Nashville Apple Pro Video Group

No matter who you are, you can probably tell the difference between a professional Hollywood film and a shaky home-movie captured on an ancient consumer camcorder. The tells are endless, but here are some tips to help you make your home-videos and movie projects look much more professional.

1. Use a tripod. The bane of most home movies is their shakiness. Motion-sickness is NOT the reaction you want to evoke in your viewers, so use a tripod when you shoot.

2. Move Read the rest of this entry »

As a filmmaker you will always be interested in ways to make your films better. One of the top ways to improve the film quality is through various editing techniques. Editing techniques will allow you to manipulate the film in many ways enhancing the over all quality of the film. It is important to receiving tracing and take course on the many different varieties of film editing techniques. This is a process that is not learned over night and will take time to master. Taking the Read the rest of this entry »

Video editing has come a long way from massive tape machines with synchronization to a controller that managed all higher effect functions through a multi-port switcher. Today’s editing is simply done, as computer software has replaced most of the cumbersome hardware and most effects are push button . Still the process can be demanding without the proper preparation.

The key to successful edit is preparation. It begins when you ingest your footage into your editing software. Whether it’s importing files or streaming video, take notes and make locators. Most editing software has these wondrous little devices which allows you to Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ve spent years watching http://www.direct.tv channels wondering how you can get into film and video editing you’ve come to the right place if you live in Nashville. Here are the best places to get your foot in the door when it comes to making a name for yourself in editing:
Schools: Nashville has a huge public school system and several notable colleges and universities, too. Volunteer to apprentice or produce a spot for your child’s class Read the rest of this entry »

One of the features which make Final Cut Pro so popular is the ability to easily transfer content across the web and compose a finished product. Some online directors are pushing this capability to its extremes, and the results are breathtaking, to say the least. One group regularly producing great content is the online music community. We don’t know if all of these were produced on Final Cut Pro, but they all certainly can be, in addition to much more.The Youtube Symphony Orchestra is probably the most widely-publicized of recent efforts. Sponsored by the London Symphony Orchestra, the project consisted of an open audition across the world of musician’s playing the same piece: Tan Dun’s “Internet Symphony No. 1 ‘Eroica.’” The different videos were compiled into a single video, which can be viewed on the Youtube Symphony Channel. Read the rest of this entry »

Not everybody wants to put down 1,000 to make a home movie of Grandma singing on Christmas Eve. If you’ve got Mac OS X, though, you’ve still got the power to preserve this treasured moment. iMovie is a video-editing software designed for ease of use by anybody. The newest version for Mac OS X is iMovie ’09, although the iPhone 4 supports a new iMovie for iOS.’09 keeps what worked in the previous settings and also restores some beloved features which were missing in iMovie ’08. These include the options for speeding up or slowing down footage and the ability to mark where different scenes were shot. There’s also the new ability to easily search through your library and find exactly what you’re looking for. You can read more about the application’s features at Apple’s official web site. iMovie is only available on Mac OS X, as it has been since iMovie 3.

Whenever a traditionally underground phenomenon goes mainstream, there are usually cries of “selling out.” However, Final Cut Pro has managed to avoid that, simply because its new-found popularity is based solely on its own merits. Well, that, and the Academy Award-winning films which have been produced on it (Avatar, No Country for Old Men, and many more).The newest version of the product is Final Cut Pro 7, also known informally as Final Cut Studio 3. Final Cut Studio is the application suite which includes FCP, the motion-graphics designer Motion, the audio editor Soundtrack Pro, the encoding and authoring app DVD Studio Pro, the color grader Color, and the video encoding app Compressor. The focus of version 7 is efficiency. As with anything Apple, newer products only get sleeker and faster, and FCP 7 is a great example. Read the rest of this entry »

Final Cut Pro was introduced by Apple in 1999, and the consumer product opened up the editing market to independent filmmakers, who could now create feature-quality products. However, it would be two years before Hollywood filmmakers caught on. Here’s a look at some of the films that have used the software, from past to present.

• The Rules of Attraction (2002): Roger Avary’s tale of unrequited love at a liberal arts school (based on Bret Easton Ellis’s novel) was the first major film to be edited with the software. Afterwards, he appeared in ads promoting FCP.
• Cold Mountain (2003): Editor and sound designer Walter Murch was inspired by Avary to make the switch to FCP, and his work on Cold Mountain proved them both right. Murch was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Achievement in Editing, and his efforts were memorialized in the book Behind the Seen: How Walter Murch Edited Cold Mountain Using Apple’s Final Cut Pro and What This Means for Cinema.
• Read the rest of this entry »

Nashville’s historic prevalence in the music industry is well-known. However, the growth of the film editing industry in the city should not be ignored. There are a number of companies in the city doing great work in post-production, filming, and editing. Some of those which cater to professional interests are listed below.Gemini Production Group: This group brings 30 years of combined experience to bear on almost any project imaginable. Although they focus on identity campaigns, commercials, and web campaigns, Gemini has also won an Emmy for a documentary and been featured at many independent Film Festivals.POSTDIGITAL: Founded in 1996, POSTDIGITAL started focusing on motion pictures in 2000. The company keeps pace with recent technology and recently added Blu-ray and HD/SD closed captioning to their production capabilities. Their clients have included USA Home Entertainment, Universal Music Group, and Geffen Records. Read the rest of this entry »