rhoboat

Vegas vidding tricks!

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 00:25:57 GMT

Pretty transition!!!

In my last vid, I used something similar to what Ulead has called mask transitions. And I did it all in Vegas!

How I do it:
1. Install the SMLuminance transition plugin from Scott's Fabulous Website

2. Open up Vegas

3. Use the Softer Bitmap transition under Luminance between two clips.

4. Under Transition Properties, click "Browse" to find any supported image. (In my last vid, I took a screencap of Alex's eye and used that quite a bit.) That'll be the "texture"/"mask" for your transition. Play with the softness and with the "black dissolves first"/"white dissolves first" and that's it! Pretty transition!!!

The film-style optical one is really nice too. :D

Frameserving!!!

And just so this mini tutorial doesn't get lost in a random comment, I'm reposting it here. This comes in handy when you want to plunk in ENTIRE episodes into Vegas so the program doesn't complain at you.

How I do it:
1. Install AVISynth 2.5 and ffdshow. You need something like Haali Media Splitter for MKV files.

Addendum: When installing ffdshow, you can have the option of not letting it handle your codecs, and just install it for the makeAVIS feature.

2. Open up Notepad, type the following script, and save as yourfilename.avs

DirectShowSource("C:\path to your video file\yourvideofile.avi")

3. Find ffdshow's makeAVIS in the Start Menu after you install it. Open yourfilename.avs as the AviSynth script, make your output as yourNEWfilename.avi, and click Create. Since I'm not bothering with audio here, you can unclick the audio box. I'm not quite sure what the rest of it means yet.

4. Open yourNEWfilename.avi (a really relatively TINY filesize that makes Vegas happy) in Vegas, and you're good to go.

Whew. Does that make sense? Basically, frameserving is a way to make a dummy file that Vegas or any other editor will like, but that dummy file actually "reads" from the original. It's a very cool thing really.

And on another vidding note, I now have streaming on LJ direct from my own host. Whoohoo!

Ashes to Ashes Vid: Nothing Else Matters

Sun, 27 Apr 2008 08:21:07 GMT

Music: "Nothing Else Matters" performed by Apocalyptica
Size: 43.5 MB WMV, zipped; 19.1 MB Streaming
Notes: Spoilers for all of Series 1, focusing on Alex Drake.
Download: HERE Stream: HERE

This is a YAPRIO vid!! Yet Another Patented Rhoboat Instrumental Overview. XD The song is a Metallica cover done with four cellos. It's gorgeous music if that's your thing. :)

Doctor Who Wallpaper Rec!

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 02:45:12 GMT

Wallpaper rec?!

Yup.

FarscapeFran has a way with photo editing that to my eyes is instantly recognizable as quirky and unique. Her "TARDIS inside TARDIS" is just one highlight. You just gotta check it out!!

See the wallpapers here at Farscape Frans's TerraFirma post, plus there are more available here at her site.

YAY!

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 01:25:00 GMT

I'm vidding again, and jagwriter78 already knows this, but frameserving FRELLING ROCKS!!!

Casting Spoiler for Doctor Who 2008 Christmas Special

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 21:14:31 GMT

MAJOR *FLAIL* *SQUEE* *FAINT*

DO NOT CLICK UNLESS YOU WANT TO BE SPOILED

Don't say I didn't warn ya. ;)

Egads!

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 01:21:57 GMT

Jelly Babies are insanely sweet! I think I'm coming down with a sugar high headache just eating two of 'em. Why, oh why did I eat two?! I shoulda paid more attention to you, hollywoodgrrl. O_o

How, erm, odd

Sat, 19 Apr 2008 21:40:57 GMT

Farm bill complicates plight of honeybees

Carolyn Lochhead, Chronicle Washington Bureau

Saturday, April 19, 2008
(04-19) 04:00 PDT Washington - -- The hand of nature, usually unseen and unappreciated, is coming down hard on California agriculture. The honeybees that pollinate its $21 billion bounty of almonds, avocados, berries, melons and other produce that make it the nation's farming giant are disappearing from an unexplained cause.

Full article here.

Those of you who've seen today's episode of Doctor Who will know what I'm talking about, and why I thought a certain line was ~~ood~~ odd.

I'm gonna miss watching BSG at 9 am

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:19:34 GMT

Watching the stream is coooooooool. I'm gonna miss it in a few weeks when I start having class again on Fridays.

Uncut Rose Picspam!

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 03:41:58 GMT

Because she makes the Doctor happy.

Oooh! TCI is on TV...

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 02:05:23 GMT

... right now!!

I love it when I turn on the TV and find Doctor Who on, even if I've already seen it all. Plus, this is PBS, so it's unedited. w00t!

Just one of those "duh" moments

Sun, 06 Apr 2008 20:59:18 GMT

A couple nights ago, I started watching State of Play which I got on DVD and for a moment, I thought I needed to download a special player so I could watch it on the desktop with the big monitor. I stuck the DVD in the drive, and while I started looking for a player to download, the DVD started to play automatically.

I forgot I bought the R1 DVD, not R2.

*facepalm*

Doctor Who 4x01

Sat, 05 Apr 2008 23:52:42 GMT

I was so happy, I forgot to squee here. So...

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Now that's more like it!

Sat, 05 Apr 2008 06:16:31 GMT

BSG frakkin' rocked tonight!

Am I the only one?

Sat, 05 Apr 2008 03:37:22 GMT

About Torchwood 2x13, I wasn't impressed.

Maybe I'm the only one, but I honestly wasn't that emotional as so many others seem to be about tonight's episode. I cried more watching last week's amazing Ashes to Ashes finale than I did for this pathetic excuse for drama. I think it was because all season long, they built up the Owen/Tosh relationship, so I just knew there was going to be something major to bring that down. I hate seeing them go, but I'm not really sad over it. Their deaths weren't all that shocking. Plus, I never really felt much of anything for any of the characters on Torchwood. Well, except maybe Rhys. Now if HE were the one to go tonight, THAT would've killed me.

As for the rest of the episode, Gray's motivation for causing Jack all that pain was completely unconvincing. Don't tell me how Gray suffered. Show me, and I'll believe it more.

And Captain John wasn't nearly as fun as he was in the first episode of the season.

Overall, while this season has been more entertaining, I think the S1 finale was immensely more satisfying compared to this one.

Top Five... Favorite Anime TV Theme Songs

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 01:01:36 GMT

Requested by shadadukal. I'm only including anime where I've actually watched more than one episode. Otherwise, I'd have even more Yoko Kanno songs on here. ;)

5. Fushigi Yuugi - "Itooshii Hito no Tame Ni" - This song is a bit reminiscent of Madonna's "Open Your Heart." I like how it starts out slow and mysterious, and then builds into an upbeat pop song.

4. Serial Experiments Lain - "Duvet" - It's in English, by a British band called BOA. The opening animation reminds me a lot of the Matrix movies as well. Pretty cool, if you ask me. :)

3. Cowboy Bebop - "Tank!" - Yoko Kanno does big band!

2. Vision of Escaflowne - "Yakusoku wa Iranai" - More YK! I do love the orchestrations for this song.

1. Neon Genesis Evangelion - "Zankoku na Tenshi no TE-ZE" - While I love Escaflowne's story more overall, I love how this opening theme along with the animation never lets up once it gets going. Exciting stuff.

Top Five... Favorite TV Theme Songs

Thu, 03 Apr 2008 04:26:21 GMT

Requested by starlightmoonla. This was hard to narrow down to five. While there are other TV theme songs I really do like, I decided to go with themes that I pretty much never wanted to skip through. These also always got me excited to watch the show. I almost included anime theme songs, but then I'd never be able to narrow this list down to five. This is a list of live action TV themes, but if anyone wants to know the anime list, let me know. :)

5. Star Trek: The Next Generation - Patrick Stewart's opening monologue followed by the marching theme is my favorite of all the Star Trek openings.

4. Doctor Who - 2005 to 2007 version. The orchestrations backing the original '63 theme really brought that something extra without being too cheesy. The latest version that was used for "Voyage of the Damned" crosses into cheese territory.

3. Farscape (Sorry no streaming link. This is Brent Barrett's site. Click "Watch" to download the WMV file.) - I'm probably in the minority in that I like Subvision's version used for S1/S2 more than Guy Gross's adaptation used for S3/S4. There's a wildness that really gets my blood pumping with the original. I also use this theme as my alarm on my cell phone. I wake up to it no problem. :D

2. Angel - I love the rockin' cello in this theme.

1. Highlander - "Princes of the Universe" - It's Queen. Nuff said.

Top Five Things Meme

Wed, 02 Apr 2008 00:03:12 GMT

All the cool kids are doing it.

Comment to this post with a subject for a top five (ships, songs, books, etc) you would like to see my answer. I will post my answers in a separate entry. Be as specific or as broad as you'd like.

Vidding Meme

Fri, 28 Mar 2008 01:52:37 GMT

Sorta tagged by jagwriter78 and humansrsuperior

1) When did you first start vidding?

November 2006. I started with a free trial of ULead VS 10 Plus, and eventually moved onto Sony Vegas.

2) What would you say was your inspiration or motivation to start doing it?

I've said it before, but it was jagwriter78 who convinced me to try out vidding when I first met her in October 2006. I can tell you now I wouldn't be where I am today in vidding if it weren't for her.

3) What do you or have you vidded?

I've only done Farscape, Doctor Who, and Torchwood so far. I'd love to branch out though.

4) Where do you draw your inspiration from for vids? Is it the song? An idea? Someone else?

I get inspiration from everywhere. Sometimes I'll hear a song that just seems perfect for a vid, and I can't let it go. Other times, I have an idea for a vid, and I need to look for a song to go with it. I've also done some challenge vids that have helped me go in new directions with technique and theme. I also thank humansrsuperior for pushing me to start doing vids with quick editing, and now I love doing fast-paced vids. It's actually more of a challenge these days to do anything on the slow side.

5) What was your favorite video to make or do?

Hands down, it's "History Repeating."

6) What was your least favorite video to make or do?

Um. "Oil & Water" and not because I'm not proud of it or anything, because I am. It's because my computer started to act up on me toward the end of making it, and I was afraid I'd lose the vid. I ended up having to reinstall Windows before being able to render the vid and post it.

7) Which video are you most proud of?

Right now, it's "Somewhere I Belong." I was able to do lots of new (to me) and challenging things with the editing, and I'm extremely happy with this vid, beginning to end.

8) What's the best feedback or comment you've ever gotten?

Ummmm. Any positive feedback is good feedback, even if it's just a smiley. :D

9)What is your opinion on clip theft?

10) Favorite genre to vid to (comedy, angst, romance, drama, AU)?

All of the above.

11) Favorite pairing(s)?

Doctor/Rose, John/Aeryn

12) What just drives you up the wall when it comes to vidding?

What drives me batty is every time I miss a ghost frame in one of my own vids. ;)

What irks me in other people's vids is when I can't follow any sort of coherent story or theme whatsoever. A string of unmatched clips does not a good vid make.

13) Is vidding a pastime, hobby or something to help gain experience to do more later in life?

Hobby, for sure.

14) What is your latest project or idea for your next vid if your muse isn't dead?

I have a Doctor Who vid to do for Sweet Charity. I also have a couple other ideas floating around in my head, which always seems to happen. It doesn't mean that I always follow through on those ideas though.

15) Finally, what kind of words of wisdom would you offer someone who wants to vid/ is a newbie?

Narrative and music matching are the keys to making a good vid. Fancy effects, flashy transitions, complicated overlays etc. while nice are no good if the vid as a whole doesn't make any sense whatsoever. If you want to try something new that you might have seen in another vid, ask that vidder. I think most vidders are more than willing to share their tricks of the trade, including myself. Playing with your program and looking at others' vids frame-by-frame is another good way to learn. People eventually end up with their own styles of vidding, so you may not please everyone. Anyway, most importantly, vid for yourself and have fun with it!

I think all the vidders on my flist have already been tagged. :)

More on X-Files 2!!!

Thu, 27 Mar 2008 07:06:16 GMT

Thank you starlightmoonla for helping me keep up to date on X-Files news. :D

There's a new trailer!!! \o/

More on the Paley Center panel from TV Guide.

Icon Meme!

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 03:03:28 GMT

Snurched from larissa_j:

1) Reply to this post, and I will pick six of your icons.
2) Make a post and talk about the icons I chose.
3) Other people can then comment to you and make their own posts.
4) This will create a never-ending cycle of icon squee. Whoo!

A few weeks ago, I got myself a paid account, so I've been picking up new icons here and there. I don't think I've had a chance to use this one yet, but it was one that caught my eye when I saw it. I think dorky Owen was one of my favorite things about that Torchwood episode, "Adam". Buffy did a similar storyline with "Superstar," only better. ;)

I've had this one for awhile now, and it's the one I like to use when I want to be snarky.

Torchwood rips so much from Buffy and Angel, so I love how this icon points to that.

This comes from one of the funniest scenes in the Miyazaki film Spirited Away. One of Chihiro's first tasks in the film is to tend to a Stink God, and her reaction while trying not to hold her nose is priceless.

This Farscape was one of the first icons I ever made, but it's still one of my favorites, so I have a hard time letting it go. Plus, it's animated, but in a subtle way. :D

This is another Farscape icon I made awhile back. It's based on a wallpaper I made for one of the old wallpaper challenges at Terra Firma. I think that's probably my one of my favorite wallpapers I've ever made where I used a combination of images from Farscape, personally scanned or photographed objects (the paper, paperclips, and pencil), and images/brushes/fonts found somewhere online.

Doctor Who Vid Rec: My Skin

Wed, 12 Mar 2008 08:01:20 GMT

Watch this D/R vid by raspberry_splat. It's been a long time since I've cried watching a vid, but this one is worth all the heartache, with both the world of Doctor Who, and all the troubles Ras went through to make this.

Ras layers her videos in a way that no one else can. She brings out such a depth to the Doctor and Rose, that you can just feel every ounce of emotion she puts into her vids. And no one vids Nine like Ras. For anyone who's ever doubted that the Doctor loves Rose, this vid is one that leaves no doubt.

Torchwood Vid: Torchwood, Angel Style

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 00:26:57 GMT

Music: "Angel Theme Song" by Darling Violetta
Size: 7.68 MB WMV, zipped
Notes: Angel style opening credits for Torchwood. Spoilers for Season 2.
Download: Link 1 | Link 2 Stream: HERE

This is my first credits spoof. Woohoo! I based this vid on the last version of the credits from season 5 of Angel. I can't quite get all the effects looking exactly the same, but I think it's pretty close. ;)

EDIT: Frell! You'd think I could spell "Russell" correctly. *headdesk*

I've uploaded the original Angel credits I used for reference. You can stream it here at imeem.

It's official.

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 06:50:59 GMT

Radiohead, Jack Johnson, and Tom Petty to headline the Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival

Here! In my hometown! And during my break at the end of the summer semester!!!

Vid meta for Somewhere I Belong

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 06:37:02 GMT

Because kazbaby essentially asked over at Terra Firma.

I first had the idea that I'd use "Somewhere I Belong" (SIB) when I had this on the same CD where I burned VAST's "All I Found Was You". Since all I don't have a reliable way of playing my iPod in the car, I tend to burn music that I'm currently vidding so that I can listen to the song on repeat and visualize clips while I'm commuting. It's a waste of a blank CD not to burn more music, so I always fill them up with other songs. Plus, I only have burned CDs in my car so I don't have to worry purchased ones getting stolen. Anyway, I hadn't heard the song in awhile, so I thought I'd put it in the mix. (I think the last time I heard the song was for the biceps track of a BodyPump class...)

After finishing up the VAST vid, I took that song off repeat and listened to the rest of the CD. When I got to SIB, I thought it'd be perfect for S3 angsty Doctor. I've wanted to do an S3 angsty Doctor vid for a long time, but never really followed through with one before.

When I found time to play in Vegas, I took the scene from "Voyage of the Damned" and started with the titles sequence. I had no real direction at this point other than the fact that the Doctor looks damn hot in this otherwise silly scene, and it seemed perfect for this vid. I played with all sorts of color settings and filters before I finally settled on plain black and white with some contrast. Earlier on, I had some film grain added which I thought was quite reminiscent of humansrsuperior's "Feeling Good". Even the font I used is the same! I had her blessing to keep it, so it's all good. ;) Anyway, I used these same black and white settings except on the S2 black and white clips. I added a jittery film effect to the font clips only which I thought went nicely with the music. For the flashes, I cut a piece of the same clip, stretched it out, and added it to a screen track. This is a technique I learned from jagwriter78's "What I've Done". (Seeing a theme here? I like to think of it as ~~stealing~~ borrowing from the best. ^_^)

The transition to the next portion of "Family of Blood" clips is just a keyframed stretch and blur. For the FOB clips, I really liked the simplicity of just crossfading into a zoomed portion of the same clip. Those FOB scenes are powerful enough without doing anything too fancy with them. And after "All I Found Was You", I felt a huge need to slow down with vidding. LOL

Oh, by the way, keyframes are something I learned from Brent Barrett's awesome ULead tutorial on beat effects. The techniques for using keyframes transfers quite nicely to Vegas. :D

Then we get into where things got tricky. For the pick up in the music, I knew I wanted to go into color, but I wanted some cool way to transition into that. Flash transitions? Done that. Zoom transitions? Done that. Nothing in Vegas really appealed to me so I pulled up my trusty first program, ULead VS 10 Plus. I really like the set of mask transitions which I had used last for "Black Market". To do these ULead transitions scattered throughout the vid, I would render the two clips in Vegas, put them in ULead, slap the transitions in, render that, and put it back into Vegas. I think timing these clips just right was the trickiest part of the whole vid.

Once I got to the color bits, I asked myself "Now what?" The "Runaway Bride" clips have plenty enough action going on to match the music, but I was looking to do something I hadn't really done before in a vid. Okay, I've done moving split screens with "Shiny Happy People", but they're rather rough around the edges. I wanted to do something a bit more like 24-style split screens which I'd actually seen in other vids. I liked the thought of having something like Donna's reaction paired with the destruction of the Racnoss, followed by Ten looking over it all. And I kind of went with that idea throughout the vid whereever I thought two clips would work better than one. Anyway, to do the "splits", I used the pan/crop feature along with masks, and I keyframed like crazy to move these things around. To keep things from getting too repetitive, I liked going back to regular old single screens timed to the music. I'm also rather fond of not using too many different types of effects in a single vid. That's I didn't do too many real overlays in this vid. I was trying to keep the look of this particular vid clean and cohesive.

I transitioned back into black and white, which I thought made sense to use for the slower parts of the music. To make things just a bit different for the S2 clips, I used the "Black and White Crunch" filter from a special filter add-on. Once the lyrics started, I thought to do a bit more paralleling with S2 clips, but I wasn't quite sure how to do that. Originally, I was going to time to each word individually, but it looked rather messy. (I think this was one of those thoughts that seemed great in the car, but failed in practice.) Then I thought maybe I'd try that flicker effect I've seen so many times before but never found a place to use it. It seemed to work pretty well, I think. For those who're wondering, the flicker effect is really just intercut single frames, and I faded the secondary clip so that the main clip looked more prominent on the next beat. The hardest part of doing this was finding two clips that would work well enough together yet still have some sort of lyrical matching come across. The flash "transitions" aren't transitions at all, but are actually a lot like what I did with the title sequence, only I didn't stretch out the overlay. As for clip choice, I just tried to put in clips that somewhat matched the music lyrically. I wasn't too worried about doing things chronologically except that I knew I wanted the climax of the vid to have the Doctor face off with the Master. :D

For the clips that go with both "fault is my own" lines, those were 50% black and white just because I wanted some color for those really gorgeous shots of Ten. :D

The use of the Daleks from "Parting of the Ways" and the planet explosion from "End of the World" to signify the Time War has been done many times before, but I still really like that combination of clips. It's just a matter of finding different ways to put 'em together. Oh, and that shot at 1:12 took a LOT of time. It's a PotW clip on top of a sun clip from "42". :)

Since I was doing the whole Time War thing, I kept going with the Daleks theme by using the angstiest clips of Ten from the S3 Daleks episodes. After this point, let me just say I chose clips to match what the music and lyrics were telling me to do. :)

A few more key time points:

1:34-1:36: This was a great excuse to use the split screens so I could have side-by-side shots of Ten looking hot. >:-)

2:23-2:51: Ahhhh, the dreaded bridge. I really was the least sure about this part, so I thought I'd go back to the Doctor vs. Daleks theme for the whole bridge. I had to have some way of sticking in what I thought was the biggest reason for the Doctor's angst fest in S3, and that of course was losing Rose. There's really very little straightforward lyrical matching here. I cut clips mostly to match rhythm of the music.

2:51-2:54: This string of quick clips allowed me to have at least ONE clip from every episode in S3. LOL

3:13-3:15: Another great excuse to use the split screen effect: side-by-side shots of Ten and the Master. >:-)

3:35 to the end: From the beginning, I had knew I wanted to end on clips on VotD instead of the end of S3. This seemed to work well enough. Throughout making this vid, I was reminded of the line from VotD where the Doctor tells Astrid about losing his home and then finding the Earth. The Doctor's sort of found a surrogate home in the Earth, and I think it's the closest to where he feels he "belongs".

Well, even though I think I wrote a lot, I hope this has been illuminating enough. I'm always happy to answer questions when asked. :)

All the pics and video clips are up!

Sun, 24 Feb 2008 07:31:43 GMT

Again, the pics are at my site, and the video clips are here.

Steve Carell and jury duty:

Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny, doing The X-Files again:

John Cho on his role as Sulu:

Sorry for the quality, but I ended up sitting behind someone quite tall so it was easier to take video of the screen even though I was only in the third row (of a hall that seats 4000). That, and sometimes I was holding my little digital camera in one hand and this nice lady's camcorder in the other while she took pics with her really awesome camera with the huge telephoto lens.