thuvia ptarth

My (self-imposed) restrictions for Seoul Town Road were no repeated sources, vidders, or musical artists. Additionally, I wanted to showcase vidders who weren't part of the Vidukon/Vividcon/Fanworks/etc set of vidding fandom or, when I did include those vidders, I tried to limit myself to vids that were less likely to have been shown recently. That plus the time constraints of a single vidshow meant that I eliminated a lot of vids that were in my first cut.

I'm mostly not going to list multiple vids by the same vidder or other vids by vidders already in the show, but you should definitely check out the vidders' other work.

My absolute favorite vids that I cut because I thought most people would have seen them already

• skygiants, Our Ghost (시카고 타자기 | Chicago Typewriter) Canonical character death, nongraphic violence.


• helcinda, Rewrite the Stars (더 킹：영원의 군주 | King: The Eternal Monarch) Nongraphic violence.

Vid I cut because another vid by the same vidder fit better and also it was kind of long

daegorr, Game Over (알함브라 궁전의 추억 | Memories of the Alhambra) This was also tempting because I only had one kpop vid in the show, but ... I wanted something to use the same vidder for a romance with a supernatural male lead (very common genre) and I thought this one might be too similar to Meliora MV's "Natural", which had an edge partly because I'd seen the source. Action movie violence.

Vids I cut because I couldn't decide between the two of them and also they were kind of long

• beccatoria, Matches to Paperdolls (선덕여왕 | Queen Seondeok) Non-graphic violence.


• shati, Hope on Fire (선덕여왕 | Queen Seondeok) Non-graphic violence.

Vids I cut because I had more dark/grim/suspense/horror vids than I could use

• pteryx, Will I Make It Out Alive (multi). Graphic violence, death, zombies, apocalypse, general bleakness, gunshots, explosions, quickcutting.


• Headsunder, the end has already begun (손 | The Guest) Horror, exorcisms, gore, graphic violence, death, extreme creepiness.

Vid I cut because I already had enough vids to eerie elecronic songs sung by sopranos

MoonCalledA, washed out (달의 연인-보보경심 려 | Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryo) Death, blood, violence (PG-13? Low R?)

Vid I cut because I already had an Imagine Dragons vid and also I found a vid for the same source to more unusual music (for a kdrama vid)

irxdxscent, Believer (Vincenzo) As a rough guess, 75% of all kdrama vids on YouTube are to Imagine Dragons or Billie Eilish. Graphic violence, gunshots, explosions.

Vid I cut because I couldn't deal with the source dialogue without the source background music removed

reiichi, Symphony (WISH YOU: 나의 마음속 너의 멜로디) I was so tempted, because except for those two dialogue bits, this is an adorable vid for a canon m/m pairing. But I really couldn't deal with those two dialogue bits. No standard triggers.

Palate cleansers

I ended not including anything really goofy because ... I am an overserious person. Sorry. But here are some palate cleansers:

• skygiants, Weird Friends (성균관 스캔들 | Sungkyunkwan Scandal) No standard warnings.


• shati, Kim Yoon Hee's the Man (성균관 스캔들 | Sungkyunkwan Scandal) No standard warnings.


• imbir, Motel Six (호텔 델루나 | Hotel del Luna) Death, blood.

stultiloquentia said:

I'm interested in how you pick your vid songs and moods in general, because Thousand Eyes was such a fascinating, and I think brave, choice, because it took such skill and confidence to navigate the pacing. It's one of those vids I love more every time I watch it. I want to know everything about how you made it.

First, sorry for the delay!

Second, thank you so much!

Third: wow, this is even longer than I expected.

( Song choice )

( 'Thousand Eyes' and pacing )

I'd love to hear about how other vidders think about song choice and/or pacing, if they feel like posting.

alpharatz and corbae put together a really great presentation on getting started vidding. It includes examples of a lot of different ways of doing things, and that plus people sharing some of their processes, tips, and tricks at vidukon_cardiff made me think it might be useful to share how I do things. I'm going to try to put some stuff together and tag it all "vidding process".

Today I'm going to talk about using proxies when vidding.

( What's a proxy? )

( Why are proxies necessary? )

( Proxy file size and hardware constraints )

( Proxy workflow )

( Proxies in Adobe Premiere )

( Proxies in DaVinci Resolve )

This should probably have gone in the previous post, but I forgot. Maybe I will update it just to have everything in one place.

Things I learned this year

• Premiere's new color match tool is amazing.
  
• Relatedly, color matching can smooth a jarring clip transition.
  
• You can use vignettes to subtly change the focus of a clip. This again can help to smooth jarring clip transitions.
  
• You can color code source and clips to track useful information.
  
• You can stack timelines vertically as well as tabbing through them horizontally.
  
• Sometimes video tutorials on video editing are helpful.
  

November 11 was the ten-year anniversary of finishing my first vid, and sadly I did not manage to post a commemorative vid that day. But I'm a little chuffed to have seen the anniversary, especially because in 2016 I was considering abandoning the idea of vidding altogether.

I am not going to do the full End of the Year fanworks meme, because for the past two years, I have only managed to post one vid per year. (I have managed to post at least a vid per year, though, so I am pretty happy about that.)

( Vid notes 2017-2018 )

( Things I learned this year )

( 2015 Goals as Accomplished 2017-2018 )

( 2019 Goals )

As usual, stealing this from kiki_miserychic:

If there is any question you would like to ask me about any one of my vids or stories, then go ahead! What I meant by a particular clip or sequence, why I chose to highlight that characterization, why I chose that song, what crack I was taking and where you can get some...anything. Anything you might like to know about how I made a vid, I shall do my best to answer. Or any questions about vidding or writing that I can answer in general, I guess. Or we could bring back that vidding meme.

I am in a terrible mood, so I would like to make it better by seeing people say nice things about vids. Let's do a vidding love meme.


Instructions/Rules

1. Comment with your username, a link to your vids, and the fandoms you vid for (or a selection you've vidded the most for, if you're all over the place).
   
2. People will comment telling you what their favorite vid by you is, what show/character/pairing they think you vid best, and other positive comments. They can also mention what they think you should vid more of, or anything else concerning what they like about your vidding. If you don't want anything like suggestions for what you should vid more, just mention it in your original comment.
   
3. Post it to your journal!
   
4. This is a love meme. No wank, no insults, no concrit. Just the love!
   

chaila and kiki_miserychic asked:

Is there a genre or style you've yet to try your hand at, but really want to?

I'd really like to do the kind of collage/art project vid that newkidfan does, or like vrya used to do (so sad I lost her vids and audio collages in hard drive crashes), where the point is the aesthetic/emotional experience rather than something more narrative. When I first started watching vids (well, and for quite some time after), I didn't really understand them -- they washed over me, they were beautiful, sometimes they were emotional, but I had no idea what argument or narrative they were building. They all felt like an emotional or aesthetic exploration, an audiovisual collage, impressionistic. I miss that. In some ways that feeling is what I am almost always trying to re-create in vids (even if I'm also trying to do something else), but I would really like to do it in a way that makes use of effects and visual distortions and key repetitions, something that creates a heightened dreamlike experience.

The problem is I don't typically have effects-heavy ideas, and when I do, I end up being wrong. I either forget the effects ("Etheric Messages") or I cut them because they're detracting from the vid rather than adding to it ("No Skin").

Actually, thinking about the vid that I'm hoping will be in this vein, it's less about the special effects than mood.

Is there a genre or style you wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole?

I've already ending up making types of vids I never expected to, so I would never rule anything out. But there are some kinds of vids that aren't particularly suited to my interests or strengths, and/or that I just don't get ideas for:

I'm pretty unlikely to do a movie trailer vid, because they don't usually have the kind of emotion or character introspection that I want. This is also a disconnect for me with most multifandom vids, and also reviewing all that source exhausts me just to think about. There is one multifandom vid I'd like to make, though, so ... maybe.

I'm pretty unlikely to do comedy, because it's so hard.

kiki_miserychic asked: Which is your favorite site for posting vids?

Tumblr seems to get the widest distribution (with the longest tail), but I love the comments I get on DW/LJ. Which is not to say I don't also appreciate the kudos, likes, and reblogs! I appreciate everything. But comments, especially detailed comments, are my favorite.

But there's probably a synergy: I'm pretty sure some people see the vids on Tumblr and then come over to comment.

frayadjacent asked: If you were to revise one of your older vids from start to finish, which would it be and why? and Point to a section from one of your favorite vids you've made and explain why you're proud of it.

Revising an older vid
Ahahaha, this is a terrible question for me. I was horribly tempted by elipie's Take 2 challenge, because I NEVER LET THINGS GO. So even though I already made some changes when I remastered it, I would pick "Low Red Moon."

I wanted it to show people why I loved Ruby and I wanted the vid to look pretty, and I think it does manage both of those things. But I also saw the whole vid as an argument Ruby is having with Sam: Look, people are dying, and if you don't demon up, more people will die, including your brother. And not only does that not get across, the vid moves over to focus on Sam (instead of Ruby's view of Sam) for long periods of time. Part of the problem is that I carried over POV ideas from text, where my favorite POV is a very tight, immersive third or first from inside the character's head. And just showing you what a character sees doesn't work in visual media; to form an attachment to them and to get their reactions, you need to see their face. I would think of it as Ruby looking at Sam, and all the audience got to see is: lots of Sam.

It's still a problem with my vids, but I'm better at correcting it now.

I also could do a lot better with the pacing now. And I could do a lot more of the color modifications I originally wanted -- I was going to desaturate everything slightly except red. I pumped up the red in a lot of individual clips, but I had trouble making the desaturation work properly. The bridge, with all the sepia and red, is the only part that really lives up to the color scheme in my head. (The rest of the vid wasn't going to be sepia. It's just that the bridge looks the way I wanted the bridge to look, and the rest doesn't look exactly the way I wanted the rest to look.)

I'd also planned to do more with the gender politics of Supernatural and associating Ruby with witches, and how women's magic was always demonic or harmful and men's magic was prayer and good, which came with grand plans to make the verses full of circular imagery and the choruses full of more rigid lines. I dropped the political part because it was way too complicated for me to pull off and I dropped the shapes part because I wanted to use circles everywhere. (I always want to use circles everywhere. I love circles. If there is circular imagery anywhere in the source, I will put it in a vid.) Those parts would have to stay dropped.

But this is ALL IN THE SUBJUNCTIVE MOOD, because I am LETTING IT GO.

A section I'm proud of
So, I actually like all my vids. After posting, I go through a period where I think they're great and then I go through a period where I think they're terrible, and then I settle into liking them while recognizing the many places I could have done better. They were as good as I could get them when I posted them. I try to think of all the errors I see now as signs of how much I've learned rather than signs of how badly I failed. This does not go well for any other part of my life, but I manage it for writing and vidding.

Since I mentioned a small percentage of the things that are wrong with "Low Red Moon", I still really like the bridge (2:41-2:59). It was the first part I put down (the bridge is frequently the first part I put down), and I love putting in all the deals with demons, and all the circles, and all the red.

(I might cut it a little differently now; it's a little overcrowded and I could use the beats to emphasize things as well as just cutting points; but I AM LETTING IT GO.)

I also like the bridge in "Etheric Messages" (0:55-1:09). It uses the rain and thunder sounds well, both visually and thematically, and it is so pretty. As I mentioned in your comments yesterday, I really like dissolves and composites, because creating new images gives me the same feeling as coming up with a good metaphor. I loved putting together all the images of the worlds colliding (the gate, the book; the Twin Towers, the smashing snowglobes, the spilling water).

Slightly updated from the comments because I thought of more things.

kiki_miserychic asked about "Origin Stories": ( This is what they make you take the medication for )

oracne asked about "Hey Ho": ( I privatized world peace )

chaila asked about "Riot Act": ( I want out )

kore asked about the openings of "Etheric Messages" and "No Skin":

( Everyone I see )

( Messages from another world )