1 Understanding the principles of digital video technology in interactive media
Digital video technology has a wide variety of applications in interactive media. We're constantly surrounded by it and most people will come across at least one example of an application every day. There are many different applications that digital video technology can be used in, each having it's own benefits.
Short films are an application of using digital video technology in interactive media. They can be used in many different ways whether it be to advertise something, inform an audience or to offer some form of entertainment. A very popular example of short films are the ones that are produced by Pixar. Their main reason is to offer some form of entertainment however another underlying reason is to act as a kind of tech demo of what's to come in their upcoming feature-length movies. Each of their videos have showcased major improvements in their animating technology while at the same time providing entertainment to their audience. They're usually released before any of their major feature-length films so many people look out for them. This serves as a kind of advertising in itself as it can get the public looking forward to said film.
Another interactive medium is promotional material. Companies can invest a lot of money getting themselves promotional material. This can be things like t-shirts, business cards and promo videos. In the creative industry you have to spend money to make money and investing in promo material means getting your name out there and getting people to notice you. If you're able to produce your own designs for things like business cards and t-shirts then many companies will be able to take these designs and give you whatever material you need. At the company I work for we recently purchased some polo shirts for us to wear at an exposition we were promoting ourselves at. We also had chairs that were branded with our company logo. Having simple material such as this can be especially useful because it gets noticed by potential clients and this can help to win work.
Film trailers can fall under the previous two applications that have been mentioned. They're short videos that act as marketing/promotion material for an upcoming movie. There's various places you're likely to see them however YouTube seems to be becoming a popular platform for viewing this type of content. There're two types of film trailers, a usual full length trailer and teaser trailers. Teaser trailers are normally released before the main trailer, hence the name teaser. They can be anywhere up to a minute long whereas a normal trailer can be up to 2 minutes 30 seconds. Personally I think teaser trailers are far superior to the full length ones. They gives a very quick taste of the feel of a movie and what it's going to be about. Full length trailers tend to give away too much of the plot which. Trailers have changed quite a lot over the years. They used to have a voice over that explained the plot of the film but this idea seems to have died out over the past few years. The content of the trailers are more jam packed, trying to draw people in by showing off the exciting or funny aspects of the film.
User-generated content is becoming a huge area within interactive media. With video hosting services like Vimeo, Wistia and YouTube, getting your content out there is incredibly easy. With the possibility of generating revenue too, it's no surprise that everyone is fighting to create the latest and greatest content. There are a few examples of people that have made a career out of uploading videos to YouTube, one of these being Felix Kjellberg also known as PewDiePie on YouTube. In 2015 Felix's income was approximately $12m which earned him the the title of highest YouTube earner. This is obviously a considerable amount of money making the whole idea of user generated content very appealing to the public. I can be very easy to get started too. People are able to just pick up a camera or use their smartphone, shoot some footage and then upload to YouTube. This ease of use makes it very appealing also. As well as video hosting sites there, many news and social media sites/organisations run solely off the content they receive from the public. Sites like Lad's Army, Buzz Feed and Reddit all use user content generate a revenue. Even corporations such as the BBC will look for and use content that has been submitted to sites like Facebook and Twitter to use on their news articles. This method of getting content is extremely useful because companies don't have to hire journalists and photographers to go and get information and take photos. Instead they can ask permission from someone on Twitter to use their content and this can be done within minutes if not seconds of when a news worthy event takes place.
It could be argued that user content is saturating the internet with everyone trying to do the same thing however it is every once in a while that you come across some content that is original and interesting. This market seems as if it'll continue to grow for quite some time, that is until the next big idea comes along.
While luck plays a great role in the success of viral marketing, lots of time is invested in the creation of an advertisement that will hopefully become a viral hit. For something to be called viral marketing, the content must spread through social media and person to person very quickly, much like a virus would replicate to larger numbers in a host. A more recent example of marketing could be the ALS/MND Ice Bucket Challenge. Through the power of social media, motor neurone disease gained a lot of exposure. Many people across the globe took part in the ALS challenge, sharing their videos on social media and nominating friends and family to take part. 3.7 million videos were uploaded and $2.7 million was raised in a single week compared to the average of $200000. The viral marketing was so successful that a gene involved with MND was discovered using the donations that were given to the charity. This shows the power of digital video technology and how successful it can potentially be when integrated with social media. There was however a marketing campaign that took place in 1999 for the release of the film The Blair Witch Project. This was before social media and sites such as YouTube. A website was made that showed 'real documentary footage' and things such as police reports and articles. The entire content of the site was made to look as authentic as possible to get people talking and spread the word about this 'real' discovered footage. Having an interactive medium like a website makes it easy for people to share information and it also gives the creators a chance to update. The marketing for The Blair Witch Project was so successful that some people still believe today that it was a real event that occurred.
Advertising is much like viral marketing and promotional material in the sense that you're trying to get your brand out in the public eye to try and win clients to generate revenue. Lots of money can be spent on an advertisement campaign. Things such as billboards, TV adverts, radio adverts, newspaper articles, sponsors and attending networking events all help to get a companies name in to the public eye. It can often be very difficult to get that initial momentum for a company but once you have a client base it can sometimes be self sustaining because companies will recommend you to others and then those companies will do the same. Digital video technology will have played it's part in most stages in the development of an advertisement. Take a tv advert for example. Computer software such as Premiere Pro or After Effects may have been used to produce the graphics and timeline of the video. A lot of time can be invested in to these stages because it takes a lot of iterations to get a quality final product that's ready to be used as advertising material.
The gaming industry probably offers the most interactive kind of media. This is another medium that has vast amounts of money pumped into it. Much like user-generated content it could be argued that the gaming market is becoming saturated with a lot of the same content and lots of companies trying to take a piece of the pie while not actually producing original ideas. Many years can be spent on producing a game and the gaming industry is fast evolving so new technologies are showcased every year. More powerful creation tools are being created and users now have access to better hardware to run bigger and better games. Graphical advancements and improvements in artificial intelligence are what drive gaming companies. Improvements to these two things can be really impressive to the consumer however a good story or gaming content must be present also to be a perfect package. We're also now stepping in to the virtual reality stage with new devices such as the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift. This VR hardware is a massive leap forward in immersion and realism, offering an almost lifelike look while being able to interact with a virtual environment by moving your body. This is however quite prosumer due to the expense of the device itself and the hardware that is needed to run it at an optimal quality.
I've already spoken in parts about the different platforms that some of these application appear on. The internet is probably the greatest platform for interactive media to appear on. It has countless uses and there are billions of websites available to people just a click away. There's also terabytes of data that's free to anyone so things like libraries are a thing of the past. Websites such as YouTube have video content that provide entertainment and there are also sites the codeacademy where you can actually learn a new skill completely free. Other platforms like DVDs and blu-rays can offer interactive media too. Blu-rays now have easter eggs and extra content that you can access. You can also be redirected to websites that can give you more information or extra content about the movie. Mobile devices also have their own special content that can be used on the go. Mobile games share a big part of the gaming market. While many apps are free to download, developers gain revenue from microtransactions that are available in app. You can use real money to buy in-game money however there is a lot of controversy over the idea of microtransactions.
When talking about digital video technology there are many different terms that are used to describe the kind of interactive media you are viewing and/or how it was made.
Digital video capture is where you convert an analog signal from a camera into a digital signal that can be viewed in video form on a computer.
Compression and file formats. his process occurs during the video capture stage and there are two types of compression. The first is lossy which, as the name describes, gives you a loss of data. This can be a very good thing if storage is a concern while you're recording. Recording lossy means that data is compressed on your video to keep the file size down. This obviously means that there's a loss of data somewhere however compression nowadays can keep videos at very good quality while keeping file size down. More advanced algorithms can compress better than others with most finding a good compromise between file size and quality. The other type of compression is lossless. Here you have no loss of data but you can potentially have huge file sizes. If you have vast amounts of storage this isn't too much of a problem and if you're going for the highest quality possible then this is the best option for you. An example of lossy compression is H.264 which is a widely used and accepted codec. On the other hand a lossless codec for video is almost unheard of because of the huge file size that it'd create. A graphics lossless file format would be PNG. A very high quality codec however is Apple ProRes 422 which is widely used with Mac users. Video codecs are the decoder instructions for the playback of a video and they are contained within a container. There are many different containers that can have different codecs within them. Both H.264 and ProRes 422 can be contained within the .MOV container. It would be very unlikely to find the 422 codec within .mp4 but the H.264 codec is very often used with .mp4.
When streaming content there are a few different methods that can be used. The first method could be to fully download the content you want to watch so there's no chance of interruption if you have a poor internet connection. Another method you could use is progressive download which is basically where you connect to a server and progressively download a video file. It relies on moving the video meta data to the start of the video so the video player has all the information to be able to play the video from the start. The final method is streaming which is where you continually receives data to play a video. An example of this could be watching a show on Netflix.
File size has already been touched on already however there is something else other than the codec which determines the size of a video. Bitrate has a massive impact on file size. The higher the bitrate the more data there is available in the file. This gives you a better quality video but also increases your file size. According to YouTube a 1080p video should have a bitrate between 3000-6000 kbps. Higher resolutions like 2160p can be between 13000-34000 kbps. This is obviously a considerable amount of data being played back per second and you can see why a higher bitrate on a video increases it's file size. It's worth noting that it is only the bitrate that determines the file size. If you were to take a project and output two files one at 1080p and one at 2160p with both having at bitrate of 5000kbps, both files will be exactly the same size. They wouldn't however have the same quality because different resolutions need different bitrates to maintain their quality. You would most likely see lots of artifacting on the higher res video because of that lack of data. You also have audio in video so the bitrate you chose for that aspect can increase your file sizes. There are also things like framerate which determine the bitrate you should use. Higher framerates require more data to produce more frames per second. Having this lack of data would have the same result as low bitrate-high resolution.
Another technology, and one we use nearly every day, are monitors. Monitors come in all shapes and sizes and have different features that determine how they look. First of all is their actual size. They are usually between 22" and 27" for general computer use but they do go higher. Much higher one's like 50" are usually reserved for televisions so they can be placed in a living room and you can sit further away. Another feature is aspect ratio. Most monitors these days will have the 16:9 aspect ratio. This ratio has common resolutions like 720p, 1080p and 1440p. Another aspect ratio that's often used is 16:10. Resolutions that fall into this category are 1050p, 1600p. They are a more square in size and are popular with graphics artists. An old ratio that was very popular was 4:3. this is a very square looking monitor and was popular with CRT televisions.
Being able to make video is all well and good but how are these videos played on a computer. There are many video players and they come in all shapes and sizes. Some are better than others and some have limitations on what they can and can't play. VLC is an example of a very versatile video player. It has hundreds of codecs within it meaning that it's more than likely able to play any video that you give it. Another video player is Quicktime which is Apple's own program. At one point it was exclusive to apple products but has now been available to windows for quite some time. It was mainly used to play .MOV which again is a codec made by apple. Windows have their own video player too which is called Windows Media Player. This player was used to play .mwv files but it now has support for many other file extensions and codecs. Many websites have their own media players built in. YouTube uses the new HTML5 video player which has replaced the old flash player that was once popular. The HTML5 player is actually built in to many modern browsers like Chrome so there's no need to download any extra programs.
DRM has become increasingly apparent in the past few years with companies trying to stop people pirating their software or content. Digital Rights Management is a scheme used to stop someone illegally copying, distributing and stealing content. It's more of a physical prevention to copyright infringement whereas you would normally rely on people just complying with the copyright laws. DRM is seen all over the gaming industry. With introductions of technologies such as Denuvo that work extremely well at protecting content, many companies are turning to DRM to eliminate the possibility of pirating. For film there are technologies such as Advanced Access Content System which is used on HD DVDs and Blu-rays to restrict copying of the content on a disc. None of these DRM methods are impenetrable because there have been instances of cracks being released so they people can gain access to the protected content. It is however predicted that software like Denuvo that uses high end encryption will be uncrackable by brute force in the near future.
Digital video technology has a wide variety of applications in interactive media. We're constantly surrounded by it and most people will come across at least one example of an application every day. There are many different applications that digital video technology can be used in, each having it's own benefits.
Short films are an application of using digital video technology in interactive media. They can be used in many different ways whether it be to advertise something, inform an audience or to offer some form of entertainment. A very popular example of short films are the ones that are produced by Pixar. Their main reason is to offer some form of entertainment however another underlying reason is to act as a kind of tech demo of what's to come in their upcoming feature-length movies. Each of their videos have showcased major improvements in their animating technology while at the same time providing entertainment to their audience. They're usually released before any of their major feature-length films so many people look out for them. This serves as a kind of advertising in itself as it can get the public looking forward to said film.
Another interactive medium is promotional material. Companies can invest a lot of money getting themselves promotional material. This can be things like t-shirts, business cards and promo videos. In the creative industry you have to spend money to make money and investing in promo material means getting your name out there and getting people to notice you. If you're able to produce your own designs for things like business cards and t-shirts then many companies will be able to take these designs and give you whatever material you need. At the company I work for we recently purchased some polo shirts for us to wear at an exposition we were promoting ourselves at. We also had chairs that were branded with our company logo. Having simple material such as this can be especially useful because it gets noticed by potential clients and this can help to win work.
Film trailers can fall under the previous two applications that have been mentioned. They're short videos that act as marketing/promotion material for an upcoming movie. There's various places you're likely to see them however YouTube seems to be becoming a popular platform for viewing this type of content. There're two types of film trailers, a usual full length trailer and teaser trailers. Teaser trailers are normally released before the main trailer, hence the name teaser. They can be anywhere up to a minute long whereas a normal trailer can be up to 2 minutes 30 seconds. Personally I think teaser trailers are far superior to the full length ones. They gives a very quick taste of the feel of a movie and what it's going to be about. Full length trailers tend to give away too much of the plot which. Trailers have changed quite a lot over the years. They used to have a voice over that explained the plot of the film but this idea seems to have died out over the past few years. The content of the trailers are more jam packed, trying to draw people in by showing off the exciting or funny aspects of the film.
User-generated content is becoming a huge area within interactive media. With video hosting services like Vimeo, Wistia and YouTube, getting your content out there is incredibly easy. With the possibility of generating revenue too, it's no surprise that everyone is fighting to create the latest and greatest content. There are a few examples of people that have made a career out of uploading videos to YouTube, one of these being Felix Kjellberg also known as PewDiePie on YouTube. In 2015 Felix's income was approximately $12m which earned him the the title of highest YouTube earner. This is obviously a considerable amount of money making the whole idea of user generated content very appealing to the public. I can be very easy to get started too. People are able to just pick up a camera or use their smartphone, shoot some footage and then upload to YouTube. This ease of use makes it very appealing also. As well as video hosting sites there, many news and social media sites/organisations run solely off the content they receive from the public. Sites like Lad's Army, Buzz Feed and Reddit all use user content generate a revenue. Even corporations such as the BBC will look for and use content that has been submitted to sites like Facebook and Twitter to use on their news articles. This method of getting content is extremely useful because companies don't have to hire journalists and photographers to go and get information and take photos. Instead they can ask permission from someone on Twitter to use their content and this can be done within minutes if not seconds of when a news worthy event takes place.
It could be argued that user content is saturating the internet with everyone trying to do the same thing however it is every once in a while that you come across some content that is original and interesting. This market seems as if it'll continue to grow for quite some time, that is until the next big idea comes along.
While luck plays a great role in the success of viral marketing, lots of time is invested in the creation of an advertisement that will hopefully become a viral hit. For something to be called viral marketing, the content must spread through social media and person to person very quickly, much like a virus would replicate to larger numbers in a host. A more recent example of marketing could be the ALS/MND Ice Bucket Challenge. Through the power of social media, motor neurone disease gained a lot of exposure. Many people across the globe took part in the ALS challenge, sharing their videos on social media and nominating friends and family to take part. 3.7 million videos were uploaded and $2.7 million was raised in a single week compared to the average of $200000. The viral marketing was so successful that a gene involved with MND was discovered using the donations that were given to the charity. This shows the power of digital video technology and how successful it can potentially be when integrated with social media. There was however a marketing campaign that took place in 1999 for the release of the film The Blair Witch Project. This was before social media and sites such as YouTube. A website was made that showed 'real documentary footage' and things such as police reports and articles. The entire content of the site was made to look as authentic as possible to get people talking and spread the word about this 'real' discovered footage. Having an interactive medium like a website makes it easy for people to share information and it also gives the creators a chance to update. The marketing for The Blair Witch Project was so successful that some people still believe today that it was a real event that occurred.
Advertising is much like viral marketing and promotional material in the sense that you're trying to get your brand out in the public eye to try and win clients to generate revenue. Lots of money can be spent on an advertisement campaign. Things such as billboards, TV adverts, radio adverts, newspaper articles, sponsors and attending networking events all help to get a companies name in to the public eye. It can often be very difficult to get that initial momentum for a company but once you have a client base it can sometimes be self sustaining because companies will recommend you to others and then those companies will do the same. Digital video technology will have played it's part in most stages in the development of an advertisement. Take a tv advert for example. Computer software such as Premiere Pro or After Effects may have been used to produce the graphics and timeline of the video. A lot of time can be invested in to these stages because it takes a lot of iterations to get a quality final product that's ready to be used as advertising material.
The gaming industry probably offers the most interactive kind of media. This is another medium that has vast amounts of money pumped into it. Much like user-generated content it could be argued that the gaming market is becoming saturated with a lot of the same content and lots of companies trying to take a piece of the pie while not actually producing original ideas. Many years can be spent on producing a game and the gaming industry is fast evolving so new technologies are showcased every year. More powerful creation tools are being created and users now have access to better hardware to run bigger and better games. Graphical advancements and improvements in artificial intelligence are what drive gaming companies. Improvements to these two things can be really impressive to the consumer however a good story or gaming content must be present also to be a perfect package. We're also now stepping in to the virtual reality stage with new devices such as the HTC Vive and Oculus Rift. This VR hardware is a massive leap forward in immersion and realism, offering an almost lifelike look while being able to interact with a virtual environment by moving your body. This is however quite prosumer due to the expense of the device itself and the hardware that is needed to run it at an optimal quality.
I've already spoken in parts about the different platforms that some of these application appear on. The internet is probably the greatest platform for interactive media to appear on. It has countless uses and there are billions of websites available to people just a click away. There's also terabytes of data that's free to anyone so things like libraries are a thing of the past. Websites such as YouTube have video content that provide entertainment and there are also sites the codeacademy where you can actually learn a new skill completely free. Other platforms like DVDs and blu-rays can offer interactive media too. Blu-rays now have easter eggs and extra content that you can access. You can also be redirected to websites that can give you more information or extra content about the movie. Mobile devices also have their own special content that can be used on the go. Mobile games share a big part of the gaming market. While many apps are free to download, developers gain revenue from microtransactions that are available in app. You can use real money to buy in-game money however there is a lot of controversy over the idea of microtransactions.
When talking about digital video technology there are many different terms that are used to describe the kind of interactive media you are viewing and/or how it was made.
Digital video capture is where you convert an analog signal from a camera into a digital signal that can be viewed in video form on a computer.
Compression and file formats. his process occurs during the video capture stage and there are two types of compression. The first is lossy which, as the name describes, gives you a loss of data. This can be a very good thing if storage is a concern while you're recording. Recording lossy means that data is compressed on your video to keep the file size down. This obviously means that there's a loss of data somewhere however compression nowadays can keep videos at very good quality while keeping file size down. More advanced algorithms can compress better than others with most finding a good compromise between file size and quality. The other type of compression is lossless. Here you have no loss of data but you can potentially have huge file sizes. If you have vast amounts of storage this isn't too much of a problem and if you're going for the highest quality possible then this is the best option for you. An example of lossy compression is H.264 which is a widely used and accepted codec. On the other hand a lossless codec for video is almost unheard of because of the huge file size that it'd create. A graphics lossless file format would be PNG. A very high quality codec however is Apple ProRes 422 which is widely used with Mac users. Video codecs are the decoder instructions for the playback of a video and they are contained within a container. There are many different containers that can have different codecs within them. Both H.264 and ProRes 422 can be contained within the .MOV container. It would be very unlikely to find the 422 codec within .mp4 but the H.264 codec is very often used with .mp4.
When streaming content there are a few different methods that can be used. The first method could be to fully download the content you want to watch so there's no chance of interruption if you have a poor internet connection. Another method you could use is progressive download which is basically where you connect to a server and progressively download a video file. It relies on moving the video meta data to the start of the video so the video player has all the information to be able to play the video from the start. The final method is streaming which is where you continually receives data to play a video. An example of this could be watching a show on Netflix.
File size has already been touched on already however there is something else other than the codec which determines the size of a video. Bitrate has a massive impact on file size. The higher the bitrate the more data there is available in the file. This gives you a better quality video but also increases your file size. According to YouTube a 1080p video should have a bitrate between 3000-6000 kbps. Higher resolutions like 2160p can be between 13000-34000 kbps. This is obviously a considerable amount of data being played back per second and you can see why a higher bitrate on a video increases it's file size. It's worth noting that it is only the bitrate that determines the file size. If you were to take a project and output two files one at 1080p and one at 2160p with both having at bitrate of 5000kbps, both files will be exactly the same size. They wouldn't however have the same quality because different resolutions need different bitrates to maintain their quality. You would most likely see lots of artifacting on the higher res video because of that lack of data. You also have audio in video so the bitrate you chose for that aspect can increase your file sizes. There are also things like framerate which determine the bitrate you should use. Higher framerates require more data to produce more frames per second. Having this lack of data would have the same result as low bitrate-high resolution.
Another technology, and one we use nearly every day, are monitors. Monitors come in all shapes and sizes and have different features that determine how they look. First of all is their actual size. They are usually between 22" and 27" for general computer use but they do go higher. Much higher one's like 50" are usually reserved for televisions so they can be placed in a living room and you can sit further away. Another feature is aspect ratio. Most monitors these days will have the 16:9 aspect ratio. This ratio has common resolutions like 720p, 1080p and 1440p. Another aspect ratio that's often used is 16:10. Resolutions that fall into this category are 1050p, 1600p. They are a more square in size and are popular with graphics artists. An old ratio that was very popular was 4:3. this is a very square looking monitor and was popular with CRT televisions.
Being able to make video is all well and good but how are these videos played on a computer. There are many video players and they come in all shapes and sizes. Some are better than others and some have limitations on what they can and can't play. VLC is an example of a very versatile video player. It has hundreds of codecs within it meaning that it's more than likely able to play any video that you give it. Another video player is Quicktime which is Apple's own program. At one point it was exclusive to apple products but has now been available to windows for quite some time. It was mainly used to play .MOV which again is a codec made by apple. Windows have their own video player too which is called Windows Media Player. This player was used to play .mwv files but it now has support for many other file extensions and codecs. Many websites have their own media players built in. YouTube uses the new HTML5 video player which has replaced the old flash player that was once popular. The HTML5 player is actually built in to many modern browsers like Chrome so there's no need to download any extra programs.
DRM has become increasingly apparent in the past few years with companies trying to stop people pirating their software or content. Digital Rights Management is a scheme used to stop someone illegally copying, distributing and stealing content. It's more of a physical prevention to copyright infringement whereas you would normally rely on people just complying with the copyright laws. DRM is seen all over the gaming industry. With introductions of technologies such as Denuvo that work extremely well at protecting content, many companies are turning to DRM to eliminate the possibility of pirating. For film there are technologies such as Advanced Access Content System which is used on HD DVDs and Blu-rays to restrict copying of the content on a disc. None of these DRM methods are impenetrable because there have been instances of cracks being released so they people can gain access to the protected content. It is however predicted that software like Denuvo that uses high end encryption will be uncrackable by brute force in the near future.
2 be able to devise a digital video sequence for an interactive media product
When sent the project to do from Barratt Homes we are also sent the text which must appear when certain rooms are shown in the video. Above is the list of rooms and text for said rooms. It is sometimes necessary to break up some of the text so it is not all thrown at the viewer in one go - this is where you can see the line breaks that have been put in. These text tags will be made in After Effects and then imported into Premiere Pro. It's important that the tags are clear and readable. Because of this they're displayed in a good size and with a transparent background and border so the text sits off the video footage. Placement of the tags in the video can be different for each clip so I'd have to choose the positioning at my own discretion.
As well as receiving a brief we also did a bit of market research on current showhome videos already on the web. After looking at websites such as norfolkhomes.co.uk and persimmonhomes.com, there are some ideas that can be taken from the videos on those sites. As for shots in the video, there were a variety of pans and slider shots with wide angled lenses which positively showcased the rooms throughout the house. Also included were some feature shots of appliances like taps, cupboards, ovens and showers. These worked nicely as filler shots between the overview shots of the room. The other interesting point was the addition of a voice over. This isn't directly asked for by Barratt Homes but worked quite well with the videos that I saw. I could be an idea to suggest this to Barratt Homes but for now we would stick to the brief and leave this additional voiceover out. Overall this research gave us an idea of the framing for shots, what would look nice and what works well to fully showcase the homes.
The three pictures above show the floor plan for the house we are going to be filming. This isn't something that is sent to us by Barratt Homes but is available on their website by directing to the appropriate development and house. This pre production stage is done to assist the filming phase on the day. It gives us an opportunity to look at the layout and decide what might be the best shots to showcase the house. The numbers show the order in which the rooms are going to be filmed for each floor and the purple cones show the potential FOVs for each camera position. These positions are subject to change on the day depending on furniture and lighting which might make the shot unsuitable.
Due to there not being an subjects in the video there isn't much need for legal and ethical considerations. There's also no worry about copyright because everything being filmed is original to Barratt Homes. However, if I did happen to come across a situation where legal and ethical issues needed to be addressed, I would have to consider whether the content we were filming was legally and ethically ok. There are certain laws that are presented in acts that need to be abided by. Some examples of these that should be followed are the Employment Rights Act, The Sexual Discrimination Act and Race Relations Act. Breaking any of these laws can be quite serious and cause complications. In extreme cases you could possible end up with jail time if it's serious. It's generally a good idea to weary of how you're representing things in film, especially people. If you show any sort of discrimination it gives people something to be outraged at. As for copyright, the intellectual property laws are taken very seriously. You should never use someone else's content without holding a license or given their consent.
Barratt Home's target audience is for first time home buyers and for buyers who are looking to sell and move. This is obviously a more adult audience (20+). Barratt Homes's aims for their videos are to show the home in a positive and spacious manner. Shots will look clean to impress the intended audience. Video will also inform the audience on facilities available. Will run as short as possible to retain view attention while still providing the relevant information. The end product will be used on their own website alongside the webpage which shows information about the house. Because of this the video file exported should be web compatible. Many codecs and containers are supported by web players so their are many to choose form but the the most versatile one we've found is .mp4 with the h.264 codec. It is not a lossless format which is primarily a good thing as this gives a good compromise between quality and file size. Smaller files sizes are better for web hosting as they take up less room and inevitably less money.
3 be able to shoot and source digital video assets for use in an interactive media product
There is a general workflow that we stick to when filming showhomes. Filming will more often than not take place on one day and the post production will take maximum of three days after filming. At each location we visit we're usually there from around 1000 to 1700 so it's an all day shoot. It's a two man crew job and to make sure we get all the material we need we work in a specific way. Because we use a separate slider and a tripod with a pan/tilt head we split the work evenly so one person will do the bottom floor with the slider while the other will do upstairs with the normal tripod. Once each person is finished then we swap and repeat the process. This gives us double the footage but with different variations of shots which helps with versatility in post production. This method also stops us getting in each others way which is a good thing also so we don't waste time reshooting if someone accidentally walks in a shot.
There is a general workflow that we stick to when filming showhomes. Filming will more often than not take place on one day and the post production will take maximum of three days after filming. At each location we visit we're usually there from around 1000 to 1700 so it's an all day shoot. It's a two man crew job and to make sure we get all the material we need we work in a specific way. Because we use a separate slider and a tripod with a pan/tilt head we split the work evenly so one person will do the bottom floor with the slider while the other will do upstairs with the normal tripod. Once each person is finished then we swap and repeat the process. This gives us double the footage but with different variations of shots which helps with versatility in post production. This method also stops us getting in each others way which is a good thing also so we don't waste time reshooting if someone accidentally walks in a shot.
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Here you can see a slider shot midway through. You have some symmetry and the frame is relatively clutter free giving a nice overall shot. |
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There are several different considerations that are taken while we're shooting our content. To start off I usually decide how the framing of my shot is going to look. Having a clutter-free shot can look more appealing than one that one that has loads of different things in the frame. It can often be confusing and doesn't look good at all. On the contrary you don't want a shot that has very little in it because that is boring to see also. Finding a good compromise can be tricky but the pay off will be worth it. The next few points all working alongside the framing of a shot. Lighting is another aspect you should think about. It the available light acceptable to get a nice shot? If there are any spots where there is direct sunlight showing, it can often look blown out if the rest of your frame isn't bright. This obviously means you lose detail which isn't ideal and doesn't look great. Shooting with as much light as you can means you can drop the ISO on a DSLR which gives a less noisy picture and looks great. If you don't have this available light it is always a good idea to light it the best you can using some LED lights. You should always remember to light as evenly as possible too so there are no harsh spots in your video. Your depth of field and focus points should be what you look at next. These two attributes may change depending on the type of shot you're doing. If you're going for a feature/detailed shot then you're going to want a narrow depth of field and a focus point on the object you're showing off. Having you're aperture open all the way will give you the greatest depth of field effect but it will also let in more light so you should be careful not to overexpose your shot. For a wider, less concentrated shot you want your focus point to be near infinity and/or your aperture small so that you get everything in the frame in focus. The final thing you should be looking at when you're filming is colour balance. You should identify the type of light in your shot and adjust the WB on your camera accordingly. Tungsten light is warmer and more orange so setting your WB to tungsten will compensate for this and make the image look much cooler. Daylight will be the opposite, so the camera will add a bit of warmth to the shot to make the colours look correct.
Sometimes shooting your own footage isn't always viable. You may not have the resources available and might therefore need to source some video assets from somewhere else. Finding something to match your project can be tricky and your success in finding something depends entirely on the type of project you're doing. If it's something very original, any footage you find may look out of place. There are many sources on the internet which off stock image/footage that you can purchase for use in a project. Websites like VideoBlocks or Shutter Stock offer subscription based services which give you access to thousands of videos that you can download and use. There are categories like slow-mo, nature, arial and timelapse which help you look for footage that you need. There may be cases where you need to pay for video assets from an outside source. If your client needs arial footage of something particular but you don't have the resources and training available to do so, you would have to hire in somebody who could. And example of this could be the MIRA job i was involved with. We had to film a car and the client wanted drone footage but we didn't have the resources to do this. We therefore had to introduce a company which was able to do this for us. We then used the footage they recored in our final project.
4) Be able to create a digital video sequence for us in an interactive media product following industry practice
Organising your assets for a project can be very beneficial to your workflow. Having correctly named folders and files means things can be found easier and you will have greater productivity. Below is a picture of the project folder for the Barratt Homes, showhome video we produced. In here you would find all the necessary files needed for the project. Raw footage is imported into this folder along with music and any additional assets like photos or graphics. The project file used for editing in Premiere Pro is also kept in this folder along with any autosaves that are made. It's a good idea to keep this folder structure as it can help reduce the potential loss of data in case your computer crashes.
As well as the project folder (which is kept on the desktop while it is in production) we also keep a backup of the raw footage on the NAS. Everything is initially backed up on to the NAS and then transferred to the desktop which ensures that the editing stage is as fast as possible. If we were to just access the files from the network, editing would be slow due to transfer speeds between the NAS and the computer so this is why we edit from resources on the desktop. The NAS is therefore considered our initial and final backup location with editing taking place externally in-between. We have recently changed the way we organise the video section of the NAS and now have a conventional way of organising jobs. Folders are named with their job number first followed by the client/project name. Each job has a standard folder structure also. There are separate folders inside which are named appropriately for different types of assets.
e.g - 0916-019 / Barratt - Padstow
09(september)16(year) - 019(job # for the month)
After folders have been created and footage has been organised the next task is to import all the necessary assets in to your editing software. At my workplace we have the Creative Cloud suite which includes Adobe Premiere Pro. The other guys in the office are more comfortable using FCPX however I have used Adobe since Premiere Elements and are more comfortable editing with Premiere Pro so that is my chosen software for editing. Importing footage is as simple as dragging and dropping the files into the 'Project' tab on the left. When the files are added Premiere Pro automatically conforms the files. This conforming is for the audio track inside the video and allows Premiere Pro to render audio faster. You can view the content inside the project tab either as thumbnails or file details. There is also the useful option of further organising assets by creating a bin and naming this bin according to the footage inside it.
(For the sake of the blog and to reduce the amount of images used I have included the Program tab within the workspace below. Usually this tab would be on it's own monitor so I can see it larger and in more detail. It's more often than not displayed on the iMac monitor due to it's more accurate colours and IPS panel. This also gives me extra space when looking at the timeline which is nice when trying to edit clips.)
So here is the workspace I like to use when editing in Premiere Pro. It gives me a view of the Source footage which is useful to look at before adding to the timeline, a nice view of the timeline, the preview of the position the scrubber is currently at on the timeline and the Project bin where all of the footage is. There are also additional tabs on the Source window such as Effects, Effect controls, Audio Mixer and the Meta Data for the clip which are also easy enough to switch between.
Here I have created the project and are now creating the sequence ready for the clips to be put on the time timeline. I should ensure that the sequence settings match the video file settings to avoid and playback or compatibility issues. Because of this I have selected a 25fps time code, FHD and progressive field mode. Audio is less important as the audio from the video won't be used in the final edit.
Here I have created the project and are now creating the sequence ready for the clips to be put on the time timeline. I should ensure that the sequence settings match the video file settings to avoid and playback or compatibility issues. Because of this I have selected a 25fps time code, FHD and progressive field mode. Audio is less important as the audio from the video won't be used in the final edit.
Here I have also laid down a basic timeline in conjuncture with the plan that was set before editing took place. The video goes from the outside and then room to room giving you a clear preview of how the house is set out. You can see a mixture of video (blue tiles) and stills (pink tiles) that have been used. While we don't usually use stills in our showhome videos, we felt it was necessary to use them here because some of our video wasn't suitable to use. An example of this would be the first bathroom shot. We obviously need to include a shot of the bathroom but the video we took didn't turn out as great as we hoped. Having no alternative clip we decided to take a still frame from the video and add a pan affect to give the illusion that the camera is moving. We also had to do this a few more times but they worked well with the video.
After the timeline has been completed and everyone is agreed that the pace and clip lengths are correct I added the video transitions between the clips. For the showhome videos we produce we always use cross dissolves between the clips. We believe it gives the cleanest look to the video and because our client is trying to sell a house, the cleaner we can get the video to look, the happier they will be. There is a shortcut feature in Premiere Pro where pressing ctrl+D will add the default transition between the selected clips. This makes adding these transitions a lot easier. We select all the transition points press ctrl+D (or right click - apply default transition) and the cross dissolves are added in automatically. You can change the duration of the cross dissolves after they've been added by simply sliding the effect on the clip
After the timeline has been put together and the cross dissolves have been added the next step is to add the tags to the video. The brief from the client shows the tags and paragraphs that need to be added to specific rooms in the video. To create these tags After Effects is used because it's very flexible for editing graphics. Each tag is typed out and is surrounded by a box which animates on over time. The box consists of two paths that animate to simulate a rectangle box. There's also a semi-transparent grey background that is added behind the box to make the text easier to read. The rectangle sizes are also changed accordingly to the size of the text which is in the box. Naming each composition correctly helps later on when adding the text on the timeline. These tags were initially set up by my colleague Charlotte as a template so they are easy for either I or someone else to edit. Once the tags are finished the project can be saved and the compositions can can be imported straight in to Premiere Pro via Dynamic-link..
Below you can see how After Effects compositions are added to the Premiere Pro project bin. The Adobe suite has a feature called Dynamic-link which allows you to import projects from separate programs in to each other. Any edits made in one program automatically updates in the other so you can make changes on the fly. In Premiere Pro, simply looking in the media browser for the After Effects project, right clicking and then selecting import is the easiest way to dynamically-link the projects together. You then select the compositions you want to add and they're then added to the project bin.
Once all the tags were added the next task was to compose them on to the footage on the timeline. Here is where we use the floor plan in our brief to make sure we're adding the tags to the correct rooms. Actually placing graphics in Premiere Pro is slightly more involved than just clicking and dragging things in to position. First I put the tag down on the timeline which you can see are the tiles that are in the V2 track above the room footage. It has to be on a track above the room footage otherwise it wouldn't show up. Next I line up the start of the comp' at a point where the room is introduced. Positioning of the text is the next step and this is where I have to take care of not making it take up to much of the image or causing a distraction. Because of this they're usually added to one of the four corners of the video. These two previous steps are repeated for the remaining tags meanwhile I'm ensuring that the timing is correct and the viewer has enough time to read the text. Finally a cross dissolve is added to the end of the clips so the tag smoothly fades out. There is also an intro and outro that have been added to the timeline. These just include the Barratt logo and the name of the development that is being previewed.
Colour correction and sharpening are the final touches for the video side of the editing process. In Premiere Pro you can directly add effects to the clips on your timeline or you can add adjustment layers which effect all the layers below. For me I like to use the adjustment layer method because it allows you to easily turn on and off the whole colour correction track to see what adjustments you have made. It also leaves the original footage unaffected in case you need to go back. The same goes for the unsharp mask layer. How I colour correct is by adding the adjustment layer above the footage and using the cut/blade tool to cut it into sections that match with the lengths of the clips. You can see that the orange tiles have been spliced and cross dissolves have been added so that the colour correction is different for every clip and that they fade into each other correctly. I add the Lumetri effect to the adjustment layer which gives me enough tools to grade the clips. The tools I would primarily use would be:
- Exposure
- Contrast
- Curves (RGB)
- Colour wheels
- Shadows, Midtones, Highlights
These tools together give enough flexibility to grade correctly. The side by side comparison below between the original source footage and the edited timeline footage shows the difference in colour. A lot of the yellow has been removed, the exposure bumped ever so slightly and the contrast tweaked to give nicer shadows.
The very final step is adding the music to the audio track. Firstly the original audio on the video clips is either muted or deleted entirely as this isn't used. Next we add the music track. We have a specific track we use for the Barratt videos we produce so we just add this to the timeline. The music fitted perfectly with this showhome so there was no need to edit it in anyway. If it did need to be edited then I would have to select a suitable point in the music where the phrases of the music change and then cut/transition between these points to get a clean sounding track. Finally a music fade is added to the end to finish the video.
Exporting is a fairly easy task but it's beneficial to get it right first time because, depending on the size of your video, it may take a long time to output again if you find that you've made any mistakes. Here are some of the settings I used when outputting the showhome video. I used the .MOV file format which is QuickTime's container. The codec i also used was h.264 which is a very widely accepted codec. It's a good compromise between quality and size. 1920x1080 was the preferred output resolution. It's a 16:9 aspect ratio and is what we initially recorded the footage in so it makes sense to output the video as such. Most monitors these days are also 1080p, FHD so this is a good quality resolution to use. Progressive is used instead of interlaced as it gives a much better result. 25fps was used to give a slightly more cinematic feel. Higher fps would give a smoother video but this isn't always a desired effect. The showhome video will inevitably end up on Barratt's website alongside the house it's previewing. We don't have any direct control of the quality that ends up on the website so we just provide the highest quality we can to the client and then let them handle the rest. This is again why we output at FHD and use a universal codec so the client can more flexibly handle then end product.
There were several versions of the project that we ended up with with slight changes. Title slides were animated differently and a couple of shots were switched around on another version. The final video was called Barratt - Padstow vf v1. This naming shows us which video is he true final version. After everything is completed. The project folder is backed up and the product is uploaded to a file sharing server ready for the client to download it.
Here is the final product that was delivered to the client:
Barratts Padstow V1-HD from Barratt Homes on Vimeo.
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