They say "a picture's worth a thousand words", I wonder what they would say about a video? So last year I was allowed to put together a video illustrating what the members have been up to. With many members now having underwater cameras and a variety of different setups to go with them, there was a nice selection of material to use. Last year's was meant to be 5 minutes long. It ended up being 7 1/2 minutes, but I was forgiven/
That video went well so I was allowed to do another for this year. More people were willing to share their images and videos and this shows in the results as the video is now 12 minutes long (actually 12.15 with space for some YouTube cards at the end). There are a lot of short pieces and a variety of small videos popping in and out of the frame. This was intentional to squeeze in content from different people and to illustrate better what people have been doing.
I've scheduled it to air from 7 pm GMT today (Friday 23rd November 2018) using the new "Premiere" feature on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/PHr8o75UBCw
The video was edited together within VS 2018 Ultimate. I've used several templates and played around with various things to fit the clips. See if you can recognise which ones I've used
. For the end credits piece I used a template I put together myself. I have a few versions of it and have used them on a variety of videos I've put together.There have been many challenges in the process of putting this video together. It's not so bad when you are using your own cameras. You know what settings you are looking to use. Setting the white balance and colours correctly is something you are going to do too if you know what to look for. However not every camera works the same and often people will adjust their own white balance to suit their needs or perhaps not bother. Whatever option you go for, diving adds a huge amount of extra work when it comes to recording stills and video. This comment leads to lighting too. Much of what we do isn't exactly geared up for lots of professional lights or easily managed sets. We often use filters or lights. Sometimes I've had to play with all this in the editing phase. It isn't easy and often it's better to do nothing or very little. Doing too much can result in the colours becoming completely wrong in the background, but Ok closeup.
Some of the stills have been edited a little in Corel PaintShop Pro Ultimate 2018. I know, I still need to upgrade to PSP 2019.
There are a few "hiccups" in the video. For the opening piece, someone is composing a new soundtrack so that this can be easily slotted into future productions by the members as a mini-package. I did look at a few alternative pieces but their timing is wrong for the length of this clip. After attempting to change their speed, the results were even worse, so I have opted to use this piece for now.
A few times the PIP speed doesn't quite follow correctly due to varying picture/video ratios. I do know how to fix this better, but I have left it as it is for this video. I believe it adds to the rawness, as most of us are not professional photographers or videographers.
A lot of people think that UK diving isn't any good, so they dive once or twice a year in warmer waters, missing out what is just a short trip from their front door.
I trust that you find the video entertaining. It does convey to the audience that we are a busy diving club and have been diving in a variety of locations around the UK, France and elsewhere. We are also featuring in a couple of documentaries, so keep your eyes open for them too.