A few weeks ago I wrote about how I have been exploring how to use YouTube as one of the characters in my novel is a YouTuber. I’m taking a bit of time to think about what I want to do, and in the last few weeks have been exploring the idea of Slow TV as it looked likely that there would be a new lock down.
My approach so far has been basically to pair films of things that are nice to look at with sound recordings of things that are nice to look at. My first three films were of sunrises, in real time that I recorded while away recently in the cotswolds. I then added in a sound track of my cat having a nice purr.
The effect is strangely relaxing. If this sounds like something you would like to see you can have a look at one of them here:
Thank you for reading. I also make art and films. You can see my films at my YouTube channel here. You can see things with my designs on at my shop here. Could even treat yourself if you wanted to. Just saying. If buying art is not your thing, but you would like to support what you see I also have a Patreon Page here.
A few weekends ago I uploaded the most recent of my YouTube Videos. I first started creating them as a kind of research project – one of the characters in my novel (currently called Feeding Jasmine Valentine) is a wannabe YouTube star and I felt it would be helpful to understand the process. As one of this people who tends to learn by doing, I was finding it a bit difficult to get into the perspective of this character, and now I feel better able to see ‘through his eyes’ as it were. The journey so far, however, has not been entirely smooth.
The best I can say is that as a research exercise, it has been quite successful in discovering the many splendid technical difficulties that can occur when making these films. My most recent two videos have suffered from some pretty substantial camera shake (although I think the narration to both was rather nice so if you are the kind of person who listens to films while working on other things, these could be for you), and problems with the camera adjusting to changes in the light.
I have also managed to run down the power on all of my equipment half way through filming something, and in my last attempt, to record no sound at all, despite using equipment that I know well and have used many times. It has been interesting, and sometimes disheartening, to understand the many ways in which something can go wrong. I am hoping that my next set of experiences may be about what can go right!
In the next few weeks I’m going to experiment with a different kind of film, and have taken some footage from a single viewpoint instead of trying to walk and talk. I’m looking forwards to seeing how that goes, and what kind of films I end up making. I hope to bring you some more successful videos in the next few weeks. In the mean time, I would really appreciate it if those of you who are into YouTube would pop over and have a look at my channel, and consider subscribing. You can see my latest effort below.
Thank you for reading. I also make art and films. You can see my films at my YouTube channel here. You can see things with my designs on at my shop here. Could even treat yourself if you wanted to. Just saying. If buying art is not your thing, but you would like to support what you see I also have a Patreon Page here.
