Having lost most of my Bonnyrigg zones this morning to Pedro_delb, I thought, might as well take them back again. I also wanted to try out the front carrier mount for the GoPro now that I sussed out the optional resolution, mounting position and format. For this video, I recorded about 22 Gb of raw video files, amounting to around 67 minutes of real-time footage. The problem I had compiling this video is how much to leave out and how much to leave in. I wanted to try and convey a gentle relaxing turfing session on the bicycle riding around Bonnyrigg. Perhaps we could call it Mindfulness Turfing. I want to convey the actual experience I’m, er, experiencing.
After much effort I managed to cut out about 20 minutes of unnecessary footage while, hopefully, achieving that aim without making it too monotonous. I’ve also left some of the clips to show just what goes into making those videos, the clips where I have to adjust the mount and so on. And yes, I have noticed I’m off-centre in the frame quite a lot of the time and have made a mental note for next time. Some footage was also removed because I’d accidentally unplugged the microphone cable from the GoPro. Dumb ass!
In the video, I mention locking my house and shed keys in the shed. Yes, silly, I know. This gave me time to kill, so I mounted the GoPro on the front carrier facing forwards and completed the exact same circuit again. This gave me another 50 minutes of footage. However, after attempts to incorporate this into the main video track, it just didn’t work. It all seemed too drab. I guess all the bright colours I’m wearing might have something to do with that. So, I left it all out. I just prefer a simple linear edit stream for my videos. All nice and simple.
I’m also beginning to get to grips with the DaVinci Resolve 18 editing software I’m using. Useful discoveries this edit have been the ability to lock tracks on the timeline, for example, locking the video track while editing the audio track helps prevent errors. And I’m now a dab hand and de-sniffing the audio track, cutting and pasting sniff-free audio over the offending sniffs. I can even spot the audio profile of a sniff without even listening to it.
For interest and for anyone thinking about creating these videos themselves, I’ve spent about 5 hours editing the footage. Add to that around 2 hours of cycling and you can see it can be a time-consuming business. It’s quite a steep learning curve this making video blogs caper, so many things to think about. From today’s session:
- check all bolts are really, really, tight beforehand.
- carry the required tools with you at all times.
- stop and check regularly that everything is working.
- stop and start frequently to avoid excessively long clips.
- take care not to dislodge the microphone cable.
- don’t drop the camera on concrete slabs.
- replace the GoPro bolts with proper Allen bolts.
- check that you are centred in frame regularly.
- carry more batteries than you need, and more.
- don’t lock your house and shed keys inside the shed.
Back soon. Live long and prosper!
Copyright ©2023 Gary Buckham. All rights reserved.
