ABOUT LIVE VIDEO
This approach refers to using a video camera to record a dramatization of a story drawn from personal experience, NOT to simply turning on the video camera and telling a story out loud, as that would basically be an audio story that shows your face.
The only way an approach like that might work is if you delivered the story in a way that allows your body language and facial expressions to do some of the “showing,” not just your words, the way comedians and oral storytellers do when they’re on stage in front of an audience. You’d definitely have to practice that approach, as you wouldn’t be able to just read from a script.
Another approach to “starring” in your own live video is to record yourself telling us a story drawn from personal experience while you do something creative (like drawing, painting, sculpting, etc.) in a way that contributes to “showing” us what happened, so that the story can only be experienced through video, not through audio.
More common approaches are likely to require volunteers to serve as “actors” who dramatize the story drawn from personal experience, while you record them (or serve as an actor yourself, if you can put the camera on a tripod). These approaches include recording:
- a scene from an imaginary TV show or movie based on your experience
- a preview for a TV episode based on something that happened to you
- a silent movie that depicts the experience through behavior only
- a “fake” documentary or newscast that delivers the story in a creative way
COMPOSING TOOLS
Unless you’re already very proficient at using Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premiere, I recommend that Mac users edit your videos in iMovie, as it’s as powerful now as earlier versions of Final Cut were. I do not recommend that Windows users use MovieMaker, as it’s still quite basic.
If you’ve never really explored iMovie’s advanced features, you’ll be pleasantly surprised by what it can do, including green screen, layered audio and video, cutaways, picture in picture, storyboarding, and more.
- 12 Cool Tips and Tricks in iMovie ’11
- Using Animatics to Create a Storyboard in iMovie
- 5 Awesome New Features In iMovie ’11
- Apple’s page showcasing iMovie’s cooler features
- My screencasts on using iMovie (mostly for photo essays, but general concepts apply to any project)
WEB RESOURCES ON VIDEO
Many of the resources below can be adapted to any kind of video storytelling:
- Seven Rules for Writing Short Films
- How to Write a Screenplay Synopsis
- How to make a storyboard and shot list
- Storyboarding Your Film
- My help page on: Using storyboards to plan a digital composition project
- Wikipedia page on Storyboards
- How to create an awesome video shot list
- Vimeo’s Video School (lots of lessons, including scripting, storyboarding, and making shot lists)
- Examples of video shots (this site also has many other video resources and tutorials)
- Cinematic techniques
- Better Video Editing Techniques
- Videomaker: Video Editing Techniques
WHAT YOU CAN COMPOSE WITH LIVE VIDEO
(This section is from a Fall 2013 assignment page. I plan to rework the material later into a stand-alone help page.)
MULTI-PERSON INTERVIEW
- Definition: multiple interviewees answering the same set of questions
- Best for: telling
- Difficulty: easy to medium
- Tools: video recording device; video editing software; external mic and tripod (recommended); suitable interview candidates
- Samples: browse the multi-person interview tag archive on my gender and new media site
MINI-DOC
- Definition: very short version of a “documentary” (analyze an issue, explain a concept, raise awareness, etc.)
- Best for: telling
- Difficulty: medium
- Tools: video editing software
- Samples: browse the mini-doc tag archive on my gender and new media site
