Ceciliahoang's Blog

Week 12

ceciliahoang — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 11:44:46 +0000

Week 12 started with stresses… I thought that I might have to fail this subject as I could not meet the deadline…

Then Luke came to save my life. He was so nice to give us extra weeks to complete the project.

Up to this stage, everything was constructed. However, I still can not find out the way to export my footage. I spent 16 hours last time to export it using Quicktime conversion. As the result, DVD studio Pro does not allow me to import the video file.

I have been looking for a solution on the Net, and there are thousands of advices and solution. I was so confused. Shooting on HD was so complicated. On TV, on the Net, they talked a lot about HD but in reality, there was no real HD footage being captured on a DVD (unless it is Blue Ray and the footage is short). So, it turned out that we could capture HD/HDV footage, then converted it into Standard and finally burn it into a DVD (DVD software design does not work with HD file).

Luke was too busy to help. I had to figure out myself. I asked Trevor, a classmate, but he could not solve it either. He seemed to have the same problem as mine. I then had to seek help from an admin of a Multimedia website. He advised me to convert the footage,using DV-PAL converter, not the H264. However, by doing this will lead to quality losses. I will have to try it…

Hopefully it work…and it does, then I am going to have my HD footage on a standard DVD .. (bad luck!)

Week 11- Camera connection problem!

ceciliahoang — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 02:52:40 +0000

I came to university at 11 o’clock to return the camera. Finally I’ve got all my footages captured and am ready for the editing parts. When I started to transfer my footages into the computer, Final Cut Pro did not allow me to do it. I checked the connection, which was good, then my camera, which could be viewed through Final Cut Pro capturing screen. I had no ideas where the mistake came from. However, I prefer to go home and do all the capturing as I have never met any problems like that when working at home.

Well, I can not work with my footage, so I log onto the net and look for more after effect tutorials. I have finished my main DVD menu and now start to create the sub-menus. Sub menus are going to be easier as I get to know more and more about After Effect. Such a powerful software.

I am in room now, waiting for the class to begin. I can see a few classmates inside the room,working on their projects. Normally, I feel so lonely as I am the only one who turn up early, and from now, I know that I will have more friends to accompany.

Update – New ideas for DVD Menu

ceciliahoang — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 11:17:06 +0000

I have been working on my DVD menu lately, and Luke told me that my draft design did not relate to vietnamese cooking tutorial. Luke suggested me to put more asian ingredients and even put animation into the DVD menu. I was about to follow his suggestion but then I had a new idea.

I am going to create flaming effect, boiling oil effect and smoke effect and put them into the kitchen (which I used as my background). I will use fractal noise to create smoke effect and use circle with transformation to make boiling oil.

However, the biggest problem is to create flaming effect. I will search for more information from the net and will work on it to create my own flame.

I also borrowed equipments from uni and will capture the last footage. on Sunday.

Well, everything is on track!

Weak 10 – It is time to run

ceciliahoang — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 11:15:00 +0000

1 week of holiday has just ended…

I have been playing with After Effect for the whole week and finally I have got my main menu draftly designed. I purchased a stock photo from the net and used it as the background of my main menu.

1 week seems not enough to get aquainted with After Effect, but I am happy with what I have created using this software and I can not wait to show Luke what I have done.

I have also booked a camera and all equipments for my shooting on Sunday. I have asked my auntie for the permission to shoot at her restaurant already so I think I will have lots of fun capturing my last footage overthere.

..and most importantly, I know I have to run, as I do not have much time left…!!

Week 9: Guess Lecture

ceciliahoang — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 06:09:59 +0000

Yeah, next week is the holiday.I have borrowed 2 HDV cameras, tripods, the lighting kit and the sound recorder. I will shoot another four video tutorials at my auntie’s house. Luke invited us to the guess lecture on Friday. Amazingly I met Ali, my old classmate, who is now so professional on working with After Effect. He taught me a lot of things about this software and also provided all the tips that he used for his gradute project last semester. Adobe After Effect is absolutely cool. After the lecture, I got some ideas of how to create the DVD menu for my video. Next guess was a guy ( I forgot his name) who had experience of working with sounds and noises. His video from last year was terrific. He used a software called Sound Soap (which I had heard about when I was at the local TV broadcast in Vietnam). His movie was not as splendid as Ali’s but so meaningful and touched. He also showed us the technique of shooting footages. He had totally 5 different HDV cameras placed at approriate anchor point in order to capture all sides of the actors and the interviewer. Opps, I forgot to mention that his movie was a interview of a group of migrants who came to Australia long time ago from different countries. That’s it for this week!

Week 8

ceciliahoang — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 03:53:32 +0000

This week is mainly about designing the main menu and screens for the DVD. I chose bright pink color as the main theme. I have some photos captured during the last shooting so that I also put them into the DVD menu.

Luke saw my draft design and he did not like it much. He pointed out the weakness and disadvantages of my design. I realized that I used lots of colors and lots of fancy patterns. Those things make my design become unprofessional. I did try to avoid it but I think it has become my habit of designing so that I need more time to improve.

Also, I spent a bit more time learning photoshop tutorials on the Net. Adobe photoshop is more and more powerful. There are thousands of tutorial with different techniques and methods. I read through, then have some practices. However, they are so hard to remember….

Last day of the week, which is today,Sunday, I start to write a script for my next shooting.

Week 7..oppss!

ceciliahoang — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 13:45:38 +0000

The news from previous entry was a misunderstanding. Luke’s announcement was for a different subject. Luckily, I checked my mail two days before the day it was due so that I did have some preparation for the presentation. What I needed to do was a bit of edting and uploading the clip on to vimeo.

I have been playing around with text in motion. I have made my text flying around the stage,in and out of the images. I have not touched the project at all, just concentrating on the presentation. I know I am behind other students now but I do not understand why I am,right now, feeling lack of motivation for this project.

Then, I watched some of the previous cooking show named ” Yang can cook”, a show from an asian chef cook. I have some ideas of how to capture the cooking steps, however, their video is a show while my idea is more concentrating on the cooking methods. I do not like to include lots of voices and sounds in my videos, so I should sit down and work out another way to attract the audience’s attention and motivation.

Luke suggested me to create a kind of “background videos”, which the Vietnamses restaurant can play it (without any sound) for their customer to watch while having meals…Such a good idea,right?

I’ll try to do it that way, then…

Week 6: Great news from Luke!

ceciliahoang — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 08:36:00 +0000

Luke announced that he would give us one extra week for our first assignment. That was a great news as I had not even started anything yet.

In class, I was studying how to use stabilise function and how to apply it to my video. After 20 minutes playing around with Motion, I finally made it work.Cool!

However, when I got home, all I needed to do was capturing the presentation. Regarding of how many times I have been filming around, but this is the first time ever, I capture images of MYSELF, MYSELF presenting in front of the camera. This probably will create lots of fun…

CAN’T WAIT to START…

Week 5: Struggling with MOTION

ceciliahoang — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 06:34:52 +0000

Today, we’ve got problems with loading tutorials from lynda.com website. I’ve spent more than 3 hours in the lab, tried to figure out how to add a key frame into my movie. Then, when Luke showed me how to do it, I had another problem. A keyframe does not serve what I wanted to do. By using a keyframe, I can move my first clip around the screen but then can not rotate parts of the clip. Once I rotate a small part, the whole clip is rotated.

Well, I probably need to watch more video tutorials and I will do it when I get home. I need to complete the colour correction for the rest of my clip before the class is finished.

Back to work now, Cecilia!Try hard as we only have 7 weeks left….

Week 4 – updated!

ceciliahoang — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 11:46:47 +0000

I’ve got new ideas for my project…Well, instead of creating the whole webpage, I just need to concentrate on my cooking video tutorials and put them together on a DVD.

This is a cool idea and lucky me as Luke has accepted it.