I made a "documentary" about Giant Bomb for school

Okay so I made this thing last year for a class. It was a fairly open ended project about making a movie about something that interested you. I thought "hey I'm interested in Giant Bomb and think it could be an interesting story for people who haven't heard of it."

And then I made this. And as much as I think it's annoying when people post something they create with a dismissive tone, this thing is rough as hell. I recorded the audio with nothing but a laptop mic and I barely know how to edit video. Still I think it'd be neat if to share it, even just for me to get used to people seeing anything I do.

It is seven minutes though.

Oh and that animated intro and the beginning is totally someone else's work. Apologies.

I should also mention that when I say school I mean University. Though I would not blame you if you thought it was a high schooler's project.

I thought it was pretty good.

It's really cool you got to do a school project on Giant Bomb, seems like a fun task.

I think the biggest problem I have is how you keep saying Gertsmann instead of Gerstmann and just the overall enunciation of the narration, sentences and words seem to slur together.

However, I know this took time and effort and, like almost anything, the more you do it the better you will get. You're putting it out there and I commend you for it. Editing well is a hard thing to do, I haven't done it much myself so I can't offer any tips/advice in that regard (not that you're even asking for advice). Maybe just slow down when speaking, relax, do some vocal warmup exercises. If it's something you enjoy doing definitely keep at it. Good documentaries seem to find ways to convey drama to people who, as outsiders, may not initially see it.

The quality is rough, but hey you posted something and continued to build up your skill-set while I simply sat on my butt. Keep it up!

I'm a fan of Giant Bomb. Jeff Gertsmin and the gang!

@htr10: @citizencoffeecake: @shozo: Thanks for the kind words and constructive criticism. And it was actually fun to feel like I knew what I was doing video editing (even though it was basically a lot of J and L cuts) and about 8 hours of work. And the thing people don't mention about VO is what to do if you hate your voice. It was a lot of self conscience repeating and then saying "I don't have time, I need to crank this out."

@baillie: @citizencoffeecake:I think it's a Canadian thing. Because apparently Geoff Keighley says Gerstmann the same way but I don't even notice. Or maybe even I say it even more messed up and I'm just an idiot.

Cool stuff! For a first try a documentary making you did a good job.

I recorded and edited a lot of radio interviews and radio journalism in High school and I totally get what you mean about hating your own voice. Sadly the only thing I can say is that you just kinda have to push through it. Once you have done VO for a bit you`ll start getting used to it and it won`t bother you a lot anymore (at least that`s what happened for me). Also don`t be afraid to do a lot of takes on each part. In the start you probably need to read a line like 5 or 6 times before you get a take that has the right flow, intonation and pronunciation. Hope this helps if you decide to do something similiar in the future!

@andrew2696: I believe almost everybody hates the way their voices sound when heard from other sources, especially recordings. If you keep doing it you'll get used to it, don't worry.

The video is indeed pretty rough, but no one should expect a first try to be amazing. Be proud of yourself for going through with it, nicely done!

This is hilarious in unintended ways, but as someone who has always had an itch to make films, I have tremendous respect for you seeing it through. Great job duder!

@heycalvero: Yeah it's totally a common thing. Always thought I would get used to it since I've already heard so many people say that but it's still jarring.

@odinsmana: I don't plan to make anything else since then, but hell it's worth it to be just to get my feet a bit wet with editing. Did a bit of that in high school but still always feels kind of cool. All told this is a basic compilation with some rushed VO but I did make it. I think I've realized that my voice is both too high and too low.

@crazybagman: Hell that's technically a positive, I'll take it. And anything for a laugh. (Is it because of the Gerstmann thing mostly?)

What did you use to edit this?

@damodar: Honestly cannot remember for the life of me, since it was year ago and I've gotten a new laptop since then.

I know it was free (legally of course) but that's it.

Edit: I'm a moron. Watermark and all.

The question must have been a joke.

@aegon: ...There's some dumb watermark in there isn't there...

Goddammit. How did I not remember that was in there. I actually didn't even watch the whole thing again just skipped forward a bit to make sure nothing incriminating was in there.

Ve Ry Good! The clips you put in make up swimmingly for the roughness of the VO.

Ill put some criticisms here, feel free to ignore:

Needs a full second pass on the voice work, several stumbles and mispronunciations.

I did not think it was edited particularly well, for example, after the farming simulator clip, there is several seconds of a black screen with no VO.

In terms of it being a documentary it wasn't particularly informative. It sort of had a bit of the back story of Giant Bomb and then just showed clips of some of the different kind of content that was housed on the site.

What subject was this for out of curiosity?

@jinoru: Glad you think the clips I choose were good. It was certainly entertaining to think of what I enjoyed from the site and what I could mix together.

@samfo: Hey all fair points honestly. Especially on the second pass. It was already late by the time I started doing the audio so I didn't have time. Your comment gives the most to go on if I ever want to revisit this thing.

It was for a general film class. I don't even remember the exact name since they're all kind of interchangeable. The assignment was to put a strong focus on audio with a montage. Originally it was tied to another assignment that had me doing an audio interview with my dad about growing up during the Vietnam war but I didn't think I could do any justice to that especially when I didn't have much in way of film equipment. Giant Bomb had a lot of content I could use and I wanted to do something lighter in tone.

@andrew2696: Your professor assigned you a film making project at a school with no equipment to check out or editing software license? That seems really unfair. Although, in retrospect I think I went through something similar for a public speaking course I took. Either way, kudos for pulling that together on your own. I know what a nightmare self teaching video editing can be.

@hatking: I think it's just assumed that if you're in the program you have some way to do this stuff. But for someone like me who kind of just ended up picking it because my high school marks were bad, here I am. It's also film studies not straight film production. It's like the Dan Ryckert way, done terribly.

I wasn't totally self taught. I had a simple production class in high school but it had been a while. And pretty basic.

@andrew2696:

Ok so since someone gave a bit more criticism and you took it well I will go over all editing criticism I have, I aint no true expert and while you may not go back to editing there is still stuff to pick up for ANYTHING you do with keeping people's attention. I took media and communication which did not teach me anything AT ALL about editing just told "ok I want a project video from you...." that was it.

This was my video complete with errors and what not so you ain't alone, first part is minimally edited, last third of part 2 was edited quite a bit.

I am a far better editor nowadays with some guidance from editor friends, PS I ain't a serious editor I took it up as a hobby for a summer for AMV Hell 7 and I have not edited shit since....however I was an asshole and would criticise EVERY CLIP in Amv Hell 6 (rough cut) AMV Hell 6.66, AMV Hell 7 and all the AMV Hell Challenges.

Back to your own project which I am sure you probably know most of the errors in it anyways.

Great intro just lacking audio, would have been great to have the actual Giantbomb feature intro, download a GB video even super low mobile quality rip the audio section using audacity import to your program....probably not gonna be so easy.

A few seconds too much dead air/no visual, somthing I am gonna be saying is make things snappy and tighter, in the world of editing seconds are a long time and you will be going smaller time scales with a project.

However nice little intro sorta ruined by the created by vegas pro watermaker however I will not complain too much as your not gonna shell out loads of money for it.

Everything is fine till the gamespot footage were you left too much of the previous Kayne and lynch scene of "wake up wake up" with that cut it would be fine as well as the little Kayne and Lynch footage at the end.

The dead air after the Gerstmann clip nah nah you need stuff there. Anything could even do fade in and fade outs of web pages reporting "Gerstmann fired" just anything relevant.

There was also a little pause you took in your speech which is fine if you have something a little jazzy to look at that moment making a little "poignant" pause, or just edit your audio and cut it out, ever hurts to make it snappier.

Another little need of a trim on the clip before Ryan Davis which this could have worked out fine with more stuff in that black space.

Pretty fine on the Brad Shoemaker show up can be futzed to make it tighter and have have "Brad Shoemaker" turn up when you said his name, however that is just being fancier.

The silence on waiting for Vinny Caravella to show up was the nice idea like I was just saying but you could have edited the cars flashing past to let that part show up sooner and let no dead air happen as you waited for it.

Good good on the use of How to build a bomb footage, this was good in just being nice filler, that is what alot of editing is just filler however a little redundant to say "In their documentary "how to build a bomb" to be followed with Jeff also saying "This is how to build a bomb." and you did fade yourself out wee bit too soon. If you were going to go with this set up (which was less editing) than saying "in their documentary" then let Jeff say it or even re edit everything diffrent as you had the title card flash up, yourself announce followed with Jeff.

More black screen..... needs to go.also this staring at a Farming simulator screen is terrible without good audio, would have maybe been a good time to edit in something else then when you say about farming simulator cut to the clip you had with Vinny...also thinking about who you're presenting to is an idea, since I don't think there is many groups you would be showing this too would accept Vinny going "You're fucked" we are fine with it, just think who you're presenting too. Next part is good showing Vinny and Ryan's enjoyment.

Another long and no audio buuuuut.....I will side with you....editing software can be fucking weird and make this shit happen. You see that in my youtube review video and I re edited my project 9 times because IT KEPT GOING INSANE AND MAKING WEIRD GLITCHES!

A wee bit too much dead air when the footage comes back....to another menu which does not make good viewing, random shots of them running around in persona would have been good, again snappy, engaging and filler.

This bit about live streams after is actualy realy good and should be what you're doing more of the Iceland trip stuff is pretty decent untill you let Drews good editing taking place the blank audio moment saying "OR NORTH KOREA!" is realy startling, a perfect way to do that would be taking some of Drew's photos and saying a bit more like " One of their crews trip to the unusual vacation spot...North Korea." also you could have easily had you audio over then fade for the roller coaster part.

This bit on the podcast is better flowing into the animated clip and all this stuff is more what you should be doing same with the CSBi movie clip.

Ryan Davis part maybe a better clip than Ryan playing a guitar would have done, however the work on the rest of the stuff is good your making it engaging with the clips, snappy and some nice audio fade/choices so its none too jarring. It could be tighter but it was very good there should be more of that, as well as you ended up choosing the same idea as me with the whole gang together at the end of the clip.

Overall your audio script was pretty good, presenting was actualy very decent above average and of course you fluffed up however it was all decent not terrible.

One thing you could have done with the entire time....a tiny little background music to your own talking parts would make them pop a bit better, the entire project if made tighter and all those glitches erased would have been a solid "Pretty good". Which when I have said to people about their editing "This is terrible, there is no good qualities to this." then you're actualy getting good praise from me.

@akyho: I'm actually amazed and happy that you managed to write up a surprisingly detailed breakdown of all of that. I'm kind of honored that anyone would offer that much to help me improve. Heh my TA did it in a few sentences.

I remember that the dead air problems was because I had recorded the audio first and then assembled the clips. So I didn't have time to do a second go at audio let alone more audio. So the dead air is because I literally had no audio to cover a clip. I should have tied the clips a bit closer then, you're right.

I think I did have a plan to add a bit of background music but didn't want to deal with more work.

@andrew2696: I do not blame you on some of your choices as a student with a project to "be in soon" cos like I said the whole intro thing with audacity...that could take 10 minutes...or take three hours if nothing goes right.

I was on the AMV Hell forums for a few years which was basically editors A) Offering advice to other editors B) Editors bitching at each other or C) posting pictures of naked women drawn and not drawn. I spent more time doing A.....then did B to the people doing C.

@akyho: The intro is also a fan created thing so I definitely should have just used the standard one. One it would have audio and two I wouldn't feel dirty about not crediting the duder who made it.

Also AMV forums are a certain type of internet I would not be prepared for. Except for the C) you listed. I'm always prepared for nudity.