How to?

[cw4u]

I just recently returned from a trip to Guatemala, and have collected over 2500 pictures, 5 hours of video, and am planning to do about 1-2 hours of interviews.

My question is how should I merge all these into a finished product. I'm probably looking at a 20-30 minute video, but I don't just want it to be a typical, run of the mill slideshow.

Do y'all have any ideas?

Thanks.

[NdEd]

www.animoto.com

Apply for a free "not for profit account" and go for it.

[tedanderson]

I would start out by writing the story and then use the video clips and pictures as visual aids to help tell it. Your story is pretty much the skeleton of your documentary and then the interviews, videos, etc. are the meat and fleash that cover it.

So start out with writing a paper as if you were writing a report for school. e.g. "Last summer I went to Guatemala. We did blah blah blah.. and we learned blah blah blah and we met blah blah blah.. This is just so that you can get all of the memories and ideas down on paper.

Secondly, watch this video by Scott Simon who is a very dynamic reporter on NPR (National Public Radio) and he explains how to tell a story and specifically mentions a couple things about producing audio and video. This is a very good video to watch because it has plenty of insight into how an audience sees things and the best way to get your point across.

[waynehoskins]

The storyboard is critical. It is to your documentary what an outline is to your speech. Many church people with wonderful intentions make tons of lousy-looking, poorly-thought-out videos and slideshows. (After our youth returned from summer camp this year, one of our interns -- bless her heart -- made a 15-minute slideshow of just pictures. Don't do that.)

Think out clearly what you want to say, and then pick the video snippets that say that.

20-30 minutes is a little long, potentially a lotta long. I'd really try to make it as short as you can, like 5 minutes, no more than 10. You can make a longer thing too, for the people who went on the trip, but make a short spot. It'll force you to get your directorial vision straight.

[Esoteric]

Hire a professional?

Mike

[billmi]

While I agree with hire a professional, I would also include the options of taking some courses, or finding appropriate textbooks in documentary production.

This is not to say that you must go to school to make an effective video, but considering that universities offer 4 year degrees in documentary film production, there's a little more to it than can be packed into a single post on an Internet forum.

[technerd]

Derek,
Find a starving Christian editor that believes in what you want to accomplish. Pay him to put your dream together. Keep your interviews short. Add bRoll to insert on top of the interviews so you don't loose the audience. Before you make the script. Get with several friends and ask what they would want to see in a final product. Is this the highlights show of the trip. Are you making a promo for a future mission. Who is your audience. You don't want to loose the crowd with footage they don't need to see. Most of the viewers remember how you impact them at the beginning and how you win their hearts in the closing. everything else is a filler. Don't hang on to one angle of the 5 hours you have to long. Keep it moving with many peices of highlights. if you use photos, flash them in with a strobe effect, or move them in from all angles crossing each other. You are looking at a month to make this a heart touching production. Just make the decision what you want to accomplish with all this input and share your vision with a pro editor first. If God wants this to be seen, he will get you the right person to do it.

[rbcyouthdude]

Watch the one Pastor Ryan just put up, it is well put together kinda like you want.
Missions Video Critique

Also go to the imb.org and go to the video pages and watch several of the videos there. I like the way they are done.

Michael

[Pastor Ryan]

Thanks a ton RBC that was very kind of you.

My advice is if you have someone in your church or a friend of the church with video editing knowledge (if you have none) to help you put it together.

Nobody can compile the story and put it all together like the person who shot it and knows everything about it.

The biggest thing you need to do is
1. Review all of your content
2. Decide the angle you want to take (do you want to make a feature with narration, do you want to let your interviews do the narration, do you just want to make a short music video for now and allow yourself more time to make a longer feature?)
3. Storyboard or work out a script with a team, don't allow yourself to be the only head involved.
4. find an editing system you are comfortable with, or a partner you are comfortable with that can do the editing for you.
5. Pray
6. Pray
7. Ask others to pray for you
8. Have a panel of at least 2 if not 5 people view your final draft, make edits and changes.
9. Pray
10. Export to DVD!

[sadlerjon]

One other thing to consider: while a storyboard is essential, getting to the storyboard can sometimes be a challenge - primarily due to the linear nature of a storyboard.

Since a storyboard is key to identifying the sequence of shots going into your documentary, you will need to make certain the shot sequence makes sense, and delivers the core message in a clear way without distraction. However, getting to this simplified linear flow can be hard - people tend to think like a random walk, realizing related items as they think about one item. If the thoughts generated in brainstorming are used directly to make up storyboard without a review step to try and create a logical order for presentation, the storyline will be hard to understand.

One approach that I have used to review and order the results of brainstorming is to create a message map which is then used to develop the storyboard. Since a message map is not linear, it allows for a number of different variations of a storyboard to be developed, allowing you to "try on" different flows. Message mapping also creates an inherent "introduce, explain, summarize" sequence, which due to the repetition helps to make points more memorable.

The non-linear nature of message maps also helps with non-linear presentation forms, such as web-sites or interactive DVDs. This is a place where outlines and storyboards really fall short, given their linear nature.

So, I suggest you look at developing a message map to help you in organizing your material.