Artistic Concepts and Processes

We all know what an essay is, right? We've all had experience in school writing one or, at least, reading one--a short, opinionated writing about a specific subject. However, there is an alternative definition, one we often don't consider --an initial attempt or endeavor. It is vital for us to create without being afraid to fail, essayer as the French put it, to attempt. In doing so we become more familiar with a process or technique and eventually, with enough attempts, we can become experts.

Here is a sample of my attempts...

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Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Downtown Springfield: A Time Lapse


Today's time lapse was taken during the same shoot as the first. I wanted to something a little different for the audio—an original recording time synced to events that take place in the video.


I used Premiere Pro to render the video. Before I imported the stills, I adjusted the Still Image Default Duration from 150 frames per still to two. If I had enough photos, I could have switched to one frame per second, essentially normal video quality. Doing so, however, could have left me a mere 30 seconds of time to write music.


To adjust Image Duration: Premiere Pro—Preferences—General


I held a spotting session to note the time, down to the individual frame, that each event occurred in the video, usually turns or stops. I counted how many frames there were between each events. Once I had the frame count, I had to do a little math.


I divided the number of frames per even by how many measures of music I wanted during that event. This gave me frames per measure. I divided this number by the frame rate, giving me seconds per measure. Then, I divided 60 by the seconds per measure and got measures per minute which I divided by however many beats per measure I wanted. I ended up with beats per minute, which I like to call tempo.


Complicated much? I thought so too, so I derived a formula.


a = beats per measure

b = frames per beat

c = measures per event

d = frame rate


I'm sure there is some way to simplify this formula. However, most of these variables remained constant. I chose to write all music in 4/4 time and a became four at all times. The video was set to 30 fps and d remained at 30. The video was short enough that c was either one, two, or four.


I was precise in my tempo down to the the third decimal place, as precise as my Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) would allow. The DAW would also accept only tempos between 70 and 200. When my calculations fell outside that range, I halved or double to compensate.


As you can tell, I spent far more time on the audio than the video, but it seems that most of the video work has happened during production with little post processing.


I hope you enjoyed the over-dramatic musical accompaniment!

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