This installment of Izzy Video is once again based on email requests from viewers. Several people have asked me to give an overview of my audio sweetening process, so this tutorial is just a quick and dirty example of how I touch up audio before exporting for the web.

What you’ll find in this video:

• One method to get your audio to Soundtrack Pro and then back to Final Cut Pro
• How to use the Compressor tool in Soundtrack Pro
• What is a compression ratio?
• Ideal levels for audio
• Where does audio sweetening fall in the overall workflow?

This video is available only to Izzy Video Members. If you’d like to watch it, please visit the membership information page to see how you can become a member and gain access to all of the past Izzy Video archives as well as this episode.

Of course you can also watch several of the free sample episodes to see if a membership might be for you.

I watched a video yesterday from CollegeHumor.com, and I was blown away by the production value and the visual effects, but the writing just wasn’t funny. They were spoofing The Matrix, and they didn’t do a great job. I won’t bother posting it here.

Fast forward to later in the evening, and I’m browsing the bios of some of the folks I follow on Twitter, and I stumble on twitter.com/nevadagrey. She’s a writer in LA, and she writes and produces a show on YouTube. It’s the opposite of the CollegeHumor thing. Not a huge production value, but I think it’s very funny.

Nevada Grey writes, produces, and directs it (and plays the role of the mother, I believe). The acting is pretty darn good, and Noell and I laughed aloud several times while we watched the first episode, and then the second…

Here’s the thing though: When I first watched The Office, I recommended it to people I knew, and some watched it, and they reported back that it wasn’t very funny. I realize there are different senses of humor, so I cautiously recommend you watch this video. I think it’s very funny. I’m curious to hear what you think.

It only has 1,320 views at the time I’m typing this. Realistically it should have hundreds of thousands, maybe millions. Someone should give her a television show if she wants one, if she doesn’t already have one.

And this leads me to a bigger question — Why aren’t there more shows out there like this? Now that we have the ability to produce full video shows and distribute them to the world at such a low costs, examples like this should be popping up all over the place.

Who’s next?

Anyway, on with the show…

Bre Petis creates a lot of very interesting videos, but this one really caught my attention because of the raw emotion over something so geeky. The video is very short at one minute and 16 seconds, but there’s a lot in there. I’d highly recommend watching it a couple times. This kind of energy level and pace is inherently fun to watch, even if you have no interest in robot arms made out of Popsicle sticks.

My guess is they didn’t use professional lighting or even a tripod when they shot this. However, they combine good editing, music, suspense, and emotion, into a short but very successful video.

This installment of Izzy Video is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Some of you may know that the first episode of Izzy Video I did three years ago was on the subject of The Rule of Thirds. Over the past three years, as I’ve rewatched episode one, I’ve wanted to redo it. It’s a fundamental rule of cinematography, so I believe it deserves a little more elaboration than I originally gave it. In this remake, some of the content is the same, and some of it is different. But I definitely believe it’s better.

In this video, I cover several topics including:

• Using the Rule of Thirds with talking heads
• Using the Rule of Thirds with landscape footage
• Using the Rule of Thirds with static objects
• Using the Rule of Thirds with someone moving across the frame

You can watch the free version of Izzy Video 110 here.

As always, the paid members can download an HD version of this video in the member’s area. To learn more about becoming an Izzy Video Member, please visit the membership information page.

Several viewers asked me how I created shadows around the edges of the video clip in last week’s episode. It’s an effect called a “vignette”, and it’s very easy to do. This week’s tutorial is an in-depth explanation on why you might want to use a vignette, and how to create it.

What you’ll find in this video:

• When to use a vignette
• How to create a vignette in Final Cut Pro
• How to create a tracker in Color
• How to animate a vignette in Color
• How to adjust vignette settings to your liking

This video is available only to Izzy Video Members. If you’d like to watch it, please visit the membership information page to see how you can become a member and gain access to all of the past Izzy Video archives as well as this episode.

Of course you can also watch several of the free sample episodes to see if a membership might be for you.

Thanks to Amber Heckler from Norfolk, VA for requesting this week’s topic. She wrote me at izzy (at) izzyvideo (dot) com and asked:

I was wondering if you could do a tutorial on how to achieve the “300 Effect” in post production. To me the “300 Effect” is when a piece of video seems to speed up, and then slow down; mainly seen in fight sequences.

Izzy Video 108 answers this question.

Some of the topics I cover in this episode are:

• What is a variable speed change
• Time-Remapping
• Video Frame Rates
• Smoothing Keyframes

This is one of those techniques that can be a lot of fun. My children certainly enjoyed making this video!

You can watch the free version of Izzy Video 108 here.

As always, the paid members can download an HD version of this video in the member’s area. To learn more about becoming an Izzy Video Member, please visit the membership information page.

Izzy Video

Originally uploaded by Noell.

Noell uploaded this photo to Flickr today, and I just love it, so I wanted to share it with you all.

This is a beautiful sunset in Rocky Point, Mexico, and I’m doing what I always do — shooting video.

Feel free to comment on the photo at her Flickr account if you’d like…

And yes, there’s a new episode of Izzy Video coming soon, so please “stay tuned.”