The video that traveled to Finland in less than 24hrs...
Posted by Corne Scheepers on Sunday, September 18, 2016
This project made me think again about the wonderfully connected world that we live in. I've produced a number of sit-down interviews with international experts for Optentia Research Focus Area at the NWU's Vaal Triangle Campus but this one traveled exceptionally fast...
So here's the production story in brief: the afternoon shoot was a breeze. My assistant Ferdi nailed a good lighting setup while I set up two cameras to shoot the interview. No problem, done it many times before. It was the post-production the next day that presented me with a challenge - I had two shoots lined up for that day, one in Jhb at noon and one in Ikageng township later the afternoon and evening. That left me with four hours during the morning to get from unedited footage to a completed clip on the Optentia YouTube channel.
And it didn't take a superhuman effort to be honest. Thanks to the multicam editing tools I had at my disposal it was possible to cut this in record time. The point I'm trying to make is that while the time and production challenges we as content creators face are getting bigger in the age of social media, fortunately the tools we use are also advancing.
If you make sure that you maintain your personal edge the tools will go a long way to help you. I've always believed that technically operating your equipment should be drilled in almost militarily to the point where it was muscle-memory, leaving you to focus as much mental energy as possible into solving creative problems. So basically: don't expect to cut a quality video with the delivery deadline three hours away if you are still dependent on a software manual. If you're at the point where you can recite that manual from memory, then pitch for the crazy deadline jobs. Not before.
What I also take away from this exercise is how truly connected our world is and how little your geographic location should influence what you produce. I edited this on a high-powered laptop in my living room in a little rural town in drought-stricken South Africa. In less than 24 hours after it dropped on YouTube a person in Finland was tweeting the link...stuff like this will never stop being absolutely amazing to me!
Above: Prof Lonka is an international expert in learning, motivation and communication from the University of Helsinki in Finland and is an extraordinary professor in Optentia.
www.optentia.co.za
So here's the production story in brief: the afternoon shoot was a breeze. My assistant Ferdi nailed a good lighting setup while I set up two cameras to shoot the interview. No problem, done it many times before. It was the post-production the next day that presented me with a challenge - I had two shoots lined up for that day, one in Jhb at noon and one in Ikageng township later the afternoon and evening. That left me with four hours during the morning to get from unedited footage to a completed clip on the Optentia YouTube channel.
And it didn't take a superhuman effort to be honest. Thanks to the multicam editing tools I had at my disposal it was possible to cut this in record time. The point I'm trying to make is that while the time and production challenges we as content creators face are getting bigger in the age of social media, fortunately the tools we use are also advancing.
If you make sure that you maintain your personal edge the tools will go a long way to help you. I've always believed that technically operating your equipment should be drilled in almost militarily to the point where it was muscle-memory, leaving you to focus as much mental energy as possible into solving creative problems. So basically: don't expect to cut a quality video with the delivery deadline three hours away if you are still dependent on a software manual. If you're at the point where you can recite that manual from memory, then pitch for the crazy deadline jobs. Not before.
What I also take away from this exercise is how truly connected our world is and how little your geographic location should influence what you produce. I edited this on a high-powered laptop in my living room in a little rural town in drought-stricken South Africa. In less than 24 hours after it dropped on YouTube a person in Finland was tweeting the link...stuff like this will never stop being absolutely amazing to me!
Prof. Kirsti Lonka Etelä-Afrikan Optentia-yliopistossa https://t.co/kKESC3faBB käyttäjältä @YouTube
— Maria Peltonen (@MariaPeltonen) September 13, 2016
Above: Prof Lonka is an international expert in learning, motivation and communication from the University of Helsinki in Finland and is an extraordinary professor in Optentia.
www.optentia.co.za
Tags: "new projects" "social media" "optentia"
