Like blogging, vlogging (video blogging) is a way to share your insights on a subject with an online audience. However, vlogging goes beyond the text of a blog post, transforming your content into an audio-visual broadcast. If you’re interested in vlogging, but don’t know how to start, here are some tips:

The first thing you’ll need is the right equipment, and the good news is you don’t need much, just a camcorder or a web camera and a good microphone. Also, for a vlog that has a more polished look, you’ll want to learn how to use video-editing software. This will enable you to add music, subtitles, etc. to your vlog. There are numerous online programs like Wax or Zwei-Stein Video Editor that you can download for free. Also, Apple iMovie and Windows Movie Maker are both easy to use and come pre-installed on Macs and PCs.

Once you’ve assembled your equipment, I recommend experimenting. Test the sound quality of your microphone; make sure there is sufficient lighting where you’re recording your vlog and figure out how you want to look on camera. Remember that vlogging is a form of communication, so you want to not only be visible (no low lighting), but also intelligible. Most vlog “episodes” should be one to three minutes, keeping the amount of bandwidth needed to host them to a minimum. Therefore it’s a good idea to rehearse your content. At the very least, I recommend preparing a script or some type of plan before each video so that you can deliver concise, focused content. Finally, don’t be afraid to have fun with your vlog. Depending on your audience, you’ll want to be more than just informative; you’ll also want to be candid and entertaining. Like blogging, it’s important to pick subjects you love and can explore in a series of posts. One episode doth not a vlog make.

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Every year, thousands of bands, bloggers, filmmakers, social media gurus and entrepreneurs come to the South By Southwest Music, Film and Interactive festival in Austin, Texas. When I joined the MCDM program in 2008 and heard about SXSW, I started to work on plans to be actively involved. Sooner than expected I had the opportunity to participate on one of the music panels—and got to spend a week soaking in the latest in digital media, while enjoying entertainment and Southern hospitality. Attending SXSW was well worth the lessons, networking contacts and, sometimes, the free food.

Pitching a panel

Last November, at the Showbox in downtown Seattle, I met with the SXSW music committee, which was accepting submissions from bands, record labels, and anyone else who wanted to pitch an idea. For the past two years, I have been filming a documentary on legendary blues singer Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter and using the MCDM program as a testing ground for the documentary’s online marketing and digital distribution strategies. I successfully pitched an MCDM-inspired panel based on the evolution of Lead Belly’s music from analog recordings to digital formats. Staying true to the digital storytelling code of honor, my presentation, “Lead Belly to Ludacris: From Analog to Digital,” included a video mash up I produced especially for the panel. The video mixed a rare performance of Lead Belly with hip-hop artist Ludacris covering a popular folk song. (You can read a review of my panel in the Austin Chronicle.)

Best of SXSW

In addition to presenting, I learned about a few innovative technologies and saw some great films at SXSW. Here are some of the highlights:

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With the statistics data showing more and more people spending their time on video games, it’s not surprising that TV audience numbers are plunging. Movies are doing a little bit better than TV, but I’m pretty sure Hollywood moviemakers don’t feel safe. Looks like we are witnessing an interesting shift in people’s preferences.

A couple years back they used to release pretty successful videogames based on movies. Examples: Medal of Honor (3 more series released after the first one’s success), Matrix, Lord of the Rings. Nowadays exactly opposite is happening: Doom, Hitman, Max Payne – all of these are movies based on the same-titled video games.

Hitman, would be the great example illustrating this trend. It’s a complex game that requires thinking, strategy and precision. Game had a great success and currently has four series (first one released in 2000)

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Today we talk about foley. Your film creation cannot live on music alone, unless you are making a silent movie, or you make sure you record every footstep sound carefully, you will need some sounds effects to enhance the action on the screen.  Most professional editing suites come packaged with all sorts bits and bites that you can use. If you do not have those, there is hope on the internet for non-commercial use: basically for free for students and filmmakers for online distribution and film festivals, with possibility of licensing for commercial when (more realistically, if) needed.

The resource I want to share with you today is The Freesound Project. Freesound makes available an ever-growing database of sound effect licensed under the Creative Commons Sampling Plus 1.0 license. This means you can use and abuse the samples for non-commercial purposes including remixing, file sharing and webcasting.

You may search the site using freeform text, tags, descriptions, usernames, or geotags.  There is also a “sounds-like” type of browsing available on the site. An account is required, but sign-up is free.

This was going to be the exception to creative commons music and a post about licensing from small recording houses. But in the past two days while talking to musician and studio manager Robby Baier at SoulTube, Robby just went ahead and posted a Non-Commercial, Attribution, Limited Use notice to the site. I verified this with the studio, and indeed, licenses to students are free (yay)-festival licenses included. When the money comes (keep believing), they would want to talk to you some more about commercial distribution and offer to even help you pick the right song for a scene. Either way, always give credit where its due.

SoulTube is home to a small, but a unqiue and beautifully-produced collection of artists. They have licensed music to commercials, TV, and films before so they are not new to the game. Check out their site, go to the “Songs For Film” section and choose the advanced search feature. You can explore from their list of artists, pick a mood, or search for specific words in the lyrics database (kudos!).

If this does not sound too good already, most of the tracks are also available in instrumental versions and you can hear the music and download it from the site directly.  Again, the only drawback is that it is a small collection, but the experience of dealing with people passionate about their music is vastly superior to any of the stock music houses or large labels.

You have labored over your film concept (the one you just came up with an hour before you had to pitch it), you have poured every emotion in your soul into the storyboards (mostly fear), and now you scurry about in the last two weeks of Winter quarter, squeezing whatever creative juices (and hard-earned cash) left in you to put out a story you can call your own into this cyberworld.

Visually, things seem to be falling into place (historically known as the crapper), and now it is time to find that perfect minor chord to send your audience weeping after they view your piece.

The musicscapes are vast and this post (in three parts) will only attempt to provide some guidance for those creating audio-visual projects to navigating the creative commons music territories (or swamps).

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Today, the Criterion Collection launched a new feature, Online Cinematheque, that allows users to view films for $5 before they buy them.

The Criterion Collection is a home video distribution company that specializes in bringing seminal (and often difficult to obtain) films into personal collections. What makes Criterion releases unique and special is the quality of the release. Every film given the Criterion treatment turns out to be a beautiful product, from the packaging, art direction, menu design, film transfer, audio tracks to searching for lost and forgotten deleted scenes or interviews with the director. This quality product comes at a price, and that price is often double that of a standard edition DVD.

Because Criterion Collection films are often rare art house films, the ability to watch films online for $5 before deciding to lay down a decent amount of money on a movie you have never seen is a good idea. If you decide to buy the movie from the Criterion website, the $5 will be credited towards the cost of the DVD or Blu-ray.

It is refreshing to see the Criterion Collection exploring new distribution methods for important films and I hope other music and film companies follow their lead.

By Kristina (Scorsese Group)

Two days and five hours of footage later, the Scorsese team has filmed the filming of the Birch Bay Marathon north of Bellingham. Our objective: Capture the process of creating a film using consumer technology (specifically the flip camera).

While we have a full cast of characters, it seems like everyone fits into three main entities:
1. Us, the film crew
2. Joel, the race director, and the rest of the volunteers who made the race possible.
3. The runners

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