Episode Three: 47 - Speaking of Audio

I had mentioned earlier that some of my interviews were conducted in less than ideal audio conditions (although I didn't realize this when I had originally conducted the interviews). During one interview we kept a fan blowing in the background, and another interview was conducted outside, very close to a busy street where lots of noise was happening. Because these interviews were done, and I had to work with what was there, I had to find a way to make the audio better. After fumbling about for a bit, I found out that Final Cut Pro actually had automated solutions for these kinds of issues. After clicking some audio button, I saw that there was a tool to decrease background noise. I don't believe that I did this perfectly, but that simple automation helped me a great deal, and made the final audio so much better than any manual tweaking I could have ever done. So finding that such tools were built into Final Cut Pro was an amazing revelation.

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Episode Three: 46 - Transitions, ii

However, in previous episodes of Listen To The City Breathe, I did not use many interesting transitions between shots. However, after working on the Christmas Fantasy music video, and watching tv and other documentaries more carefully since making the first episode, I learned that well placed transitions do contribute something special to a film. In this episode, I chose to use one specific kind of transition when we turned away from Toshi, and another specific kind of transition when we returned to him. After all, the transition needs to serve a purpose to tell the story, and I tried to maintain that idea when using transitions, and when choosing which transition to use.

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Episode Three: 45 - Transitions, i

There are two main kinds of transitions I used in this episode of Listen To The City Breathe. The first kind is a transition between shots; the second type is when transitioning between "chapters" in the film. Since the first episode, I started a style where the transition between chapters would be some shot of a subway train either passing by or passing through. For the most part, I kept that system in place for this episode. I still like the break that this kind of shot creates, and how it helps the viewer realize that we are now moving on to a different part of this film.

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Episode Three: 44 - Color

It is difficult to use any image straight from the camera. I remember that I used to believe that my camera was so great that any image that I took was great, as is. However, I quickly learned that many (or all) of my images would benefit a great deal with color correction. I never did this to a great deal in Final Cut Pro, and so this offered a certain learning curve challenge. For one thing, I was much more accustomed to the layout and workflow within Photoshop, and other Adobe products. But the color correction tools in Final Cut Pro are much different. If I was going to continue with Final Cut Pro (as I said earlier, I just couldn't get premiere to work), I would have to get used to working with the color tools that were present here. Certainly, at first, it was difficult, but by the end of the project, I felt like I learned a lot, and although I don't think I'm an expert, at least I understand a bit better how these things work. I feel confident that in future films, they will look better still.

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Episode Three: 43 - Editing with music

In the course of improving my own skills at documentary filmmaking (and filmmaking in general), I read several books about cinematography, lighting, directing, editing, etc. One topic that I haven't read a whole book about, yet, is music in film. However, most of the other books included at least a chapter on the subject. After making the music videos (link, link) I really like the methodology that I developed in that process. That is, the film follows the music.

The reason that I bring this up as a point is because every filmmaking book that I have claims that the music should be amongst the last things added, after the editing is already finished, and the film is locked-in. Perhaps they say this in reference to working with composers who are creating an original score for the film. But even then, I believe that music offers a more intrinsic rhythm, and thus the imagery would do well to follow that rhythm.

For that reason, I certainly didn't lock-in the film before adding music, but rather added music, and then re-edited what I might in order to make the film better fit the natural rhythm of the music. To be sure, this is, in fact, a back-and-forth sort of relationship. That is, sometimes the music dictates how the image has to change, and sometimes the image dictates that the music has to be rewritten, or change in some way or another.

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Episode Three: 42 - Music, ii

I had already had a couple pieces of music that I thought might work nicely. I recently created a more mellow dance piece for my Yellowstone video, and for an advertisement for a JapaneseLiterature course, I had created something a bit more upbeat. In fact, that commercial was another deal that had a specific deadline that slowed down the production of this piece. (But for that piece, I only created the music, and edited together a bunch of clips from classic (and not-so-classic) Japanese films; so I created none of the shots for that commercial.) In all, I created five new short pieces of music, that I hope to use and reuse again in the future.

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Episode Three: 41 - Music, i

Since deciding to delve into filmmaking, I had soon after also decided that I should make my own personal library of music that I could use for these films. I already had a small collection of music that I have created over the years, but for the most part that music was more art-music oriented, and certainly didn't fit into the tone for Toshi's episode of Listen To The City Breathe. I also already had one album's worth of piano music by Ramon Catalan, who has given me permission to utilize his music. The problem with that, however, is that piano music also didn't fit the tone of this film much. Thus, I arrived at the conclusion that I would have to make my own new music, since I didn't already have a big collection of dance music.

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