Edit Hell

I have the basic line edit done and it's looking pretty good. I just have to add sound effects and music. And also the news segment at the end. I ended up recording yesterday along with the opening wide shot and both went well. But now I am just struggling to cut it down on time. I sort of knew this would happen, I was just hoping that it wouldn't. I am about 30 seconds over the 2-minute mark, and that's with some revisions already. I'm not exactly sure what to do at this point. Right now, I made a "director's cut" with the full dialogue and everything included, and I'll make a revised version where I cut as much as I can. I'm going to have to start cutting into dialogue and see what is unnecessary and can be removed. Hopefully, it comes out alright.

BREAKING NEWS

As I'm making the revised version, it just feels like the pacing gets thrown off by the cutting of dialogue but I think this also may have to do with the fact that I already had a vision so it feels a little empty without it. For a first-time viewer, it may not seem bad at all. At least that is my hope. I'm at around 2:15.

But right now, I'm going to just try and finish everything else, and then continue trying to cut up what I can. So this means putting the news on the TV and making the breaking news graphic. Putting videos on the TV was surprisingly easy. Since I use Adobe Premiere to edit, I just had to select the corner pinch effect and adjust the corners to fit the screen. On the right is a screenshot showing the effect. I think it turned out pretty good. I think I still may play around with it, dimming the screen a bit, making it more realistic in the scene, etc. 

The hard part about this was masking Malcolm as he was crossing the screen. Since I overlayed the video over the TV and the original clip, it would come out on top of Malcolm. So I had to manually rotoscope Malcolm's body and reveal the TV behind his body. It was a hassle. It didn't come out perfectly, or else I would've been sitting there for at least an hour just trying to perfect it, but since it isn't the main focus of the shot and it moves pretty quick anyway, it works out. 

The next big step was the breaking news graphic. For this, I went on YouTube and searched up a tutorial for a breaking news graphic for After Effects. I just followed this and it went easily. I'm already slightly familiar with After Effects so it wasn't too bad. For this clip, I just put it right before the news anchor section I recorded and put that on the TV as well, making it seem like it was interrupting a broadcast. 

SOUND

Next step, sound. Sound effects, music, all that good stuff. I first tried to find music that fit because that was pretty important to me. Throughout this whole process, I tried to decide if I should make the music myself since that gives me more control of the mood, beats, etc. But I lowkey don't have the slightest clue on how to make a suspenseful piece of music or any music in general, so I kinda gave up on that early on. 

I didn't touch it again till now, so I decided to try and find something on sound websites, like slipstream, artlist.io, etc. Only issue with these is that they require a subscription, and I kinda wanted to avoid that. Plus, a lot of them felt too dramatic, grand, or just didn't fit the mood. There were only like one or two out of the dozens I looked at that I really liked, but I didn't want to commit to anything since I was scared I could find something better for free. So I turned to YouTube to see what I could find. 

YouTube is usually hit or miss, and mainly miss when it comes to music. Most copyright-free tracks sound like they belong in a Home Depot ad, but on the rare occasion that you find something, it may just work out. And for me, it did. The suspenseful tracks on YouTube aren't that bad, they get the job done and are a solid background. I found one that wasn't loud or extravagant but it worked. With the help of some risers here and there, it should be fine. 

So the next step was sound effects. I got them from a few different places. YouTube isn't that bad for a lot of things, sometimes it can sound like it was recorded on a microwave, but other times it works just fine. Just depends on what you're looking for. I also used tune tank, free sound, etc. Really anywhere that was free and sounded good. 

My timeline ended up looking like this for audio, so I'll take that as a win. 

I'm pretty much done at this point, just doing some minor revisions and trying to cut down as many more seconds as I can. Wish me luck. Once I'm done here, I will tackle my CCR.