glad that comes through, cause that's exactly what I tried to do.

Actually, you're right. I blurred some shots intentionally to match other out of focus shots. There was a lot of colour work to change the look.

Thanks for the kind feedback, Noa.

Hey Vito,

I think you did a great job. Before I read your last post, I was thinking that this dude might just be starting out, maybe he's still working for free. Dunno.

I did however like the shot of the camera sitting on the alter. (that lacks respect.) But good job. I feel for the guy, I hope he understands what he needs to change.

I think you did a great job with the footage.

Nice job Vito, very inventive!

Hey, I'm shooting in Montreal May 24th. If you're working that day maybe our paths will cross in Old Montreal.

Thanks, you guys.

Andrew, it would be great to run into you. I am shooting that day. Two camera job with Landyn. Hope we run into you!

Hi Vito,

Could you tell me the version name to the Louis Armstrong, What a wonderful world?

I have never heard that start to the track before.

Hope you can help.

Regards

Wayne

You did a good job of the footage by the way, considering what you had to play with.

Sent you an email Wayne...

Hi Vito

Emailed you back.

Thanking you

Vito, the contrast is too flat. Just kidding!

From what you had to work with I think you pretty much pulled off a miracle. You should save the bad footage and show it to potential brides who think that their uncle can film the wedding for them, lol.

My only suggestion would be at the beginning you transition from a shot of the groom in B&W, and during the transition it goes to color. Minor issue, but easy to fix too.

As a newbie videographer, I am constantly learning about the process. I look at all the professional clips here and I really want to learn the skills to film at that level.

I feel that I am good at what I do. But I know I still have a lot to learn. So I look at this video and I can't help to think that it's not all that bad - and dare I say it, I've made the same mistakes. Oh well - as long as I LEARN from them.

Here's my stupid question - I know that the contrast in the video is bad - how can it be fixed/avoided?

I would say it can be avoided to some extent by shooting with proper exposure, but even then, you will still probably want to adjust the footage in post using a contrast filter or a color corrector.

Travis - thanks for the reply. Forgive me, but how do you know if you have the right exposure. Is it just as simple as the image seeing if the image is too light or too dark. I can certainly figure that one out - but it's making the adjustments so that it is just right.

Well, in the camera you should have access to "zebras". These allow you to make sure you don't blow out your whites, or at least your important whites. There isn't a whole lot more you can do unless you have a camera that allows for custom presets that affect contrast (which many do, like my GL2's).

Most of my contrast adjustment is done in post however via a color corrector filter.

Yes, I've been using the zebras and help quite a bit. Also, I've been playing with the custom presets a bit as well.

I guess I just want to make sure I'm doing it right. Sounds like I'm doing okay.

For color correction, I'm using Final Cut Pro. Still figuring it all out - but getting there.

Thanks so much!

No problem. Good luck!

Dammit, Travis, you have a good eye! I figured I would just tweak that out but couldn't even find it the first time around. On a 20 frame fade to black, no less.

It's my crusade now to post something one day, about which you will have no suggestions as to colour or contrast... (note correct spelling of colour :-).

Always appreciate your time. Thanks a million.

No problem, Vito. I know most of us post our work on here to get some sort of useful critique out of it, if not some support as well. So I always speak freely about anything that stuck out for me, even if I thought the piece was great.

Case in point, I actually felt a shot didn't feel right in Patrick Moreau's recent Beastie Boys music montage, and although the entire production was stellar in my opinion, I still pointed out that clip.

So I'm glad that you find my posts valuable, and that you understand I'm just trying to help us all get better. If nothing else, you've made me laugh out loud twice today!

love the noirish feel you had in the beginning part, very nice. Should have kept it that way the whole way through. But, very nice. I have taken on a couple of these jobs myself, and no more from now on.

For me, personally, I can't stand cleaning up someone's mess, and have even sent jobs back from "professional" crews because they were such shit, the amount of time wasn't worth the pay to edit it. Makes you want to call the person who shot it and ask them WTF are you doing in this business!?

Personally....I LOVE your edit!! It's got a great "feel" to it! The B&G will be thrilled!!

On Dark dark scenes
 

If a scene is very very dark, I usually take the opportunity to play with the camera some and just see what I can do. For example, one wedding when I was just starting out, I happen to be shooting with a Sony camera that has that "night shot" feature which is an IR LED or two and it switches to a green/grey scale image. That was hte only way to shoot the footage, so I did it. Then in post I just turned everything to B&W and then colorized things and added layers of color effects. The dancing was done to some 80s song, so the bright colorization worked pretty well.

As for dealing with the very very blurry shots from 1/15sec shots.... there isn't much you can do with that. It just isn't usable. I'd rather see grain than that kind of blur. You did a good job minimizing the impact of those shots. It is better to leave them out, than include them and make the viewer go "Ewwwww."

Hurray. Excellent work. She should thank the cameraman for screwing up. Probably wouldn't have got nearly as interesting a film otherwise :-)

I think you may have missed that he was editing footage that was given to him, not footage he shot himself.

I got that part. The first part of my comment addresses what to do in those instances if you are the shooter, the second part to if you are the editor. I was trying to combine both thoughts into the same post.

Oh, okay, my bad. It's been a long week, lol.

No problem. I was kind of straying from the topic by introducing shooting topics, instead of just editing topics.

Usually, I'm with you on that, but this time I felt like it gave me a chance to change my thinking a bit, so I learned something.

Thanks for all your feedback, guys. Always helpful.

Interesting idea
 

I learned most of my "what not to do while shooting" by editing the footage I shot and thinking "Awwww crap. I need to remember not to do X," etc.

It would no doubt benefit me to edit another shooter's footage so I can learn a different set of mistakes to not do, instead of the same set of mistakes from my footage. :-)

Too funny! I'll never forget the sense of horror I had watching my own stuff when I first edited it. Thank God it's much better now, though I still see things I can't believe I was stupid enough to do.