This is my work for Jim Grooms videoessay assignment here and this was probably the hardest assignments yet but I really enjoyed it. FIRST, it was really hard for me because I spent about the moment I read this assignment to yesterday (4 days) trying to figure out which movie I wanted to do. I love love LOVE movies so I was going to do my favorite “On The Waterfront” but then I realized I don’t have that movie here at school because I left it at home, the last time I went home (which I regret). Then I was going to do “Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain” and realized I lent that out to a friend just last week. THEN, I thought I’d do “Requiem For A Dream” or maybe “Funny Games” but I realized both those movies would be really, really hard to explain. So, I decided I was going to do “Amadeus” but as I started trimming away I realized there is no way I could do this in around 10minutes. My first version was actually 30minutes long and I did my best but I could only cut it down to 17minutes, no less, and still give it justice….so that was a no go. So, then on monday I noticed myself humming a tune from the movie, “Top Hat” and I was like BAM! I’ll do “Top Hat” 1935. It’s a very fun and easy movie that I enjoy.

Now, the whole actual process wasn’t that bad thanks to Jim’s wonderful instructions. I’ve never really done anything with videos before, except watch them, so this was all new to me and I actually thought it was fun and rather simple with patience. Granted, I already ripped Top Hat and had it in AVI format so it was easier for me to trim. I actually used a free AVI trimmer I found online here because I could not get MPEG to work. They basically both have the same layout only this is just for AVI format. Then with the actual editing…I have windows 7 live Movie Maker and I actually Googled and Youtubed how to narrate on movie maker and it was just not working. There were plenty of VISTA examples but not any for windows 7 and actually recording. For example, the VISTA one has a narrate button, windows 7 does not….not sure why. So, I spent a good couple of hours trying to figure that out. Eventually, I gave up on Windows Movie Maker and just downloaded Jim’s other recommended device VideoSpin which worked very, very well. Although, there was no narrate button/record on VideoSpin either. So, I actually ended up using Audacity and just played the video file in the VideoSpin and then recorded my thoughts on Audacity at the same time the video was going. I did that about 3 times. (The second time was perfect but then my AC came on and RUINED IT) Anyways, then I uploaded the Audacity file to mp3 and THEN, I uploaded that mp3 into VideoSpin and it combined the video and the Mp3. Then, all I had to do was play around with the volume levels; they had one for the video and one for the mp3. I also added the movie poster for Top Hat at the end and beginning of the scenes as a kind of intro and conclusion; I did this on VideoSpin. Then, I just saved the movie and uploaded it onto YouTube. Maybe there was an easier way to do all that…I did miss class last Thursday so I probably missed something, my own fault. But anywho, I think it turned out okay for my first time.
A little background: Top Hat is a musical that I really like even though I don’t really care for musicals. I didn’t really go into the plot of the movie here. So, if you really want to know what’s going on you could see the movie or read about it here. I think it’s a fun movie in general and I used to dance (Tap/Ballet) but theres more background information in the video. Enjoy my videoessay!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sUS-LuyOdU