Highlight Video Advice

[Son of a Son]

I respect a lot of posters here and I am looking for some advice. Below you will find 4 highlight videos of my daughter. The first three I put together myself from video taken by someone else's HD camera and my own GoPro. The 4th video is one I paid for from a company offering video's at USJN in DC (I did not attend that tournament).

What I am looking for is critique on content and editing as I have never done this before. Should I show more "X" or less "X". My daughter is a 6'1" Junior 4/5 looking to continue playing at some level in college. I am learning about this process as we go, but before I start sending links to schools she is interested in, I wanted someone else to view the films and give me feedback. I will apologize right now, with the exception of the video we paid for, this is ALL very much "Daddy Cam" work.

Thanks!

 

[Dionysus]

@Son of a Son — A couple of thoughts/opinions.

The video work seems pretty good overall.

Music: I like Linkin Park and Green Day but that will not suit everyone’s taste. The wrong music will immediately turn some people off to the video, and personally I don’t think either one is a good soundtrack for girls basketball.

You want to frame her performance in the best possible way so you might consider going with some simple background music, or just use the audio picked up from the game.

2nd video: was this a different camera? It has kind of a fisheye lens look to it. There was quite a bit of camera movement in this one too, use a tripod as much as you can.

 

[Son of a Son]

Thanks Dionysus.

Music: You know, it never occurred to me. I showed these to her Varsity Coach this weekend and he doesn't even have speakers so it never played. The music choices were actually a simple math problem, as I simply searched my library for songs the same length as the final video. It was funny that Linkin Park matched two of them, especially when "Lying From You" is one of my daughter's favorite songs thanks to Taylor Teagarden! The 4th video was the professionally made one and I like the stock music there. I can't really use the audio from the video as you can always hear me and about half the time I sound like a raving maniac! Guess I should just use my google-fu to find some stock music clips to use.

Camera: The 1st and 3rd were an HD camera used by another parent to record the game using a tripod. The 2nd was my GoPro, and there's not much I can do about the fisheye. I kind of knew that going in, but didn't want to not get video. I also used the headband attachment a) because I don't have a tripod and b) it allows me to keep the camera pointed where I am looking without thinking about it. I've noticed that when I try and film using a tripod, I get into the game and may leave the camera facing the empty side of the court.

 

[Dionysus]

Your daughter looks like a terrific athlete by the way. She seems to be a natural.

If you get a longer piece of music it's pretty easy to edit it to just fade out at the end of the video timeline.

In any case, it's so great that you're capturing these moments in her life. She will really enjoy watching these later when she's grown. I took tons of photos and videos of my kids when they were young and they love watching them once in a while. Great memories.