This new version of Adobe Premiere Elements makes significant changes over its predecessor. Premiere Elements 8 adds file organizing and keywording, plus greater integration with Photoshop Elements, while making it much easier to edit in style. The retail price is $99 or you can get it bundled with Adobe Photoshop Elements for $149. Adobe is offering rebates right now and SHI.com, where we get most of our software, should be offering it soon with the UC discount.
The most obvious and welcome addition to Premiere Elements is the Organizer. The Organizer allows you to view, keyword-tag, and organize videos and photos; and when you have the two Elements programs installed, it acts as a conduit to both programs via a single interface. It automates keywording through Auto Analysis of image content (including face recognition) and Smart Tagging (of video quality), starting instantly when you import files. In addition, you can drag and drop tags onto a video while it previews, which can be quite useful since the most important content of a movie might not be in the first frame.
There are two ways to create movies from your video: Instant Movie and manual creation. Instant Movie can use the new Smart Tags to create a movie, with music and transitions. In addition, Premiere Elements 8 offers more customization tools for Instant Movie, but it doesn't always produce great movies. The results do tend to be pleasant, though sometimes rough, with the clip order not always logical or smooth. You may prefer to use Premiere Elements 8's manual tools to edit the Instant Movie, or to start your own from scratch.
Other automatic tools include Smart Fix, Smart Trim, and Smart Mix. Smart Fix attempts to automatically correct the imperfections--such as an underexposed clip--that Smart Tags has flagged. Smart Trim uses SmartTags to determine which portions of a video should remain and which should go, as well as to weigh the interest of various sections. You can set Smart Trim either to work automatically or to mark the areas of video it recommends for trimming; if you select the latter, you can then manually trim, adjust, or retain pieces, all in an easy-to-use timeline.
Smart Mix balances different sound sources so that the background music doesn't drown out narration or dialogue. Again, you can override Smart Mix's choices.
In Premiere Elements 8, you can now add still photos to movies, even if you don't have Photoshop Elements installed. There is a library of templates, effects, transitions, and graphics has expanded, and now includes animated clip art that you can drag and drop into a film clip. Afterward you can add the new Motion Tracking to move objects within the video.
Premiere Elements 8 is a worthwhile upgrade for anyone interested in organizing videos, and editing them with its improv Continue ReadingVOB is a container format. That means in the one file it has video, audio, subtitles and menus. It it the file found on DVDs to be played in a DVD player hooked up to a TV, like any video store rental DVD. Windows Media Player will play them on a PC. So will IntervideoDVD and dozens of other programs; half are free, half you must buy.
To do that, open Windows Media Player, go to Tools, then Options. There you will see a tab for File Types. Make sure DVD Video is checked. Then it will play VOB files whether they are on a DVD or not.
For more information about VOB files, you can start here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VOB and get overwhelmed at your leisure.
Yesterday I gave a presentation at the Pest Management Conference at UCD about putting video on the web. Out of that, came a new item in the TechTools toolbox: Video for the Web. It covers:
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Content issues
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Suggestions for shooting and editing your video
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The need for file compression
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How to post your video file
Remember, the TechTools website is listed under My Links in the left-hand column of your ANR Portal.
If you have questions, contact me at mlpoe@ucdavis.edu
Many people are so concerned about the gear they think they need, that they don't put their energy where it needs to be--tell an interesting story. If you are shooting for YouTube and the like, then just have a vague idea of what you have to say and wing it.
In contrast, the pros begin with "pre-production" and that is all about the script. By the way, "production" is the shooting and recording phase and "post-production" is the editing phase. We're just talking about pre-production right now.
Here are the basics in telling a story. The emphasis here is in the realm of instruction, promotion, and information. Hollywood uses a slightly different appoach with an emphasis on emotional connections and development. Showing someone how to treat a tree for crown gall is not quite the same, but that's more of what we do.
Start with an outline of what you want to say. Don't worry about what anything will look like yet. You can divide your story in acts or simply parts.
Part 1 is the introduction. This can include something attention-getting or simply tell the audience what the purpose of the video is and who should watch it.
Part 2 is the meat of your story. All the points you want to make are presented in detail here.
Part 3 is the conclusion where you remind the audience the purpose and suggest how this information can or will affect them.
I use this reminder when I outline my scripts: "Tell'em what you want to tell them, tell them, tell'em what you told them."
Once you know what the story is and what the details are, style becomes a consideration. How will you tell your story? Your choices include:
a. Unseen narrator.
b. Onscreen host who will also narrate.
c. Host or narrator with interviews included.
d. Interviews only. (Very difficult to do, but great when one inteview flows into another and another to tell the whole story.) These are often done with "word cards" (onscreen titles) to tie things together.
e. No narration, just music and natural sound that support the visuals.
f. Combinations of segments using variations of above.
Some will work better than others, depending on your audience and the time you can hold their attention.
After you've come up with a style, apply that to your outline to develop a script. The emphasis should be on the audio--narrator, interviews, etc. Some people start to fret about the video shots at this point. You are scripting---anything is possible right now. Write the audio part first and then work on the video.
Below I have provided your a link for a television script format file you can download. I've been using it for years with MS Word. It keeps the video and audio in separate columns.
This blog will get you from "I want to make my own videos" to "Wanna see my video?"
We'll cover hardware, software, techniques and more....The story you have to tell is up to you.
Stay tuned.
