Athens 2017 Reflected – Being A Videographer (Part 3/3)

Athens 2017

I have worked at SideOut’s annual beach volleyball camp for the past five years – in Rhodes 2013 (blog, video), 2014 (blog, video) and 2015 (video) then in Athens 2016 (video) and 2017 (video).  Athens 2017 was fun but a lot of work!  It was probably the hardest camp since the very first one back in Rhodes 2013.  To find out if it actually was one of the hardest camps, I looked back at my blog to see what I wrote about my previous camps.  I was surprised to find that my last reflection on this annual beach volleyball camp was back in Rhodes 2014.  I had skipped the past two years!  So to amend this, I will reflect on this year’s camp while taking into consideration the past two camps.

I will break down this reflection in three parts as relates to my three roles at the camp: 1.  Being a Performance Analyst 2.  Being a Photographer 3.  Being a Videographer

Being a Videographer Reflected

This was another role I carved out for myself – being a videographer.  The first video I edited was the Rhodes 2013 End of Camp video as a surprise to SideOut and I have edited videos for every camp since.  There are three types of videos I have edited for SideOut.  They are:

1.  End of Camp (EoC)Video – these are videos that highlight the camp experience.  This video take long to edit so they are usually published weeks after the camp (see playlist). 2.  High Five (HF)Video – these are videos where people high five the video to reveal different people and locations.  These videos are quick to edit (between each high five) so they are usually published a day or two after the camp (see playlist). 3.  Daily vlogs (DV) – these are vlogs to highlight things that happened each day (2017, 2015).

What did I learn from this experience.

Create a checklist of shots to film.  My approach to editing the EoC video is film a somewhat random bunch of things, see what videos I have after the camp, group them as montage themes (e.g. training, tournament, social etc) and then start editing.  This approach means I do forget to film certain shots.  Some include establishing shots such as filming venue/ bar entrances so we know where the action is taking place.  Or it be simple things like somebody picking up the ball, or players talking (see link for example).  I tend to film action shots so I never think about everyday camp shots like that.  So if I prepare a checklist of shots to film then it can remind me to film those shots.  I could use the checklist to tick off the shots I need during the tournament days.  That’s when I have the most free time because the performance analysis have finished by then.

Dedicate time to film some shots.  I did this for the past two years where I filmed the group’s high five clip after they did their technique analysis filming.  It was an ideal time to catch the group while they were there.  However, I should squeeze in more dedicated filming during this time.  I could film the perfect action shots such as dive towards the camera.  So rather than being at the right place at the right time in real match play, I can just set that shot up.  The other thing I want to do is film some creative shots like some in this video.  I could never get this kind of shots because I would have to interfere in the game or training session to get that shot.  However, since this would outside both of those situations, I could get those shots.

The high five clips should be between 5-10 seconds.  When I edited the HF video last year, I remembered some of the HFs clips dragged a couple of seconds too long.  You get a bit bored and you are just waiting for the next clip.  I had this in mind this year but it backfired on me.  This was because the HF clips was too short.  Some happened so quick you didn’t know what happened or you couldn’t savour how great some of the HFs were.

Filming enough high five clips.  I definitely didn’t film enough high fives because this year’s video only lasted 1:34 minutes to compared last year’s 2:54 minutes (or 28 high fives compared to 43 last year).  I should set myself a quota or something.  Perhaps on the tournament day, I should set myself to do 30 HFs. Athens High Five 2017

Time to edit the daily vlog?  This was something I first did in Rhodes 2015 but I abandoned halfway through the camp because the hotel’s internet was so slow.  It would take something like 10 hours to upload.  I gave it another go this year because I knew the internet at the hotel was good.  I did one vlog for the first day (see below).  However, I found I didn’t have time for edit the second vlog and by the third day I just had to abandon it again.  I simply couldn’t make the time for it.  The camp this year was the biggest yet so the performance analysis workload was much more.  That took up the bulk of my time.  Taking photos and filming for the videos took up the rest of my time.  The daily photos took up the start and end of my day.  While I would like to do daily vlogs, something would need to change so I have more time to do it.thevolleyballanalyst Athens 2017 vlog Day 1

Utilising a gimbal.  I hate shaky shots.  They look amateurish.  An example is the the walk through in the Athens 2016 camp video (see link).  You want those sweeping cinematic shots that look epic.  I tried stablising the video in Adobe Premiere Elements but I couldn’t make it work.  So I did some research on physically stablising video and I came across gimbals.  A gimbal is a pivoted support that allows the rotation of an object about a single axis, i.e. it stablises the video.  I found a cheap gimbal called Zhiyun Smooth Q (see one review) so I thought it was worth a purchase.  I bought it three weeks before the Athens 2017 camp but since it was coming from China, I only arrived when I was in Athens.  I really can’t wait until next year when I can use it to full effect.

Overall Reflection

I simultaneously like and hate editing the EoC video.  I like it because it’s cool seeing it all put together but I hate it because it is so much work!  I really can’t wait to bring the Zhiyun Smooth Q to next year’s camp for all those smooth, cinematic shots.  I feel like I will be better prepared for next year with a checklist of things to film and the dedicated time to do it.  

Read all three parts: 1.  Being a Performance Analyst 2.  Being a Photographer 3.  Being a Videographer