Photo + Narration = Artful Video

HannaFromGhanaHDTV from Stefanie 3x3 on Vimeo.

Get an idea and start planning!

First for any artwork production is the idea. You might already have one. If not you might know about various brain storming techniques. However, even then you need a start.

This can be a question, for example:

I want to show my artist friends something really awesome. What would impress them?

Often we got ideas from assignments a school provides.

You may follow the idea I provide here, which is to juxtapose the visual (photograph) to the audible (narration) in a video and to share this in the Internet.

Please note, this is not just about creating a video. You need this steps for any kind of artwork, although the term pre-production is normally used for the video production process.

When you got your idea, write it down. One sentence may be enough.

I want to make a photograph of white hands on a dark background and add the narration “I am Hanna from Ghana”.

Say something about the meaning you want to convey.

I want people wondering about the juxtaposition of the visual and the audible to make them think about their ideas from skin color and origin of a person.

(you may choose any other picture like the mouth of a bearded man sounding like a child and saying: I am Hans from a Grimm fairy tale. Or you show the back of a woman's head with braided hair saying in a man's voice “I am Jimmy from Pimp Town.” - Sorry for this, but art sometimes must be provocative to make people think.)

After this for visual ideas you should do any kind of sketch. For a video you might create a story board. For our purpose you can use any form you like. Look at my one frame story board.

You can do something similar for music and sound, like a time line or musical notation.

Now you have to explore what you need for your production. Compare it to what you have. Write it down. If you do not have what you need write down an alternative.

 

I need	I have
time, about 2 hours	I actually have two hours of time this Saturday.
hands	I will take my own hands.
a dark background	I have a cardboard box I will use.
camera to shoot the picture or the hands	I ow one myself and will use it. (You may lend devices.)
a microphone to make the narration	I do not have any microphone. alternative: I have my zoom recording device and will use it for a microphone. (You may have a microphone, which I recommend for a better quality, or you use your build in microphone.)
a software where I can make the narration with	I know I can add a narration to a video in the Movie Maker. I will use this option for my production which anyway results in a video. (You may have to download it: Click to get the Movie Maker Or use any other software you know.)
a software where I can produce my video with, which is combining visual and audible and export this as a video	I will use the Windows Movie Maker.
a platform where I can share my video	I have heard tumblr is a good place to share. I will get an account there and share my video via this account.

Now go on and produce!

This will be the production part of your work. For the idea we are following here it will be just taking the picture you need. You can also see the narration as part of the production.

The following picture shows how you can shoot for example and eye of yourself. I have to mention that I can take single pictures with my video camera. You may have any other device and an appropriate tripod construction.

I also show you a picture that displays how I have set up my microphone which I have connected with an USB plug. You may have a microphone that uses a jack plug, which also can be connected to your computer.

Edit your materials!

Next I will show you how to load the picture to the Movie Maker, how to make the narration and how to export your work as a video you can share, which can be called the post-production.

Share your artwork!

The next video shows how to share your artwork on a tumblr blog. (Naturally you can use any other blogging page.

To share the webpage resulting from your tumblr blog go to the edit icon, then copy and paste your tubmr url.

(Which shows the following screenshot.)

Music Production and Sharing

A series of tutorials about how to produce pieces of music and how to share them on Soundcloud and Tumblr.

The first video shows you how to find the download page from a great free sound editing software called Audacity.

The next video shows you how to produce a beat with the free online software Soundation. When have created the beat it is opened in Audacity where a voice track is recorded. (You could record in Soundation, but not in the free version.)

Audacity produces a track every time you click the record button. If you want to delete a track, just click the cross at the left top corner.
Also note the following screenshot, which shows about Audacity and microphone settings.

The third video is about sharing a Soudcloud track on a Tumblr blog.



Make an Animated GIF from a Movie Clip

What the hell is an animated GIF?

It is a sequence of images saved as just one image. Does that make sense?

I believe so when you think in terms of file formats. GIF is an image format, which means it is handled like an image when displayed, differently from video or audio.

Want to know more? Just click!

First what we need for an animated GIF are single images. The two following videos tell about a way to get them. We got them for free via free pages and software.

Note there are more possibilities than that, especially when you are able to buy more advanced software, but for now, this:


Download a Youtube video.

!!!NOTE!!!
Do not forget to press the green word DOWNLOAD. I did forget it in the video.

Get single images with MPEG-Streamclip.
(In MPEG-Streamclip mark a sequence of about 4 seconds.)

Produce the Animated GIF with Gimp.

Share your GIF.



I hope this was fun!



How to rotoscope an action.

Shadow Soccer

Here I'm going to explain how you can contour something in Gimp with the Path Tool to gain an exciting animated gif. You also can use a tablet and pen, it is just not what I'll show here. I thought people without a tablet should also be able to do this tutorial.

For following the tutorial you need to know how to make single images, which we have talked about earlyier in the Lesson about making a Gif from a movie.
Once you have imported the images do the following:

Choose Shift + the eye symbol of the bottom layer in the layer tab to make only this layer visible.

Next create a new layer by clicking the New Layer symbol (1) in the layer tab. Choose a white background (2) and name the layer 0001 (3).  (The next will be 0002 and so on.)

After This set the Opacity of the layer to 50%..

Now it is a good idea to zoom in where you want to start drawing the outlines. Just enough to keep an overview.

(Zoom Tool or Ctrl + Mouse Wheel together with Space Bar + Left Mouse Button)

After you have selected the Path Tool, click along the outlines. (If possible don't move the mouse while clicking, you may come into the edit mode, where you can shape the path.)

If you reach the edge of the screen just use the Space Bar together with the Left Mouse Button to move the visible part or just use the scroll bars.

Don't overdo this, we are going for the motion, not for the detail. Maybe I've already set too many points.





When you've finished your first outline, click Stroke Path (1)  at the Tool Options palette of the Path Tool. Then choose a Line Width (2) and confirm.  (I've chosen 3 appropriate to the resolution of my image. You may need a different width.)

Normally the stroke will appear in black, which is the default foreground color. For changing the stroke color, change the foreground color.



To position the path tool anew you have to select another tool first and then again choose the path tool. (There may be a better ways which I don't know.)
For the ball you can use the Ellipse Select Tool plus in the Edit menu Stroke Selection.

When you've finished the outline of your first image set the layer opacity back to 100%. The result should look something like this.

You now can delete the layer with the original image or you can do it when you've finished all images.

Go back to the start of this tutorial and do the same with any of the imported images.

When you've removed the original images you can play back the action.

Go to Filters in the menu bar and choose Animation -> Playback.

Maybe you have to scale the image now. For an animated gif the image should not be larger than 800 in width. In the end this is up to your choice, but note if you save something as a gif file the file size is restricted. The more images you need the smaller they have to be.

Just try to save your work as a gif file now (File menu -> Export to -> Filename.gif). If it is too large you will have a pop up window which tells you about this.

Don't forget to check the option As Animation and Loop Forever.

You should also experiment with the delay between the frames, to find out which speed is the right for your animated gif.

Go to your gif file and open it in any preview. I personally open it with the internet explorer. If you're fine with the result you're done. If not correct what ever you want, but don't forget that there are many more assignments to do.

Share the Gif at your blog!