Tuesday, October 12, 2010

The Preserve - A Video Essay

I've always been drawn to the photo essay. W. Eugene Smith was a master of them. I think I first was aware of his work from the Life Magazine spread, The Country DoctorThe cool thing about doing a photo essay is that it gives you focus. You have a subject or an idea to build images around. So instead of being restricted to one general image that hopefully tells the tale, you can build the story from a variety off points of view. It's a lot like putting together a slide show. I love the discipline of creating a decent slide show, the ruthless editing, and thinking about a beginning, middle, and end.

As cameras are getting better at incorporating video as well as still capability, now we can start to explore the idea of a video essay. Here's my shot at it, taken with a recently acquired Sanyo Xacti HD 1010 refurb, and edited in Sony Vegas.

The Preserve from Anthony Mindling on Vimeo.

2 comments:

  1. Tony, this is outstanding on so many levels. Very well done and it does indeed weave a story or more than that... weaves a wonderful feeling of tranquility. Thank you!

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  2. I'm very pleased to hear you enjoyed this effort, Diane. It's great fun to make these "moving stills", and then see what happens when sound and music is added to create a mood.

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