Using Adobe Spark

Creating 'My First Video' using an iPhone and Adobe Spark Video. I began by choosing a subject, "Missing Zappa' and decided upon a simple narrative. This narrative sought to join up a moment from the past to a moment in the present. I used my iPhone to take 20-30 photos and one short video sequence of 60-70 seconds. In addition I used a newspaper data base entitled UK Press online to obtain primary sources to enrich my narrative (primary research method).

Using a Primary Research Method to inform my video production.

My next task was to learn to use Adobe Spark Video.

The key point is that I learned to arrange a few images on a time line. The app allowed me to set the timing of each image between 1 to 10 seconds. I began by setting all the images to 10 seconds but then realised that this would make for a very mechanical video with each new element changing in predictable ways.

Nevermind - it was a fair start.

As I was taking the photographs I had a rough idea of how I wanted to order them but as I set them down I made two order changes and arranged two shots as simple composites using an option in the layout menu of the app. The hardest task of the video production was the 'writing' and recording of the commentary. I had thought that I would be able to record a commentary that ran across all the images but my experience so far indicates that the production assumes a commentary corresponding to each single image. I soon discovered that the timing of the image-commentary link could (and did) push beyond the 10 second timing if the record button continues to be held.

I found that I needed three or four goes at getting the commentary sounding about right and trying to avoid a 'stopping and starting outcome'.  As I listened through to what I thought was a good recording I would then decide to change a detail but changing a detail entailed recording the whole image section again. Given that this was usually less than 10 seconds it did not present too much of a challenge.

The final production task (apart from uploading the video) was to choose a background soundtrack from the soundtracks within the app. I  had wanted to use 'Baba O'Riley' by The Who because the author of 1971 Never A Dull Moment chooses this song as the greatest of that year but this would be to offend copywrite laws. I do not have the money to buy the permissions from the record label.

Having listened to the soundtracks under the 'Thoughtful' heading I chose 'Distant Telegram' because of the historical dimension of my narrative. Finally, there is a tool to enable me to set the volume of the soundtrack so that it does not overpower my recorded commentary. While I am happy with my first video I ought to collect reponses from my target audience to hear what they think.