My video capture questions:
- Do you just capture as much video as possble so you have stuff to choose from?
- How much time do you spend each day in the parks on shooting specific footage for the video?
- How much of the video is rehearsed vs. your family having fun & enjoying vacation?
I capture as much as I can...probably around 2.5 hours of footage for this project in total. You know you're doing well when you force yourself to leave great stuff out of the video. I HATE being 90% done with the video, because I start to realize what's going to be left out. Just remember, NO ONE wants to see your video as much as you do.
I brought two cameras to the park each day. One was a camcorder which I could pop out at any moment. The T2i I would often put in a locker and bring it out for no more than an hour or so a day.
As for the rehearsal, little is truly "rehearsed" except practicing the lyrics in the car a couple of weeks before we leave; and also timing the lyrics with my moving camera in the opening. So while it's not "rehearsed", it's most certainly "planned". For instance in the opening of the song, I'd tell my wife to "stand still while I video the castle; I'll swing the camera around, then you make stupid faces for ten seconds." The whole scene was done in thirty seconds, and we were off to the next attraction. She had no idea what I was doing, and didn't care till it was done. I had it mentally mapped out weeks before, so it didn't slow us down.
Map out ("storyboard") everything ahead of time, keep your camera batteries fully charged, and you won't slow down anyone's vacation.
My video editing questions:
- I feel like iMovie 11 doesn't have as much of the "special effects" capability as I would like but Final Cut Pro is out of my price range. Is there a happy medium?
- How are the time lapse shots done? (Like in your Oasis video of you sitting by the pool)
- You mentioned Motion was a steep learning curve. How did you overcome that? Books, websites, trial and error? Any book or website recommendations? (I might be able to justify purchasing Motion and just live with iMovie 11)
- Last but not least....Your opening sequence in your 2011 video (with the 6 video frames) was done in Motion, correct?
Have you priced Final Cut Pro X? I think it's $299 and does way more than you can possibly learn in less than a couple of years. It's very powerful, and a third the price of the previous version. True professionals hate it for reasons you don't care about. But if you know iMovie, I'd say it's a very, very good option for you. I don't know of anything that's "better than iMovie" anywhere near that price point.
You'll really hamstring yourself using Motion without FCP X. I'm not sure if it's even possible, but maybe it is. I doubt that you'd really want to, though, until you learned Final Cut first.
I tell people iMovie was like learning to ride a bike; Final Cut like learning to fly a plane; and Motion like learning to fly a helicopter. But with Final Cut Pro X, I don't think the learning curve is as steep as it used to be.
I did a lot of training with Apple One to One at the Apple Store, as well as the official Apple Training Series. (lynda.com is the most popular place to get it.) Also vimeo.com Video School is amazing and free.
Yes, the opening sequence was created in Apple Motion.
As for time lapse, you'll need a DSLR and an intervalometer. I learned time lapse by memorizing this tutorial:
http://digitalartwork.net/2007/01/30/time-lapse-tutorial/
Keep me posted. Good luck!
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