House of Leaves

2007

2008

(  Vids I made in 2011  )

My first tutorial on post-processing with Avisynth is almost four years old and while a lot of stuff still holds true, ( I think it is time for an update on some things.  )

I am part of this year's round of vidding interviews over at vid_commentary and I did manage to write 11k words on vidding, because obviously I'm a sucker for punishment details. So anyone interested in reading up on my whole vidding history and tech can do it here.

There are still people out there, who are very intimidated by avisynth and how to use it to prepare their sources. So I compiled example scripts and tried to break the necessary steps down into easy to follow instructions. Everything is better and more detailed explained in this part of the A&E's guide - The 'A&E's technical guide to All Things Audio and Video' contains a lot of information and is maybe overwhelming, if you just start out with Avisynth and don't feel so confident. But you should follow it step for step while installing the software you need, which is compiled here in AMVapp.

( Using Avisynth to prepare your source with example scripts )

Day 30 – Do you have a favorite vid you've made? What makes it your favorite? And don't forget to give us a link!

Clear the Area, My Skin and To be a Ghost are my favorites and I won't chose between them. These are my carefully crafted character love letters, unashamed and self-indulgent. This is a look into how my brain works and connects things. This is why I love Scully, Cordelia and Dean spelled out in pretty pictures and fast cuts. These are the reasons why I adore them, why I am moved by their arcs and how they did win my heart. Besides I had so much fun making them, even when I stumbled into a block or some crazy bullshit.

So I hope I didn't bore everybody on my flist to tears with this meme. It was cool to think about this stuff and for once write it down.

Day 28 – Have you ever collaborated with anyone else, whether vidding together, or having an artist or writer work on a piece about your vid?

xandra_ptv and I did four Multifandom projects together - and it was crazily awesome. I did expect much more technical hassle, because I know that Xandra and I have different ways to set up projects and was so surprised that it was much easier to melt the pieces together. Again the magic lies in avisynth for me. The vidding process itself was a blast, we didn't went into it with detailed plans and so it felt very organic to react to new drafts and pick up ideas Xandra laid out. And it was the first time I did actual speed vidding besides one 48hours-challenge with charmax, just to keep up. I had a nagging voice in the back of my mind and on IM that if I wouldn't deliver my drafts, Xandra would steamroll over my parts and take over.

The Multifandom aspect really helped me in with the speed, because I could use iconic scenes left and right without the need to search for more obscure scenes. So I often did stick with the first idea that came to mind for a lyric. So three of the four vids were done very quickly for my usual snail pace back then and 'Those Days' just fucked me over. I suddenly draw a blank in the middle of vidding. I kept coming back to it every few months and watch our drafts and loved what we had so far, but I couldn't come up with where to go next with my part. And then along came a few new shows that had fascinating sibling pairings, so it all ended well.

We will do more themes - we actually had too many after the last project and not the patience to decide on a song. Men in chains, scar fetish, mentor relationships, dark/light, threesomes, just to name a few. Yes, we love fandom tropes.

Day 29 – What is your current project or projects?

I have a dozen set up in subfolders in my project folder. I have over 40 songs in my 'To vid or not to vid' folder. Xandra and me have shared what feels like thousands of vid ideas.

So the current projects that I want to finish are:
1. The X Files Season Challenge with Xandra (if we are ever crazy enough to do the Reverse X Files Season Challenge it has to wait - a few years)
2. The Sam/Ruby/Dean vid I lost the project in a crash and started to recover, even when it now does go into a different direction then the last draft Xandra saved from me.
3. The Vampire Diaries - Damon/Stefan. Nothing more than bare bones laid out from 'Those Days', but yeah, me likes

So the current projects that I want to start are:
1.1 With all the refreshed XF-knowledge pick up the project laying on my hard drive for years - because it's a fucking cool concept
1.2 Make that damn Scully vid anyway
1.3 Mulder/Scully/Krycek - C'mon, it can't be that hard.
1.4 Comedy vid - Seriously.
2. The Same Song/Same Fandom Challenge with Xandra
3. Another Remix-Challenge with Xandra
4. Festivid pinch hit
5. Get another vid scratched from my To-Do-List from back then
6. Multifandom vids with Xandra (Lots and lots of them)
7. Vid against a song - hard
8. Vid literal with a song - so fucking hard
9. Make another German song into a vid
10. Do a movie vid

Day 26 – What is the oddest (or funnest) thing you've had to do for a vid?

# Get Spike in chains and ready to be tortured by Willow.
# Vid Deadwood to a German Rapsong - or more precise Sprechgesang - and make it such a cool fit.
# Use my dropped and leftover ideas from 'Wood and Nails' and make them into a contradictory vid 'My girl' - totally unrelated, but I still love it for what it is.
# Stop choosing scenes and instead use alpha masks to include all the pretty in 'To be a Ghost'.
# Make the Impala really mad at Sam and then have her make out with him - sexily.
# Get Spike stalking a sleeping Cordelia in her bedroom.
# Get over myself and accept the computer crash for real and be willing to post the second to last draft of 'Used to you' - well knowing about all the faults that I fixed in the lost final.
# Vid a classic Christmas song to 'Die Hard I + II' and pretend that corn popping is equal to hand grenades going boom.
# Find Wesley/Angel scenes that could be taken as car blowjobs, heart-to-hearts, break-ups and depressed drinking together.
# Let Fred over-paint a sketch of Cordelia on her crazy wall.
# Transform Spike into 'Frosty the Snowman'.
# Make Spike question Angel about their relationship status - in chains and with a stake in his hand.

Day 25 – Music – Do you listen to music while you rip source? Do you listen to your vid song immediately before vidding, months before vidding, or just while working on it?

I was always interested in the technical aspect of vidding. The whole backlog of stuff you have to do right, a lot of things even before you open Premiere. And then after you close it and can enhance your final encode. I mean I'm still easily distracted and lose hours hunting down information, especially when Xandra let me come near avisynth-filters. It's fascinating. It's also stuff an average watcher won't notice, besides thinking shiny and there is still so much possibilities out there, I could try and yeah, I love this part of vidding. I have preparing my footage down to a science, in the way I want it and which works best for me.

But I don't really like the actual prep work that comes with vidding, when I don't have the tools to further improve it or I have an inspiration I want to start on fucking now. I mean having to rip 5 seasons AtS and 7 BtVS for a vid, can make you question your commitment to your idea - hard. Or 9 seasons and two movies. This is my main reason, why I don't understand people, who clip their source - It's so much work and you have to do it again and again. Besides I absolutely need the whole season/show on my hands so that I can decide on a whim, preferable neatly packed as season-avs. I tend to do prep work when I don't feel very inspired to actually vid, to get it out of the way. So 2009 was a pretty good year for that kind of task and I could still pretend I would do some important chore for vidding, while perfecting my system. Luckily now I'm in the position that I have most of my sources ready to go and thanks to the Multifandom vids plenty I haven't even vidded solo yet or potential shows, just because I could run ripping and indexing on the background while reading fics.

I have done all mentioned options with music. I have songs I would love to vid, but haven't found the right fandom yet. 'Hey Pretty' was on the backburner for years, till SPN came along and made it a perfect fit. I have listened to songs on repeat for (a) week(s) to play around with ideas. 'Walk the walk', 'Feeling Good', 'Haunted' and 'Wood and Nails' - pretty much every song when I came back after a one year hiatus in 2006. Following my last hiatus in 2009/most of 2010 I have changed my way of approaching music in and for vidding. I have searched for hours for songs to vid a specific theme I want to explore, music became more canvas than painting. I think the best way to explain this would be that I'm now working with a more open framework, I don't need twenty support beams to hold up the vid.

I did give up on the idea that only the most perfect song can be vidded for characters/pairings. Because back then I just ended up listening to music for months and throwing away good enough ideas instead of vidding. This need for precision/an unique twist did drag me down, so now I take what seems like a good enough fit. What surprised me by this approach is the way, it feels different to form the narrative. I own the vid more, because the idea was before the song and so the structure is clearer. I do tend to need an hour or two with the song on the background to get used to the mood(swings), rhythm, beats and narrative. It still doesn't thump the feeling when you stumble over a song that transforms into perfection, but I take what I get till then.

Day 24 – Betaing – How many betas do you like to use to make sure there aren't any major flaws in your vid? Do you have a Beta horror story or dream story?

I'm still eternally grateful for my early betas, who had to sit through some appalling shit and had the patience to explain, where I failed and where I succeeded. In detail. But the thing is, now I vid to get the vid I want to see. If there are flaws in a vid, I own them. Vidding is all about excitement and passion for me. I don't need someone to walk me through a vid, but I'm in the lucky position to have someone, who shares my brain.

I love vidding with Xandra on IM, it's inspirational competition. It gives us the opportunity to ask the rare 'What ep was this scene in?'-question, which on two or three occasions leaded to the very disappointing answer, 'A fanfic' or 'Just in your head'. And also important conversations going something like this, 'Damn, I need her/him looking sad. But not sad sad, more happy sad with a glint of manic depression.' - '2x04 around 34 minutes in.' - 'Yes, but I need the expression as night shot preferable with blue police lights flashing.' - 'How about 1x15?' - 'Perfect.'

IMing regularly leads to various degrees of 'Spin the ship' and the always fun game of, 'S/he is ready to rip his clothes off to shut him/her up' aka UST pumped up while scrolling through the eps without audio. Xandra and I indulge in rewatch marathons and we sometimes lose nights to random 'Arrested Development' or 'Better off Ted' cravings. We pressure each other into shows one likes like 'Deadwood', 'Game of Thrones', 'True Blood' or 'Firefly', which frequently results in even more vids. Xandra has a knack for alternate plot lines and back stories to spice things up. Reasons like Veronica being married to Lem make their relationship this much richer and interactions even funnier. Most importantly we crack each other up, get tropes and vibes.

We know each other and our tastes and differences so fucking well. Our vidding styles are completely different, but I trust her implicitly to tell me when I'm in the wrong head space for a vid or push me through a block and drag me through a slump. Even kicking and screaming in utter frustration. We also share our technical knowledge and boy, were there some things she taught me I wished I knew earlier. In return I dumped her in the beauty of avisynth-filters and ignored her curses. The instant gratification of seeing her react to a draft and telling me to stop fussing with a perfectly good section and 'Really? Do you need that eight frame shot? Because most people will miss the meaning.'

So exposure to new fandoms, shows and music and being a constant inspiration, makes Xandra my dream beta.

Day 23 – When you post, where do you post to? Just your journal? Just an archive? Your own personal site?

My LJ, vidding and if I am a member of a fandom specific comm there, because people who are interested in this fandom should have a chance to find it without having to hop through loops in order to see the vid post. I recently added a vid masterlist page on my site, because I figured some people might only know me through that link.

I would like to post at youtube, but Germany has the worst representation of music artists with the GEMA - they are stuck in pre-internet-age. So pretty much everything is blocked here. Youtube and the labels try to force a compromise, but yeah, I don't see them reaching an agreement soon. Other streaming sites either disappear like imeem or stage6, or make a limit like BAM so for now I don't bother. Mostly because I will always rather download a vid then watch a streaming version.