Sorry for the typo in the other thread.

Enjoy this one! Comments always welcome.

Cat

The movie link is:

http://uwolchallenge.com/challenge3/CR_UC3_gowild.mov

Cat, happy to see I'm not the only one trying to get something together with an older camcorder. Actually, I've decided that my older Sony Digital8 takes better looking video under most circumstances than a newer (still old!) Canon minidv. You've got to be the graphics guru here. I couldn't put something like that together in 10 years! Good work. Thanks for sharing.

Rick

Rick! Thanks for the comments. With many views and no one saying anything I was getting nervous. Appreciate the watch.

Cat

Hi Cat.
I think you've put together a great film, and I loved the puzzle.
How do you do it, and what editing prg do you use?
This is art!

Thanks for sharing.

Hi,

Great title :) (Mine too!)

I really like the way you put together the images, and the effects were very creative. The lightning and spring showers bringing new life was especially evocative. Very fun to watch.

Ruth

Hi Geir:

Everything is done in Adobe After Effects. I learned a lot about masking on this one!

Hi Ruth:

Thanks for watching and the supportive words.

All the best you two.

Cat

wow....10/10 for originality and very cheery, nice tune ! Interesting idea and I think it worked well...you lost me a little with the rain and lighting I have to say, maybe if it hadn't lasted quite so long...but hey. Shot nicely exposed flower shots in there too.

Nice piece, very creative :)

Hi Catherine

Your video is very well made! I'm impressed.
You have made one thing clear... I need to learn After Effects!!
(so far I only know very basic AE stuff)
I really like what you did.

Hi Trond and Mat:

Thank you, thank you for the comments and responses. Trond, After Effects is an amazing piece of software for special effects. I think we could all spend a lifetime working with it and only scratch the surface of what it can do. Thanks for the input!

Mat, great comment! Now how could I have made it so you wouldn't have gotton lost with the rain and lightning? The attempt was this: the picture that was being pieced together at this point had the resemblance of meadow, rock cliff and clouds in the sky. The spring rain brought on the flowing river after the rain let up. You have a point that if you don't see the meadow, rock cliff and clouds in the sky at this point, the rain and lightning would be a very strange interlude. I see this quite well, but then again I'm the one drawing the picture!

Thanks again for the comments and feedback... all welcome!

Cat

P.S. I consider it a great honor to receive a smiley face from Mat Thompson. Thanks Mat.

Trond, After Effects is an amazing piece of software for special effects. I think we could all spend a lifetime working with it and only scratch the surface of what it can do.


Yes, I already have AE7, and bought the Adobe classroom in a book.
So learning a little more than I know now will be my mission for the summer.
(hopefully in time for uwol4 I will have learned something useful)

Catherine:

Great effects. Kept trying to predict what was coming but it was unpredictable and very interesting. Nice job !!

Cat, very creative and funny to watch! I think most of your time is spend in AE than at the shooting location. I would have liked to view more "live" footage, this was a little bit to static to my taste.

But as mentioned: very creative and a "new" way to show the nature a think :-)

leprechauns!!! but where are the leprechauns?? with that soundtrack, i was expecting some....

(is that even how you spell it?? c'mon, UK people, help a poor dumb 'marican out....)

i'm been definitely wanting to do more FX with my nature and outdoors footage. seems like a fairly untapped realm with endless possibilities....

Interesting approch...some serious AF work on this one. I liked the flow, the music was a great fit to the images an effects. A few more motion shots would have worked better for me.

Good Fun.....Brian

hi cat,

had to smile a lot while watching your film. great concept, very well delivered. liked the lightning and rain part best. with your film you remind me that creativity is something i miss far too often when watching nature programmes.
great work.

Points are well taken Per and Brian. I am submitting among the gurus of film. More film would have made this a more well-rounded and full submission. I confess, I took film with every still photo to cover the bases. The resolution of my camera just didn't make the cut for me over the stills except in the few places I allowed them to go into the clip. I think the challenge for me next challenge is an improved video camera and using it. Thanks for moving me forward.

Cat

Wow Cat! That was awesome!

I was not expecting anything of that sort! Great job, very artistic!

My head still hurts from trying to rap my mind around how you managed to do that!!

Excellent job, two thumbs up!
~Gabriel

Hey Cat!

Unique and wonderful build up - great concept carried through really well. Stands out as one of the most individual and creative entries - well done!
Must start honing my AE skills again ;-)

Cheers!

Rob

Gabriel and Rob:

Thanks for the kind words and a bit of cheer you two!

Gabriel, you are one of those kind of people that I would love to wrap up and take you home with me! ;o). Don't change except to keep on honing those film techniques of yours.

Rob, what encouragement from someone with your caliber of talent. Thank you.

Cat

Cat
Yes this is a pretty neat piece. Compositing is a real art. Your elk antlers look a little strange thou lol. Like some have said I would like a little more full frame video shots. Also are some of your flower shots out of focus or is that a compression issue?

Gordon Hoffman

Please don't take this as a criticism of any sort. I just wanted you to know what I was thinking as I watched your piece.

As it all came together, I thought that the end result was that all of the different portions would eventually build a still. That it would morph into an actual photo of what you were creating. I assumed you started with a photo and were recreating it as you went along. And we would see the original photo at the end.

I don't have the skills to do that, but for some reason I thought that was the goal. After I gave it some thought, I realized that what you did was even harder.

All in all, a very intersting piece. Thanks.

Hi Gordon and Steve:

Thanks for the critique! All comments welcome!

Godon:

I think we all agree that more video footage would have rounded the piece out a lot. The elk were actually masked from live footage I took last winter of elk in our backyard. The one grazing in real life has it's antler pointed towards the camera, so it does get lost in the masked replica. The other's anterlers were up against a background that was very similar in color so it was hard to tell exactly where the points went. So I just did the best I could do. As far as the flower shots being out of focus, wow no comment on that one. I don't think it was a compression issue so if they were, it falls on me and my equipment. I thought they were okay.

Steven:

The picture was in "my mind's eye!", but the whole thing morphing into a final still would have been a great idea. Thanks for thinking of that!

I greatly appreciate your time and comments.

Cat

Cat,

Well, karma brought me to this thread. I thought I had commented on it but it must have been Ruth's of the same title.

Great concept. I love how you wove the tapestry of life all together. It's the little things that when all placed together make the big picture.

I never noticed the bird or was it a bee flying around in the upper left hand corner at the end of the film. Nice attention to small details.

The only real note I have for you is that some of the shots are in some fairly harsh light. I think if they had been shot during magic hour it would have raised the look of the film a bit higher. I think the lighting took away some of the beautiful colors of some of your subjects.

Open shade can work great in harsh light. Sometimes I even stand over a subject to cast a shadow on it to deal with the harsh light if I have no choice but to be out filming in it.

It had a nice building of anticipation as I wanted to see the picture you were "painting."

Good uplifting happy music too. :)

Kevin!

I'm nonplussed! That was very kind of you to go to the trouble of taking a look at a past film, with so many to review this time around. Your comments are well taken and I will experiment with soft lighting for an overall feel. Thank you!

It's funny but this one was not as well received, and I personally had a blast with it and really liked it. Ah, diversity is the spice of life!

You're the best,

Cat