x
ETF2L is looking for new Staff to recruit! Are you interested in supporting the league? Then click here for more details on what we can offer and how to apply! 

Forum

The Well: Moviemaking edition

Created 4th December 2010 @ 22:45

Add A Reply Pages: « Previous 1 2 3 ... 8 Next »

decap

Quoted from huhystah

Like for example in your movies/ subtitle’s movies as well you can’t really find that much sync, just few places or even there aren’t anything. Why is everyone liking your/ subtitle’s movies and for example not others who did the same basically, like decent music, frags and was a nice movie overall. Like maybe the kills aren’t that great or the smooths/ thirdperson views which makes the movie better and nicer to watch or smth.

In short: How to make a nice movie without any really sync but really nice to watch?

I can’t really be sure of why people like our movies, but in my opinion it’s due to a number of factors. Firstly, you’re completely wrong that our movies have no syncing, they are very strongly syncd and structured in a way that works with the song, but it’s often more subtle and less in your face, which is more enjoyable when what people want to see are the frags.

One of the most basic things that a lot of editors get wrong when making movies is that they forget they are making a frag movie, that is, they focus too much on showing off their ‘3dit1nG sk1llZ’ rather than focusing on the frags. The main thing we focus on when we decide to make a movie is the content. We prefer only to make movies of those top teams and players, showcasing more of the competitive gamestyle than more basic, community movies which are all about airshots in pugs. No one is impressed by airshots anymore (maybe in 2008).

Secondly is that the most important thing that differentiates a good movie from an alright movie is the soundtrack. Most people don’t put much effort into it, they just think oh this song is cool its really fast paced, but they don’t actually listen to it properly. They just think ok I needa have a little intro like 20 seconds and then frags and then a little end credits and that’s a movie. Originality is extremely important. If you use a song that’s been used before, or even a song used by an artist that another big movie used, it shows a lack of creativity.

But above all, when I make a movie it has to have some sort of style, and stick to that. Take the Alienware movie, or the Fanom movie. What you see visually and what you hear go together very well. These movies flow in the same way the songs do, it’s speed goes faster and slower with the song.

Too often people will just casually do a smooth or a thirdperson shot into a fragmovie to try and sync with the music. But it’s important to ask yourself “What does this add?” “What warrents the extra time?” “What information about the scene does the audience not see from the original first-person clip?” You’ll find most of the time it is not necessary.

Fanom, MMM, YYT, these are all team movies, and the game is Team Fortress 2. It’s a game highly reliant on teamwork and that’s what makes these movies good – they show teamwork, and not just individual skill.

Take a look at your latest movie – PxL LAN
Music – Glitch Mob? Not very original
Intro – Boring, rollouts, what is there here that hasn’t been seen before?
Syncing – Very forced. You can tell you have put in these extra shots to make the movie appear to go with the song, but it ruins the flow.
Massive smooth during breakdown – What is the point? It’s a waste of time where you could have showcased more frags, etc.
What is the point of the movie? It’s a LAN – but apart from the title nothing about the movie says this. What the i40 movie did great here was that it brought a lot of the feeling of the community at lan into the movie. Without the photos/videos of LAN, and Byte’s amazing shoutcasting, it’s just another movie with boring Videocopilot effects.
The more you can make your movie original, and the more you can create a consistent flow and style of the movie, the more people will like it, and the more professional it will look.

Remember, it’s a frag movie, not an editing reel.


Last edited by decap,

morf

[j]\\\'
[j]'

dude.

Morphine

(Cat Enthusiast)
一一═デ︻

Any tips on making smoothing look, well, smooth? I guess I just try to smooth from too many angles and end up with lotsa weird turns :(

Is there any way to smooth around yourself? Or can this only be achieved through multiple demos of the same match?

And opinions on slow atmospheric music :D

toogyboogy

(ETF2L Donator)
SOFT
bobs

whatever i do it just seems like the end products fps is really high and thus making the video slow. but if i lower the fps the end product just looks terrible,

tesco

mrp.

Quoted from alfa

Can you post your rendering settings in Sony Vegas?

http://ozfortress.com/showthread.php?t=35030
http://ozfortress.com/showpost.php?p=563500&postcount=2


Last edited by tesco,

Heepnose

im having problems compiling in vdub. im taking the 2gig avi file and opening in vdub, compiling it using Lagarith lossless codec. it makes it like 600mb but then when i open it in vegas or anything else the video isnt really a video anymore, its crazily choppy and most of it is missing.

any idea what im doing wrong? :D

Dranearian

S4P

What sort of FPS should you be recording at/rendering at?

For my first little test I did.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0YEvulYSHw

I used 120 recorded FPS and rendered it at 30. Can you get by recording at less than 120 if you don’t plan on using slow-mo for that clip? And is it noticeable if clip A is 120 and clip B is 90?

Mainly hard drive space is the concern. With a 5-10 minute video and 30 seconds being 6+ gig at 120 fps… hard drive space goes bye bye fast! :p

Dranearian

S4P

Quoted from Heepnose

im having problems compiling in vdub. im taking the 2gig avi file and opening in vdub, compiling it using Lagarith lossless codec. it makes it like 600mb but then when i open it in vegas or anything else the video isnt really a video anymore, its crazily choppy and most of it is missing.

any idea what im doing wrong? :D

I would personally suggest (from my limited experience) you record as TGAs, and compile those thourgh vdub with lag.

And the video wont be watchable because its too large of a file for your system to handle in most situations. Once you render it in vegas it will be better.

Heepnose

vegas handles watching the 2gig file just fine its the small one it doesnt like =D

edit: just been massively shouted at by a friend for recording in avi, thanks for the help! :D


Last edited by Heepnose,

octochris

(0v0)

when will you realise your full american potential

dougiie

CotC

I use Sony Vegas Pro 9 and I’m looking to make an simple text intro / outro

Im comfortable with all colour aspects / rendering of tf2 clips, but the basic text things seem to throw me out. Where would you suggest I look at for tips, or can you offer any advice on making an intro? Cheers :)


Last edited by dougiie,

Dranearian

S4P

Quoted from Heepnose

vegas handles watching the 2gig file just fine its the small one it doesnt like =D

edit: just been massively shouted at by a friend for recording in avi, thanks for the help! :D

Weird. I get weird stuttering in my large (6gig+) recordings. But I think its the fact you are converting an AVI into an AVI. No real point to that.

How can you satisfy everyone with the songs you use?

decap

Quoted from tesco

decap: why did you stop making tf2 movies?

I have been busy with university most of the year, and have been working on other projects in my free time. I did some work for a charity raising money for homelessness with a video, website, logo design and stuff, which took most of my free time during the year. More recently I’ve been helping out with pldx, and am making a website for Torn Productions.

Quoted from toogyboogy

I fail at using the pldx tool and virtual dub, do you do mentoring? :D

What exactly do you need help with? The PldX tutorials have most of the stuff you need, it’s how I learned moviemaking.

Quoted from LikeThis

oh this is awesome!

Is there any third party plugins/effects that you couldn’t edit without?

What’s the secret to awesome transitions?

What’s the biggest mistake people make when using colour corrections?

Do you use any sort of filing system for the demos people send you? Care to share some tips about that? :)

I don’t use an third party plugins or effects. You can do everything you need to do with the default installations, and using plugins usually makes your video look cheap (Magic Bullet). There are some great colour correction plugins for After Effects but I do all mine in Sony Vegas and find that for frag movies you don’t have to have an absolutely perfect image. By far the best colour correction in a TF2 movie is in Morf’s complexity video though, so he’s better to answer this.

Transitions – most of the time they look cheap. Instead of using transitions made in After Effects etc, use in-game camera shots, to exit one scene and leave another. Stick to basic cuts and fades while you’re editing and you can’t go wrong.

Sorting demos is extremely important, especially for team movies. When I was making a coL movie (got scrapped) I would sort the demos into the different leagues, then inside those folders sorted into matches, and then name each demo with the player name and one tick file containing all the ticks for that match.

Quoted from M24_

What is your favourite frag movie of all time?

edit: Your favourite TF2 frag vid and then you’r favourite outside of TF2.

TF2 is difficult because there are so many different types of movies.
Team Movie – Tie Fanom/CompLexity LAN – they are both great in different ways.
Individual Movie – Exfane/Meatshot 2
Community Movie – Copyleft – but there aren’t very many good community movies.
Favourite movie from all games is probably Get Quaked 3 by Robokill

Quoted from Starkie

How often do you make transitions in the music (say, cutting out a bit or adding another layer to add effect)?

Do you think too many transitions can ruin the flow of the music?

Editing songs to me is unnecessary 95% of the time. A couple of my movies have edits in them, but they remove a slow/boring part of the song that doesn’t fit the movie, and the transition must be done perfectly. Most of the time though, the music producer has spent hundreds of hours perfecting the song and that is the way it works best. If you want an example of how not to do a soundtrack, watch Mazarini and Paradox – Play With Soul. That soundtrack is disgusting.

octochris

(0v0)

Quoted from decap

Editing songs to me is unnecessary 95% of the time. A couple of my movies have edits in them, but they remove a slow/boring part of the song that doesn’t fit the movie, and the transition must be done perfectly. Most of the time though, the music producer has spent hundreds of hours perfecting the song and that is the way it works best. If you want an example of how not to do a soundtrack, watch Mazarini and Paradox – Play With Soul. That soundtrack is disgusting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBl98mIryUs&hd=1

Good/bad transitions?

edit: transitions are at 2:20 and 4:45


Last edited by octochris,

Add A Reply Pages: « Previous 1 2 3 ... 8 Next »