I do not understand how people make videos for a living. Once I finished this assignment, I literally had to put my head down on my desk. There was so many parts to this, I swear this video was like 40 minutes long.

So first, I needed an idea. I didn’t have one. I downloaded the trailer PSD file on the assignments page and messed around with the words on there. I then started thinking about celebrities because I still had Mean Girls on my brain from my last assignment. I was thinking of making some sort of trailer about being in the public eye and how that could be damaging, but paparazzi clips aren’t always the best quality. I still wanted to incorporate that so I found this video clip of cameras flashing and I added this sound of someone say “no” from Freesounds over it and I really liked it! I then wanted to use the song Pretty Hurts by Beyonce which speaks to how women are only viewed for their looks and wanted a video of someone doing their makeup. I remembered years ago seeing a book trailer that had Zendaya Coleman in it and in the trailer she is doing her makeup and getting ready, so that was perfect. I added some title effects and I split and added a freeze frame to the clips too. I then added the PNG of the broken glass and shattering sound from Freesounds to the project. I then found this video on some great scenes in Euphoria which is a show that also stars Zendaya and her character in that show has some ROUGH moments, so it fit the vibe I was kind of going for. For the first clip, I brought back the Beyonce and I added another Freesounds clip of someone saying where are you over and over again. I then added the second clip of her on the bike and extended the music to the end.

This post is a detailed tutorial of how to complete the assignment Mash-Up Trailers within the Video Assignments bank. This tutorial will be heavily based around the use of iMovie, which should definitely help the Mac users out there. This tutorial will also use my previous completion of this assignment Godzilla Vs. The Incredible Hulk to help guide the tutorial. If you would like to just simply watch my mashup trailer, here it is:

So pay attention, and hopefully you can develop a solid mashup trailer after this.

Step 1. Choose the movie/tv shows that you would like to mash up. This is the first and one of the most important steps. Choose as many movies/tv shows as you would like to use. For me, I chose one movie that I wanted to use in my trailer and then chose a movie that complements and/or parallels this movie very well. For example, I wanted to use Godzilla. I then went on to choose The Hulk for my other movie because it parallels the theme and tone of Godzilla very well.

Step 2. After you have chose the movies/shows you are using, it is time to develop your story for the trailer. The idea of a movie trailer is to tell, briefly, what the movie is about. This means that you need to create a simple storyline for your movie. Even though you won’t execute this in a full length movie, you will help display this storyline shortly in your trailer.

Step 3. Now, you will need to download all the media for your video. There are many different ways you can do this, and you should have a multitude of media for this. To get your video clips from the movies I suggest you use either Keepvid or ClipConverter. These are great for downloading YouTube videos by simply using the link to the video.

For downloading any audio from Youtube simply use this YouTube to MP3 converter, its quick and simple.

If you desire to download any sound effects, I suggest you use freesound. When gathering all your media, I suggest you not only get video from the movies/tv shows you have chosen but also any other outside sources, such as newscasts or other clips, that help aid your storyline. Also, when downloading these media files, think about downloading them into a specific directory on your computer so that it is much easier to find later.

Step 4. Import all of your media into iMovie (or whatever video editor you are using). If you are using iMovie simply click ‘File’ -> ‘Import’ -> ‘Movies…’. This will pull up a popup window where you can select the media you would like to import. The bottom half of this pop up window includes the import settings for this project. I would suggest you click the button labeled “Create a new Event”, title it, and import your video clips to that event. I also suggest you check the “Optimize Video” box or just leave the default setting. Now hit “Import”. It should take a few minutes to import all your clips, but once this is done you are ready to go.

Step 5. Using your event video bank in the bottom half of the screen

Select the regions of the clip that you would like to add, then simply drag them to the top left project window.  The rest is basically up to you to edit the rest. From here, I will simply give the iMovie users some tips on how to get the most out of iMovie. If you would like add audio tracks from your iTunes library you can simply select the music icon directly to the right of the sound level bars. This will bring up a list of the songs within your iTunes library and you can drag and drop the songs wherever you would like in your video.

If you would like to add text to your video, click the “T” icon that is two spaces to the right of the music icon. As you can see in the bottom right hand corner of the screenshot of above, these are all different types of text styles. You can drag and drop any of them into the project window, and they can be layered on top of clips or alone by themselves. When you add text, you have the opportunity to change the background and font of the text.

If you would like to add transitions to your video, click the facing triangles icon that is to the right of the text icon. Similarly, you can drag and drop these transitions between the splitting of clips to create transitions between clips.

If you would like to change video/audio levels or add video/audio effects simply double click on clips in the project window. The clip inspector will then come up with multiple tabs labeled “Clip”, “Video”, and “Audio”. These tabs will allow you to do many different things, more general changes being made within the “Clip” tab and more specific changes within the “Video” and “Audio” tabs.

To watch your video you can either use the play button on the toolbar on left within the middle toolbar. This will simply play your video in the little box in the top right hand corner. If you would like to watch it in full screen, click the play button with the dark box surrounding it.

Step 6. Once your video is complete it is time to export it. To do this, from the menu click ‘Share’ -> ‘Export using QuickTime…’. Then name your video and choose where you would like to save it. Depending on the length of your video this will take some time to complete, but when it is finished you have your completed video as a viewable QuickTime video that can easily be uploaded to YouTube.

I hope this tutorial has helped. If you have any questions, regarding this assignment or the use of iMovie, feel free to comment on this post and I will do my best to get back to you with a response. See ya!