[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ixk7U_0aVMM&hl=en]
What: A tour of Zola, a new downtown Spokane nightclub, with owner/developer/artist Dan Spalding. He created the interior with almost completely salvaged and recycled materials.
High hopes: I got to use a much nicer camera than I had before, so I was expecting to create greatness. I don’t know if I got that, but I’m pretty happy about what I was able to do in about two minutes.
Areas for improvement: This could be sharper technically. I wish I’d taken the time to set up a tripod for several shots. But I liked the flexibility of working without. I also debated going back to the bar at night to get some crowd shots to round out the B roll. In the end, time and energy constraints kept me from doing so. Low-light conditions affected several shots, which I included anyway for the sake of variety.
Conclusion: I have to remind myself that this was only my fourth video effort, and I can’t expect to nail it all at this point.
For more: Visit spokane7.com.
Posted by Zahler at 10:09 am on March 29th, 2008.
Categories: Shameless self-promotion, Video. Tags: bars, dan spalding, nightlife, recycling, Spokane, spokesman-review, Video.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46SV8WwyHZI&rel=1]
What: The finished video I promoted in a previous post. I shot it Monday night, edited it Wednesday and Thursday morning and posted it Thursday afternoon.
Why so slow: Partly, this was because the video pairs with a story in the Spokesman-Review’s 7 section (read it here), and I didn’t want be finished too far in advance. But this also proved a more complicated edit for me. I had shot a lot of b roll — part inexperience, part justified assumption that bad lighting would make some of it unusable. Scrubbing through the footage took time, and so did forming my narrative and sequencing my shots around it.
What worked: More variety of wide, medium, and medium-tight shots in this second effort. Fun subject matter. Incorporation of natural sound to help form the narrative.
Gained wisdom: Interview more people than you think you will need; I really wished I had talked to the third competitor. Film my talking heads even tighter. Beware (again!) of echoes; it probably would have been better to interview my subjects outside. Turn tight shots into super-tight shots. In low-light situations, my little Sony doesn’t quite cut it.
Posted by Zahler at 1:51 pm on February 22nd, 2008.
Categories: Shameless self-promotion, Video. Tags: alcohol, Bartenders, booze, competition, entertainment, iron bartender, nightlife, Raw sushi, Spokane.
