'Last Minutes with Oden' has won the first Vimeo Award for best short documentary -- and the award for best overall video, which carries a cash prize of $25,000 to create a new project.
As with most award-winning videojournalism, it was previously showcased on KobreGuide.com.
The heartbreaking video, by Eliot Rausch of Phos Pictures, depicts a man saying goodbye to his loyal old dog as the pet's struggle with cancer finally comes to an end.
'Oden' was among nine Vimeo award-winners in a variety of categories, culled from more than 6,500 submissions. You can watch all the winners here.
Here's a new boon for videojournalism producers and consumers. The "new Twitter" enables you to embed photos and videos directly into your posts, thanks to partnerships with more than a dozen popular hosting sites, including Flickr and YouTube.
And now Brightcove is joining the party. That's huge news, simply because Brightcove's clients include many of the major news publishers, including New York Times, Washington Post, Time, USA Today, and Financial Times.
In short, you're going to start seeing more professionally produced news and feature videos embedded on Twitter, without leaving the site. It's just a matter of time before broadcast networks and even local TV stations come aboard.
Beet.TV interviewed Brightcove SVP Jeff Whatcott, who explains it all in the video below, which Beet.TV embedded in its own Twitter post, simply by cutting/pasting the URL of the YouTube clip, which automatically created the videoplayer when published.
It's time to start strategizing how you can best start deploying video on your Twitter account.
The proliferation of video on the Web is due not just to an increase in professionally produced fare, but primarily because it's so cheap and easy for average idiots to shoot footage and spread it around. And much of the impetus for that activity has been Websites that make it cheap and easy to upload and share video for the world to see.
Everyone knows about YouTube, but in fact there are dozens of video sharing sites out there -- most of them free -- that offer features similar to, and in some instances superior to, YouTube's.
TopTen Reviews, which is sort of a Consumer Guide for techies, recently rated video sharing sites, offering comprehensive reviews of each and a useful side-by-side comparison chart. Here are the leaders of the pack:
Producer Features (e.g. video creation tools; educational resources; public/private options)
Content (e.g. large library; aesthetic and legal regulations)
Ease of Use (e.g. intuitive organization and navigation; quick loading; minimal buffer delays)
Help/Support (e.g. FAQs; user guides & forums; customer service)
So which site was number one? No surprise here -- YouTube. It wasn't the first video sharing site, and its content is not always the greatest, but it's now synonymous with video itself, having garnered nearly a fifth of the world's Internet traffic. (Here's the TopTen review.)
TopTen reviewers especially liked YouTube's "functionality and community."
The real strength of YouTube is the members that interact, comment, and post videos for specific interests. It’s possible to find a video on YouTube for any interest, occupation, hobby or pastime...
Perhaps the most telling effect of YouTube’s video sharing formula is the fact that YouTube has gone from being the star to creating stars.... Now presidential candidates use YouTube as a way to give their debates and speeches a national audience, because YouTube has such a broad user base....
But is YouTube the best choice for videojournalists, who want their non-fiction stories, often on weighty topics, to stand out from the crowd? What has your experience been with video sharing sites? Which ones do you use... and why?
For most of July we taught a videojournalism workshop in Perpignan, France, for eighteen American students. It was part of a study-abroad program co-sponsored by the Institute for Education in International Media (ieiMedia) and San Francisco State University.
Here are a few tips we can pass along, based on common student errors and problems we encountered.
A. Shooting Suggestions
1. Use the tripod whenever possible. Shaky camera work is hard to watch and screams "amateur."
2. Avoid zooms, pans and tilts. The top pros almost never use them, for good reason. They're distracting, tough to edit, and the sign of a novice.
3. Focus manually when shooting close-ups. On autofocus, the camera often locks in on something that is in the background.
4. Take lots of reverse shots of subjects’ faces as they carry out their activities. If you need to, hold the camera at arm’s length, in front of the subject, and record at least 10 seconds of video.
5. Also shoot across the subject’s shoulder, from their perspective, to see what he or she is seeing.
6. Shoot overalls. If the subject of the story is church bells, shoot not only inside and outside the church, but also position the camera on a hill near the town where you can still see the church, to let the viewer understand how the sound travels over the entire region.
7. If the subject talks about the past, ask if they have old photos from that time that you can use in b-roll or cutaway shots.
8. When using a simultaneous translator or interpreter, make sure they provide word-for-word English versions of whatever the subject says, and doesn't substitute the third-person or add "he said." If the subject says, "I went to the store..." then make sure the translator says, "I went to the store..." (and not, "He said he went to the store.") Make sure you aren't just capturing the translator’s interpretation and summary of the dialogue instead of what actually was said. If the translator’s voice is crystal clear, you can use it in the final story, over the actual subject's voice. Otherwise you will need to dub in a new voice or use subtitles.
9. When possible, avoid subtitles and on-screen narrative text. People don’t like to read movies.
10. Sometimes you can capture footage on a Flip or other small camera that is not super high quality but might be better than no footage at all.
Audio suggestions
1. What you hear on the audio track you need to see on the video track, and what you see you need to hear about. When someone says something in the story, viewers want to observe what is happening. If viewers are watching something, they want to hear about and understand what they are watching. Few video images are simple and obvious enough that they don’t need supporting dialogue or voiceover. This simple principle of correlating what you see and hear is very difficult to carry out. Often students had an interview section about an element of the story but no video to accompany it. Or they did not have enough video footage to go with extensive audio passages.
2. Here is where the wireless mic can come in handy. By wiring your subject, you can overhear what they say to everyone around them, as well as observe with the video camera what they doing at the same time. One student did a story about the problems of being an English speaker and playing on a French sports team. Viewers heard only the players talking about the difficulties. The audience never got to hear an actual dialogue demonstrating the problem. Wiring a coach during practice would have let the viewer hear the challenges of communicating across the two languages, and viewers could draw their own conclusions.
Editing suggestions
1. You need to create a road map of what steps to take once you have collected your material -- i.e. what to do first, second and third.
2. We found that by having students transcribe all their interviews (a task they detest) and also all the spoken audio collected during candid moments (a task they overlooked), they could more easily and quickly create a paper script.
3. With a paper script, students could see if they needed to write voiceover to provide information missing from interviews or dialogue. With more time, they could have gone back and done more interviewing to fill in the missing pieces, but under their tight deadline restrictions, recording a VO with the missing information became the best alternative.
4. We also had them watch all the interviews as they listened to the spoken “natural sound.” How people say things can be as interesting as what they say. Voice inflection does not show up on the paper edit.
5. We had the students lay down the audio track (interview and spoken audio nat sound) before they started to add their visual sequences. They essentially produced a radio story before they turned it into a video story. This approach assured that the story flowed and made sense.
(Of course, this is not the only way to structure the process. We're interested in hearing about approaches others find effective and efficient.)
Storytelling suggestions
In the workshop, the greatest problem was the students’ inability to recognize the theme and/or nut graph of their video story – for instance, why this pastry chef was featured and not the one down the block.
Also, they had problems sticking to the central theme once they had identified it. They had a tendency to throw in all the cool shots and off-the-wall interview comments rather than stick to the heart and soul of their mini doc.
Though the students didn't always use it, we found the following approach is helpful in establishing a theme:
a. Write a title/theme before you shoot;
b. Rewrite the title/theme after you shoot;
c. Rewrite the title/theme after you draft a script;
d. Rewrite the title/theme after you edit.
In the end, see if all your images and sound conform to your title/theme and original agenda.
Here are some examples of students' work, below. (You can watch more here.)
Keeping up with Snails
A look at an escargot farm in Estoher, France, just outside of Perpignan.
Saving the Strays
Saint-Nazaire, France resident Helen Ferrieux takes care of stray cats in her village.
Here's a chance to win $25,000 for your short documentary video, in the first annual Vimeo Awards, but before you submit your entry, be sure to read the fine print.
First, "Documentary" is one of several categories, and the one and only cash prize goes only to what is judged the best video of all categories. The only other awards are exposure on Vimeo's website. Also, buried in the rules is the small matter of a $20 entry fee ($5 for Vimeo Plus paid subscribers). Many top awards charge entry fees -- usually quite higher than this, and often when no cash prizes are awarded. But those are usually established prestigious awards, and this is the "first annual" go-around for Vimeo.
Deadline for submissions is July 31. Winners will be announced by October 9.
The contest is accompanied by a "jam-packed two-day festival," Oct. 8-9 in New York. It will include panels, parties, and screenings of winning entries, but details so far are scarce.
Short films/videos that seek to document compelling actuality or reality
Maximum Length: 20 minutes
Description: Short films/videos that seek to document compelling actuality or reality
Requirements: Your submission must be a short documentary piece that exemplifies the art of non- fiction storytelling.
Submissions may include a variety of storytelling methods: presenter led or narrated, fly on the wall, point of view, ambient or personal stories, etc.
Your Submission should be a complete idea that is presented in a clear, innovative and original way.
Judging criteria: We are looking for creative excellence in pieces that push the boundaries of documentary filmmaking.
The grand-prize winner for all categories "will receive a grant from Vimeo to create a new, original work. The winner will be invited to premiere their work at the Vimeo Festival and Awards in 2011 as well as on the homepage of Vimeo.com."
Winners of individual categories "will be promoted heavily on Vimeo.com's homepage as well as on the Vimeo Festival and Awards Site."
Intriguing announcement from Vimeo that should make it easier to create collaborative video projects, even remotely:
Sharing videos on Vimeo has always gone beyond passively viewing the clips our fellow Vimeans upload. Many of us have given permission for others to take what we've done and screen it at events or chop it up and make something completely new. For a long time, we have wanted to make these kinds of permissions easier to grant, and we're pleased to announce that after working together with the fine folks over at Creative Commons, we've done just that!
Today we are launching a new Settings option that allows you to add one of several Creative Commons licenses to your videos. What does this mean? It means that while you still retain the copyright for your work, you can allow other people to distribute it, remix it or use it for a new purpose, commercial or noncommercial. All of this while still requiring that they credit you for the original work.
Vimeo notes that this is not a free pass to upload and distribute others' work, but rather to build on the work someone else has created (and licensed) with your own original contribution.
What do CNN, Reuters, New York Times, Vimeo, Time, Major League Baseball, the White House, Virgin America, Sports Illustrated, Flickr, People Magazine, and TED have in common?
These are some of the leading Websites that will work seamlessly on the iPad, or what Apple calls "iPad ready."
"iPad features Safari, a mobile web browser that supports the latest web standards — including HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript."
Translation: If you're using Adobe Flash, you're screwed. As we've previously noted, Steve Jobs refuses to support Flash, so on Apple's mobile devices (iPhones, iPods, iPads), ubiquitous Flash videos and animations appear as broken icons or empty spaces.
Given the iPad's enthusiastic reception by influential reviewers, and pre-release customer demand, we suspect most savvy Websites will start marching to Apple's drumbeat and customize their Websites accordingly, using native HTML5 tags instead of third-party software plug-ins.
Learn how to test and prepare your Website content for iPad readiness here.
Meanwhile, take an early look at iPad's top newspaper apps (pictured), courtesy of Nieman Lab. See the variety of ways that USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Associated Press, and other major media organizations are taking advantage of iPad's screen size and touch-screen functionality. Note that these paid apps are different than their respective Websites.
Any more questions about the iPad? New York Times tech guru David Pogue is here to answer them for you.
And strictly for your weekend amusement, here's David Letterman playing with his new iPad:
Be sure to let us know what you think of your iPad ... and, more importantly, its customized content.
Cine Institute in Jacmel, Haiti began as a film festival, offering hundreds of films from around the world free of charge to local audiences. It evolved into a full-service film school, offering Haitian youth training and production support for making documentaries, commercials, and feature films. Its educational mission was to empower the country's students with creative, technical and business skills that could nourish local media, provide jobs, and spur economic growth.
Then came the earthquake.
You've seen the images. You've seen the footage, on TV newscasts and online video reports. All by international journalists who descended on the devastated island.
Now see the videos that local film students shot, and uploaded to Vimeo.
Here's a sample:
Stories of Heroes
And here's a Grit TV video story about those Cine Institute students:
Video WTF is a new communally-minded open-source Website where you can ask -- and answer -- any question about video cameras, editing, production, publishing, promotion, whatever.
It's collaboratively moderated, and you can dive in and participate without even registering. And it's free!
(Though your first question might understandably be: For a site that aspires to mainstream acceptance, why the potentially controversial and off-putting name?)
Topics range from how to bid on a video project or construct a business proposal for a Web series, to hardware/software recommendations, to infinitely more technical considerations.
(We're encouraged because Video WTF is brought to you by the same folks who created Miro, a high-quality open-source, non-profit HD video player and podcast client that hands-down beats what most newspapers out there are using. You can download the free software to view and publish video. They've also recently launched Miro Community, which enables you to create your own private multi-source YouTube for free -- a boon for colleges and PBS affiliates.)
Have a video whose length or file size exceeds the limitations of YouTube or Vimeo? Use Video WTF to ask for pointers to alternative video sharing sites. Or to help others by sharing your knowledge.
A relatively inexpensive lavalier (Azden WMS-PRO Wireless Microphone System for $160) was generously recommended to us by a KobreChannel reader, but sounds too good to be true at that price, and so we just asked Video WTF users if they have heard feedback about it, or personally encountered any drawbacks (e.g. static).
Similarly, our new Kodak Zi8 does not zoom smoothly or silently -- a glitch with just our video camera, or a flaw in the model? We asked Video WTF denizens for their experiences.
We look forward to sharing their responses with you.
What's the best site for uploading and sharing your videos?
There are so many criteria that we've been constructing our own list of what to look for. Every videoplayer seems to have some advantages, such as ability to link to the video from (or embed on) other sites. But all have innumerable inadequacies and flaws.
On one Quality Comparison Page, using identical test footage, you can see for yourself the difference in Color, Vision, and Sound. However, this doesn't take into account other factors, such as whether that annoying "play" triangle icon appears in the middle of the screen when you pause, or whether you can manually fast-forward the slider.
In a separate 45-page PDF ebook, Williams rates and describes the ease and quality of creating an account, uploading video, and viewing video at each of these sites -- along with annotated pros and cons.
Additionally, Williams offers a handy chart, Online Video Comparison Matrix, which features an apples-to-apples comparison of more than a dozen useful criteria.
He notes that video editing sites are different from video sharing websites: "While sites like Photobucket (and now YouTube with Remixer) do both, these sites are designed for the editing of videos, (which) are normally loaded from other video sharing sites, and not uploaded to the site directly." Here's a sampling of those:
What’s in Your Bag with John Lehmann
-
John Lehmann is award winning photojournalist with the Globe and Mail in
Canada. John shares with Munetake Kayo what he carries while working, and
why he c...
Videographer job at University of Texas System
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Matt Flores, a former colleague at the San Antonio Express-News, called me
today asking if I know anyone interested in a videographer position at the
Unive...
'Last Minutes with Oden' has won the first Vimeo Award for best short documentary -- and the award for best overall video, which carries a cash prize of $25,000 to create a new project. 
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