I sincerely apologize for the lack of posts yesterday. I have been working on a little project of mine for some time, and yesterday I finally managed to finish it. The result is a video I'm very proud of, entitled "True Test - A Video Game Tribute".
Making of:
This is only my first video; there will be many more to come, hopefully at the rate of one a week. I will post every video on my blog, with a little "making of" featurette such as this one; of course, you can always find my videos on my YouTube channel, the link to which I will post at the end of this post.
The making of this video was a long and arduous process that cost me much time and effort, mostly due to the different screen resolutions the videos themselves were in. I initially started this project on Editstudio 6; I had used the software before, and so I downloaded and used the trial. I found, however, that I could not fix the problem of the differing video resolutions. So, I turned to Nero, and downloaded that trial instead. It was a great program, until I realized that the feature to slow down or speed up a video did not exist. This is not a cheap program, and while I didn't buy it, I have a feeling that some people who will may be sorely disappointed. I mean, seriously; no speed change? Even Windows Move Maker has that. Anyway, I finally settled on Sony Vegas Pro, which I managed to borrow off a friend. It allowed me to do everything that I needed to, and I spent all of yesterday rebuilding my video inside Vegas.
Now, on to the actual content. There are 29 video games included in my video. If you missed the description, here they are (in order):
Gears of War 3
Grand Theft Auto IV
Devil May Cry 4
Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2
God of War 3
Mass Effect 2
Mass Effect 3
Red Dead Redemption
inFamous
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow
Resistance 3
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Darksiders
Darksiders II
Final Fantasy Versus XIII
Edge of Twilight
Dragon's Dogma
Assassin's Creed: Revelations
Kingdom Hearts Final Mix (Deep Dive)
Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII
Metal Gear Solid IV
Prototype
Final Fantasy XIII-2
Metal Gear Solid Rising
Lost Odyssey
Starhawk
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Tomb Raider
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception
This may seem like a lot for a 4-minute video, but there were originally intended to be much more; I had originally planned to feature around 50 games. As the song neared its end, I had wanted to time some very quick clips (1 second or less) of various video games into the video, resulting in a very speedy, action-oriented collage. I ended up not doing this because I felt the final product would better benefit from a slower, more focused approach, and so I went about changing the concept behind my video.
There were many games that were originally supposed to be included, but did not make the final cut. There was a landscape scene from Red Faction: Guerrilla, for example, that I replaced with a landscape scene from Dragon's Dogma, because the Guerrilla footage was watermarked. If there's one thing I won't stand for, it's watermarks in my videos. I get most of the footage from trailers and reviews on GameTrailers, but when I find I can't work around the watermarks, I resort to downloading the clean version from FilePlanet. This didn't work for Guerrilla, because the footage was exclusive to GameTrailers. No worries, though; the game will soon get its own video. Anyway, I was also intending to include Killzone 3 and Halo 4 in the video; Halo 4 was actually in at one point, but I decided to take it out and abandon both games, because I felt the project would be better off without them. The Dead Space games were also early picks of mine, but as they definitely didn't fit with what I wanted the video to be, I disregarded them as well. I really wanted to show some love for the lesser-known (but brilliant) games by including footage of The Witcher games, but I couldn't find a clip or a place to put it. I really wanted to include Beyond Good & Evil 2, but there is only one trailer, and it didn't fit. I didn't use footage from the first game, or from great games such as Psychonauts, because the games included in the video had to have realistic graphics; this would make the video flow much better, and hopefully tie all the different worlds together.
The song I used is called "True Test", by Polywood; I first heard it in the DC Universe commercial, and immediately loved it. The challenge of setting a variety of action-oriented video game clips to the entire song is that the first minute is relatively quiet. I found my solution to this with the "Ashes to Ashes" trailer for Gears of War 3, which comprises the first minute of the video. I'm not a particularly big fan of Gears of War; it's just that the footage and the ambiance fit, so I used it. I'd like to think it turned out quite nicely. I always intended to finish the project with Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception, and I feel I did that successfully as well. In between the beginning and the end, however, I do feel I could have made many aspects of the video better. Some of the clips feel somewhat out of place, perhaps, but I had spent so much time on the video I just decided "the hell with it", and went with what I had. I timed everything to the best of my ability, so while some transitions are slightly off, most of them are alright.
The theme I wanted to explore in "True Test - A Video Game Tribute" was that of the title of the song and thus the video: the idea of a "true test". All of the characters featured in the video are truly challenged by those who would oppose them, and thus they all face the test of overcoming all obstacles, and perhaps even themselves, to achieve their goals. When all appears lost, they will find the strength to continue, and that drive is central to many of the characters.
I intend to use this "theme" idea for as many of my serious videos as I can. Of course, humorous videos are also in the works, so if you've never seen a funny video game tribute before, be prepared.
And, we finally come to the end of my long essay! Thank you for watching, thank you for reading, and make sure to check out my channel on YouTube here:
http://www.youtube.com/user/UnchartedGamingBlog
Please look forward to my next video!
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