The 380 sec portrait

[Lind82 Profile Private messageWebsite]

Hi everyone.

First of all I have say thanks to everyone that contributes to this forum. I hope that one day my posts can be as beneficial to you guys as your post have been to me This is my first comment/topic ever and I am quite excited to see if I will get any feedback on the show I just made. My brother is getting married in august and I plan to incorporate this video in my speech somehow. Maybe as a starter. The captions is in Norwegian but the language of the pictures is as you know global. Let me know what you think and will appreciate all feedback that can improve my productions. Feedback from you guys are much more valuable to me than feedback from family and friends when it comes to this topic. They are too easy to satisfy.



Best regards,

A Proshow Enthusiast Newbee

[kabeeo Profile Private message]

Outstanding. I really enjoyed the work. Thanks for posting it. I think he will love it.

[alcain Profile Private messageWebsite]

Ok. First, welcome to the group! Second - while I am known to be brutally honest in my critiques, I always try to offer helpful suggestions as well. Here is my take on your show...

The ten second count down - un-necessary and too lengthy.
Loved the Jenny Zarem effect intro, but it abruptly stopped and went into a slower paced song. If you want to do this, you will need to add a one second silence before you move to the slower song. The way it is now sounds like a mistake.
I know the old photos are faded and the colors have gone to sepia, but they really should be color corrected for this show. You want all of the photos to look as best they can.
The end of the second song stops and this time there should be no gap in the music. You need to do a 3 second cross fade with the audio. Reason? These songs are similar in nature so a cross fade is appropriate.
Your general panning and zooming seems just fine to me.
Doggie "Red Eyes" (green) at 4:58, then baby red eyes at 5:02 should be corrected.
The last sequence is priceless - very well done.

I enjoyed your show, thank you for sharing.

Blessings, ~Al

[Lind82 Profile Private messageWebsite]

YES!!! That's how a feedback should be written. I do not want members to tell me what I want to hear, but what I need to hear and you did great. Excellent and valued points. Much appreciated.

[polanen Profile Private messageWebsite]

Hi,

First of all I fully agree with Al (AB) , but I also have some other points.

* I think the show is about 1.30 minutes to long to keep the attention.
* The text in the right corner is un-necessary
* I like the style pack 2 but in my opinion you use to many of them.

Oke, still I like your show and music.

One advise make a try-out to see the show in real and not on a PC.

Thanks for posting

Gr. Ab

[HunnyB Profile Private message]

For some reason I can't view this well ---wish it was on the site in presenter.
I alway have trouble with You Tube veiwing. Wish I knew why. It keeps stopping to buffer. Over and over and over again.

[AMD Profile Private message]

I thought you had a basically good show.

I, too, agree that the countdown is unnecessary and actually does not fit in with the rest of your show.

IMHO, the "Jenny Zarem effect" does little for a show except to "jive" up a high energy sports show, perhaps. Images remaining on the screen for such brief periods of time could as well be any images at all since they really can't be effectively viewed. My experience with clients--including paid clients, friends, and relatives--is that they want the images to remain on the screen long enough to be viewed and find it a bit frustrating to have them appear for a fleeting moment and disappear completely. I do know that others seem to like that "effect," so I guess it is just my experience, but I find it basically distracting fluff that takes up precious show time that could be better utilized. Again, this is just my opinion.

Once your show got settled, I thought it was very nicely done.

Thanks for sharing.

Ann

[alcain Profile Private messageWebsite]

I find it basically distracting fluff that takes up precious show time

Look at any blockbuster movie nowadays, the ones that make it to number one for months at a time...

you'll find that all of them have plenty of "distracting fluff" within their scripts. It is part of the overall package and viewing experience. It adds the variety, charm, drama, and "distraction" from reality.

Just my experience. Blessings, ~Al

[Lind82 Profile Private messageWebsite]

I find all comments so far very helpful. I like the fact that you guys are judging this show trough professional eyes even though it was made by a pure amateur. The comments you guys posts are a very helpful tool for improvements. I will purchase some photo software, continue to watch the sample shows for new ideas and of course take advantage of all the previous posted comments in this forum. Learning from my own mistakes is good, learning from mistakes made by others is even better

A wonderful day to you all

Lind82

[mikemullett Profile Private message]

For some reason I can't view this well ---wish it was on the site in presenter.
I alway have trouble with You Tube veiwing. Wish I knew why. It keeps stopping to buffer. Over and over and over again.

I have exactly the same problem Hunny, so frustrating

Mike

[gpsmikey Profile Private message]

I would agree with what Al said - I was having trouble with it buffering all the time also, but what I was able to watch was very well done. Make sure you have the aspect ratio correct for whatever TV it will be viewed on and watch the
safe area (the newer LCD/Plasma TV's seem fine, but the older TV's were very good at trimming the edges of the images off - very discouraging to work very hard to put a show together only to find edges of pictures and captions trimmed by the TV. I might consider slowing down the switching images (Jenny effect) a bit so people get a better chance to focus on them.

mikey

[bob walden Profile Private message]

I agree with Ann. The Jenny Zarem effect is not for me!! I find it distracting and annoying. Trying to shift my point of focus to see the images only to find them gone before I have a chance to view them bugs me!! Isn't the point of a slide show to view the images? Also found the intro to be to long. But I really liked the majority of the show. I dont understand the language. However I felt I understood the captions because the images were so visual it was pretty easy to understand how they related. That makes an interesting show for me. Images flying in and out for no apparent reason tend to turn me off. Just my opinion though! Only other thing for me was the lack of correcting some of the images. While its cool to view old images sometimes it detracts from them if some repair or color correction isnt done. I did have several halts in viewing but not too bad!! Overall I liked it!!

Bob

[debngar Profile Private message]

I don't think you can help the YouTube buffer problem. It happens to me sometimes too.

I would als suggest to lose the caption in the right corner and remove the countdown intro. It's not necessary and will shorten the show.

I's fun to try out all the new stuff, effects, styles etc. If you decide to make adjustments to the show, think about whether the motion and zooms have a good purpose. As long as the effects compliment the images, I see nothing wrong with them but the minute they compete for the viewers attention and make it hard to focus on the main subject, that's where I think I'd tone it down or make some kind of adjustment in the display.

I'm sure when you make the final touches to this show, it will be the perfect addition to your speech at the wedding!

[tdew Profile Private message]

I agree with Ann. The Jenny Zarem effect is not for me!! I find it distracting and annoying. Trying to shift my point of focus to see the images only to find them gone before I have a chance to view them bugs me!! Isn't the point of a slide show to view the images? Bob

Me too! Bob said it.

But I wanted to comment on how much I liked the pairing of pictures from childhood photos to ones taken in more recent years. The two brothers with their sand castle were great.

It's a lovely show and I'm sure the family will enjoy it very much.

[Lind82 Profile Private messageWebsite]

Everyone,

I have received excellent and useful feedback. However I just want explain my reasoning for some of the effects used. I do not try to argue against any of the comments, just let you guys in some of the thoughts behind some of the effects.

“The 10 second countdown”: Too long? Maybe, but in a wedding were a lot of stuff is going on I thought it would be nice to have a countdown to prepare the party for what is coming next. Let them have time to make them self comfortable and focused.

“The Jenny Zarem effect”: Most of the party are probably expecting a traditional home made show. I wanted a beginning that catch their attention right away. Just giving them enough to be curious about what is coming next. Yes, the pictures can't be effectively viewed, except the centre picture that only changes four times. Since all the pictures will be used later in the show I did not want them do study them close. In other words I just wanted to use this effect as a teaser.

“The text in the right corner” Unnecessary yes, but will only be used on video posted online.

“The show length”. It might be too long for strangers to watch, but for close family and friends I hope and think the length will be all right. I would considered it as a huge success if total strangers would find the show interesting for nearly 7 minutes.

“Quality of the pictures” Not the best at all. The pictures was scanned into my computer using old scanner/printer. I do not have photo software, but I will definitely get one fast.


I have a VERY positive experience posting my video in this forum. Of course it would be nice to have only positive comments, but I did not post my video for that reason. I posted it to learn of my mistakes and I definitely have. I grew up way north of the arctic circle (North of Norway) and there we call a spade for a spade, so do not be afraid of pointing out elements in my shows or comments that needs improvements. I will work extra hard on my future shows to make it hard for you guys to find anything “bad” to comment on

A wonderful day to you all.

Lind82