Many successful videographers carefully plan their projects before filming. Writing a script can help you organize your video prior to filming, avoid time-wasting digressions, and select appropriate language for this medium. In a new video tutorial, I discuss the difference between writing text meant to be read and that meant to be spoken and provide a series of suggestions for preparing a script for a video.
By the way, many of the tips I cover in this tutorial apply to preparation of material for podcasts and oral presentations at conferences.
In this tutorial series, learn how to edit your videos on iPhone or iPad using LumaFusion 2019. In Part 1, I introduce the workspace and show how to trim clips and begin building your video. In Part 2, I cover various adjustments such as creating cutaways and picture in picture, modifying the audio, and adding text titles and transitions. These basics will get you started editing video like a professional.
I found the LumaFusion app to be fairly easy to navigate, and it worked well with the touchscreen on my iPhone. Although sometimes I found it difficult to see some elements in the timeline (e.g., transitions), I was able to make them larger by expanding the view (using the pinch-zoom gesture). (This would be less of a problem on an iPad.)
The various framing tools allow quick resizing and positioning of a video clip or photo.The ability to use multiple tracks is a big plus. I also like the advanced text titles tool, which lets you select font style, size, and color, along with other options such as outlining and opacity. Additionally useful are the galleries of presets, which allow you to quickly make routine adjustments. Although not covered in my tutorial, you can create custom presets and save them to a gallery for repeated use. Overall, the app seems to be well designed and has few glitches.
Music and sound effects can enhance a video and the viewer’s experience. However, finding music and other audio tracks that are free to use is not always easy. YouTube has compiled a library of audio tracks for YouTube creators. YouTube has also made it easier to search and find an appropriate audio track (using filters such as genre, duration, attribution requirements). If you have a YouTube channel, you can use your Video Manager to find and add a music track to your uploaded video.
In a new tutorial, I show how to use YouTube’s Audio Library of free music and sound effects tracks in your videos.
I recently came across a Tweet from Climate Central that was illustrated with a striking videographic, which is a combination of graph and video. In this case, the graph showed where Earth’s accumulated energy (heat) ends up (land, sea, air), and it was superimposed on a video of ice floes floating on the ocean.
The idea behind such videographics is to create an attractive and memorable information product that catches people’s eye. The moving image draws your attention as you scroll through Tweets or surf through a website. My attention was definitely captured, and I took a closer look at the graph and the data it presented.
In addition to making your Tweets more visible and informative, videographics can be used on a webpage, as supplemental online material for a journal article, or for a scientific presentation. On a webpage, it can create an eye-catching visual that highlights a recent publication. More journals now accept videos and interactive graphics to accompany articles; a videographic can enhance an online article or be offered as a downloadable supplementary file. Judicious use of a videographic in a conference presentation or seminar can emphasize a key finding and make the point more memorable.
So, how do you create a videographic? It’s relatively easy if you know how to use Photoshop and a movie-editing program. Here are the steps:
1. Prepare your graph in any graphing program and save it as an image (jpg, png).
2. Open the image in Photoshop.
3. Use the “magic wand” tool to highlight the graph’s background and delete it.
4. Now save the graph with its transparent background as a .png file, which will preserve the transparency.
5. Import the new graph into iMovie (or other movie-editing program).
6. Import a video clip that illustrates what the graph depicts (clouds streaming across the sky, waves lapping on the shore, people walking).
7. In the timeline, add a ten-second segment (or whatever duration you choose) of the video. Add the graph to the timeline as a picture-in-picture image and resize/re-position as needed.
8. Export the video file and post it on your website or in a Tweet.
I made a tutorial showing exactly how to prepare your graph and then superimpose it on a video clip (see embedded video below or go to this link).
I recently received an email from a reader who was having difficulty figuring out how to make a video about his non-visual topic. He wanted to communicate his research on data technology but was at a loss as to how to depict this topic using video. I gave him some suggestions specific to his situation, but realized that there were likely others out there like him. So, I decided to make a tutorial that shows three ways to generate film footage about a non-visual topic. Here it is:
