I was wondering how many of you instructors and advanced martial artists (5th dan and above) have made your own instructional videos? If so did you have someone else film, edit, produce it? Did you do the editing yourself? If you edited the video yourself, what software or suite did you use?
After several years I finally did find a video editing suite that I used to produce 9 instructional videos. They are not Hollywood quality, but I only wanted something reasonable. I want people to be able to learn from them, not be wowed by a bunch of special effects. I’ve seen to many videos that distract you with un-necessary effects.
I have used many video editing suites. My experiences were that most were very disappointing. Several suites either would not install, or would freeze up when using.
no one
I see that you are looking to accuse here. If so accuse me too. i have many times told people that they should not learn by video, books, …etc. Yet I market nine videos of my own. I tell people that these are for information only. A person should learn under the guidance of an instructor. Videos, …etc is for review, reference, and to help understand about other arts/ techniques. my view on that has not changed. I do however believe that video has a place. It is just not one of being a person instructor.
Stuart F Thanks for the info. It is appreciated. I had Adobe Premier 6, but after a month of stumbling around trying to figure it out, I gave up. All I wanted to do was create a 20-35 minute video to teach the basics of the Bo and demonstrate a kata. As for frills, I wanted only a first play clip before the menu comes up. Power Director v5 does that easily. I did want to have a PiP, but decided not to. Since I had no one to run the camera, I just set it up and did the raw footage. 1.5 hours of footage became 34 minutes of finished video.
no one
I see that you are so intent on accusing that you did not read my post well. I will not bother to repeat myself. you can believe what you wish. It is obvious that you are fast to alienate yourself from those of us that are the regular top contributors here.
Shihan J i fully agree with you on windows Vista. It truly sucks. I have two computers here. I use XP while my wife’s computer has Vista. Her computer is faster, yet with Vista it runs much slower. I refuse to use it at all.
For what it is worth. I had bought a Hi Def video camera last summer. It came with Power Director v6. My computer would not recognize the camera. Needless to say I returned the camera and software. Cyberlink has released v7 which should be improved over the v5 I use regularly. I’m considering upgrading to it since it is powerful, easy to use, and cheap $69 regular, $119 deluxe edition. Then I’ll upgrade from my digital camcorder to a true Hi-Def video camera.
Stuart F Good comment about lighting. My videos were all shot out doors. I did like the problems caused with indoor shooting with mixed light sources. Fluorescent lights give that sickly greenish look.
Lycann Thanks for joining in. My question came about as a result of seeing another question someone posted on using Windows movie maker. I personally don’t like it. I’m sure people would like to see some of my video, but I’ll ever post anything on Youtube. I feel that there is some good martial arts video there. However the trash martial arts videos there are more prevalent. I have no desire to have people using my clips as they see fit. It is hard enough to control who get them now.
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I have produced an instructional video, not my instruction just my film making. And when I did it the thing that struck me was how basic they were. One angle one shot size with the instructor demonstrating just as they would to a class. As if they wanted to get it over and done with as quickly and cheaply as possible, and it shows in the quality.
Anyway I edited on a 35 grand Avid system and filmed using a sony dvc pro camera and the sony pd150 for some hand held stuff that didn’t get used. I still prefer Avid or Adobe premiere.
Final Cut pro from Apple is very good if you have a mac, and doesn’t need that high of a spec to run.
Video editing requires a lot of memory and quite a bit of processing power, but any medium to high spec pc these days can do things that 10 – 15 years ago needed 20K plus equipment.
My tips
1. Plan what you want to instruct and imagine how it should look
2. Storyboard and script what you want to see and hear
3. Get the shots on the storyboard along with 2-3 other angles or framings of every shot
4. For a 15 minute bit you will need to film about 1.5 – 2 hours of actual footage
5. keep a log of each shot with a description and its position on the recording medium.
These tips should make it easier when it gets to the editing stage.
For ease of use I have heard that Movie Maker , (I think that is what it is called comes with windows post 2000), is pretty good, but I haven’t used it so can’t really rate it.
The other thing about martial arts instructional videos is that I don’t think I have ever seen one that is correctly lit, or had any lighting on it at all other than the daylight from the window and the lights in whatever hall it is being filmed in. And mixing light sources like that isn’t a great idea. Flourescent tubes give a terrible look on camera, better to film it outdoors.
i made one about 20 yrs ago, i think i may burn it though.
didnt have software for editing back then. it was done on vhs. and my friend had some equipment at the time for editing.
i was way to young and inexperienced when i made it.
i’m thinking of making new one soon, i’m in the process of laying it out.
i had the same issue with some video editing software. my computer was no powerful enough to do the editing and would just lockup on me
edit:> no one, i said videos and books were for reference, and not meant as the solo source of learning, you still need a qualified instructor.
videos cant take the places of an instructor. and are not meant to.
and pugpaw has made similar comments as me.
edit:> nwohioguy i was with up till windows vista i hate vista, but then xp i dont thick can use that much memory,
edit:> no one, you need to completely read what is wrote, obviously you aren’t
I am working on a video series, but I’m just the technical advisor as far as MA goes.
I don’t know jack about those programs, yet, I have the complete Adobe Master Suite. Someone else is manning those controls.
I believe that if done right, a video can convey a foundation in MA.
Again, it has to be done right.
no one – because someone tells another that they cannot learn from video, doesn’t mean he should not make one – and if I know something about Pugpaws, when he said that, I’ll bet my life on that he was directing it to someone with NO foundation at all. I can learn some kata by watching a few times, so I can definitely learn from video.
Edit:
no one – you mentioned that Pugpaws didn’t bother to read your response and OBVIOUSLY you didn’t read my comment directed to you. Obviously, someone who refers to himself as “this one” can’t be taken seriously either way.
We are giving “this one” way too much attention.
Take your multiple personalities to another forum.
I’ve compiled demo videos and done a lot of film editing throughout college. Given the prices that distributed videos usually sell for, and if you plan to do many videos, I highly suggest investing in a mac (and going through http://shopper.cnet.com/ you can find the previous model ones at decent discounts) and getting Final Cut Express (about $200) and setting that machine aside solely for video editing.
FCE is my choice purely from an ease of use standpoint. It’s considerably more robust than iMovie (which comes preloaded on macs, I believe, and may, with iDVD, be sufficient for your needs) and is much easier to use than the Adobe and Avid options. I used to do my editing using Vegas on my old PC, which worked alright but had a tendency to crash too often.
The amount of time you’ll save using such simple software and the time for rendering the final video that’ll be saved by having a dedicated machine will make the expenditure worth it.
Please note: I’m not suggesting a switch to a mac across the board — that’s simply not for everyone, but having a machine that excels at a specific job can make your life easier. I am also only suggesting this approach IF you plan to be doing a number of these videos, and distributing them through your website or companies like budovideos.com.
[One additional note: A cheap option purely for the video and sound editing, though by no means a robust option, is importing your video from your camera into Quicktime (on either a PC or Mac) and editing it there. I believe the upgrade to Quicktime pro is only about $30, and you can do basic cut-and-paste style editing right inside.]
We have cataloged our entire system up to Godan including advanced techniques and did it all ourselves. The key is getting good equipment to make sure the videos are of good quality. Here is what I have and use and our videos are near HD quality.
Computer – Gateway Quadcore 6GB Ram, 1 TB Hard Drive Windows Vista Premier.
Camera Canon HD Digital Camcorder with 60GB HDD
I use Sony Vegas Movie Studio Premier which allows for timeline editing and much more. It is very easy to learn and use and comes with a great DVD Architect studio to produce professional DVDs. It costs around $99 on amazon.com
I used to use Adobe Premier and have release 9 but it is to slow and takes to long to compile a good video regardless of the computer. The key to video editing and production is to use a higher end computer than most home users will purchase. I bought my gateway at best buy for $649 and it works great but I dd put in a $149 ATI video card with higher graphic resolutions and speed.
Our videos are for reference only and they simply document the technical aspects with some demonstrations. I never included instruction in the videos because I do not want them to buy the DVD’s and think they substitute for class room training. I do however have an instructional DVD on Ichi Nitten Ryu Iaido for my students who study that because it is a very rare art and we only hold classes one day a week.
Edit – to no one…get over yourself. Many good traditional instructors know the value of creating videos to help their students and for reference materials. I own an extensive library on over 100 systems out there for study purposes. The difference is that I have been training for 31 years and can watch a video and understand the principles being given but I do not learn systems from them…rather just understanding of them. ShihanJ has said that videos are great for reference many times but not for learning. Your post shows your own ignorance.
I know I’m not an instructor or an advanced martial artist, but I’ll answer anyway.
I’ve never made any videos even though I’ve been asked to before. The only thing I’ve ever watched martial arts videos for was entertainment. I agree that videos should not and can not replace an instructor.
I would very much like to see your and Shihan J’s videos. lol.
I am going to put some videos in my blog to illustate certain points made in the blog but they will be playable within the blog on WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER and not for sale.Editing shouldn’t be a problem as most will be one move a kata bunkai backing up a written description in the blog.
Maybe later I will do entire kata but those will be for sale.
You can always use Windows Movie Maker. Newer versions are part of the Live branding but you can install the older version (6.5 I believe). Both versions are free but the older version is a little more robust.
You will be limited to saving files in WMV format at a fixed resolution and aspect (as far as I can tell from my limited playing about with it).
I have played with Premiere a little bit and found it to be very resource demanding but that is par for the course when it comes to media editing. There a lot of tutorials freely accessible online to help you get what you need out of the program, I found a really good one that I had to translate from Russian with the help of Google site translations.
Let me know if you post any samples or clips on YouTube, I’d like to check them out.