Edit feedback needed

[D_Fresh]

Hey all, here are a few videos I've been working on lately. I seem to getting myself into a mental "edit loop" and likely being over critical of the color correction. So I am seeking your advise on the Color, Brightness, and Contrast.

The video is taken with an Apeman A80 action cam. It is one of the more budget cams out there, but does a fairly decent job. Unfortunately, it does have a bit of an issue with Overexposure in some areas...there's not a lot I can do about it for this footage, but am experimenting with WB settings in a couple weeks. I have also just received my Flip7 and will be experimenting with that on the next dive weekend.

Camera: Apeman A80
Settings: QHD (2560x1440), 140 deg
Tray Mounted, No Filter, No Lights
Depths range from 5m to 30m
Edited using Premiere Pro CS6; Fast Color Corrector, Brightness & Contrast, slight adjustment in Channel Mixer, and for YouTube upload only - a 60% opacity LUT to try and preserve color when uploaded.
Down-scaled to 1080 for YouTube.




Please let me know what you think it needs, or doesn't need.
I appreciate your advise!

 

[Chris Underwater]

To be honest - the overall quality of those videos is extremely poor. A little better color correction will not save this footage.
I would worry about getting a decent camera and learn how to use it first, and about perfecting the footage in post later.

Also, you will probably get more replies here if you enable embedded playback for your videos.

 

[D_Fresh]

I would worry about getting a decent camera and learn how to use it first, and about perfecting the footage in post later.

I completely agree. It just happens that this is what I have to work with at the moment. I have some 1080/60fps footage which is has much less motion blur, but the visibility was very poor that weekend.

Not bad footage of the Jackfish though eh?

I appreciate your feedback, keep it coming!

 

[Joris Vd]

i'll review the last clip really quickly.

Please drop the weird intro font in combination with the gradient and the hard drop shadows. Just use a nice clean white font and dont center everything over the middle and your footage will look alot more professional right of the bat. There is no reason to use different colors in the title screen. Unless it has a function. But it just looks like randomly chosen colors thrown around.

Since you're using such dramatic music with alot of musical stabs in it, it could be fun to use it to cut at some moments. I would leave out the filmed and edited by untill the end in maybe a short credit screen, or very shortly after the title

I would suggest switching to a white font and play with the thickness of the font and not displaying everything at once like a pancarte. Maybe play a bit with the font styles 5 (Black , bold , hairline etc) to distinguish your title screen instead of colors.

I would also skip the entire first shot entirely and open up with the diver.

Don't use the crossfades please, they are sometimes used in clips nowadays to give an old feel or as a humorous thing, but it looks really unprofessional especially if you're using long shots.

Your footage is completely blue so it should be pretty easy to make it smooth purely with hard cuts.
I would also probably reduce the video up to 1.3-2 minutes maximum. After 2 minutes I felt like there was nothing new to be seen in the video. Maybe condense more shots in a shorter time span?

I might be being harsher than necessary, just some considerations I had watching it really quickly.

On the positive note,
I think you have some cool shots with the walls of jacks and I feel like the footage is definitely usable.

I'm not sure if you've ever color corrected your footage, but it might we worth watching a basic color correction video on youtube. There's tons of video's and tutorials on Editing on youtube that can help you alot.

 

[D_Fresh]

Embedded playback is now enabled, apologizes for accidentally disabling in YouTube.

Since you're using such dramatic music with alot of musical stabs in it, it could be fun to use it to cut at some moments. I would leave out the filmed and edited by untill the end in maybe a short credit screen, or very shortly after the title

I would suggest switching to a white font and play with the thickness of the font and not displaying everything at once like a pancarte. Maybe play a bit with the font styles 5 (Black , bold , hairline etc) to distinguish your title screen instead of colors.

I would also skip the entire first shot entirely and open up with the diver.

I totally agree regarding the music and cuts. I selected the music after cutting and I should have reversed that process....

I will be sharing the video with a few members of our dive group and possibly D&T, so I added the watermark just to prevent anyone from trimming the ends and claiming it as their own. But yes, it is tacky, I will definitely make it smaller and more transparent.

Don't use the crossfades please, they are sometimes used in clips nowadays to give an old feel or as a humorous thing, but it looks really unprofessional especially if you're using long shots.

Your footage is completely blue so it should be pretty easy to make it smooth purely with hard cuts.
I would also probably reduce the video up to 1.3-2 minutes maximum. After 2 minutes I felt like there was nothing new to be seen in the video. Maybe condense more shots in a shorter time span?

I might be being harsher than necessary, just some considerations I had watching it really quickly.

On the positive note,
I think you have some cool shots with the walls of jacks and I feel like the footage is definitely usable.

I'm not sure if you've ever color corrected your footage, but it might we worth watching a basic color correction video on youtube. There's tons of video's and tutorials on Editing on youtube that can help you a lot.

As far as post processing and color theory in general, I am (or was, before moving to the Philippines) a lighting designer in theatre and shoot landscape photography in RAW. So I am used to post processing (i.e. brightness, contrast, vibrance, white balance, and using histograms) but video is a whole new beast. I am enjoying learning video correction/editing.

Question: When you have a piece of footage in which your colors are changing (i.e. from a wide shot closing in on a subject, like the nudibranch) would you recommend keying the color correction, "static" color correction aiming for a midpoint, or slicing the clip?

Don't worry, you're not being too harsh I appreciate the feedback.