A Video Scrapbook tells a very personal story. It combines some very powerful media–video, photographs, memoriabilia, music, narration–into a priceless video that will be enjoyed by your friends and family for years to come.
A typical vido scrapbook lasts from 5-15 minutes, has 1-5 pieces of music, video and photos, and a number of title pages and captions. Your video can also include narration.
Normally, the structure of the video scrapbook is as follows:
Title page introducing the video.
One to five chapters–each covering a different topic, time period, or theme. These chapters will be the “scenes” when you create a DVD.
End credits and/or a message.
Below is a legacy video I created about my great grandparents. It includes a title page introducing them, video captured from old 8MM film, old photographs that I scanned, music, and a Bible verse that ends the video. I created this video using iMovie.
Interviews are a great touch to most any video. For example, you can interview guests at a wedding, grandma or grandpa for your family reunion video, children at a birthday party, etc. This creates a special touch to your video presentation.
When interviewing people, try some of these techniques:
Never use the word interview because it tends to make the person nervous. Once you point a camera at them, they may lose their ability to talk.
Don’t make the person look into the camera. Instead place your camcorder on a tripod. Then, position yourself to the left or right of the camera and have the person talk to you. This is a technique that reporters use on television. The next time you watch the news, check it out.
Turn off the record light (LED) so it’s not a constant reminder that the person is being recorded. You can usually find this option in the menu of your camcorder.
Chat with the person to get them to relax. They will talk more naturally. You can always edit out the parts that you don’t want. It’s always better to get more video than you need if you can get them to relax.
Have a list of questions you want to ask. Work your questions into your conversation. You can always edit out your voice.
If possible, set up your camera prior to the interview and do a test run to make sure that the lighting and background look good on video.
Have fun! Your mood will set the tone for the video
If you have any other interview tips or comments you would like to share, please leave a comment.
Before you go on a video/photo shoot, take time to sketch a scene list to make sure you get all the footage you need. This process will save you time when you sit down to edit your video later on.
For example, if you are going to create a Video Scrapbook of your child’s birthday party at McDonald’s, your scene list might look something like this:
Need video and/or photos of this…
McDonald’s where the party will be held. You can use this photo at the beginning of your video scrapbook to show where the party was held.
Birthday boy or girl.
Birthday cake.
Balloons.
Child blowing out candles.
Child eating cake.
Child opening presents. Make sure you get those cute expressions!
Friends/family wishing the child a happy birthday. Briefly pull their friends aside and get them to say something special into the camera.
Children playing.
Ronald McDonald. If there’s a Ronald McDonald painted on the wall or if there’s a statue of him somewhere, make sure you get a photo or video of that. This will be a great filler for your video and will help set the scene.
Children leaving the party… which will be a great ending to the video.
These are only a few suggestions to get you started. Be creative! The more you plan, the better the video will be.
Also, think about what music you want to include in the Video Scrapbook prior to the event. Some of the lyrics of the song(s) might help you decide on different scenes.
Have you ever gone to one of your child’s recitals (sporting event, play, etc.) and realized that your batteries on your camera were dead? Next time, be prepared. Make sure your camera bag is packed with the following:
Digital camera
Camcorder
Extra batteries for digital camera
Extra batteries for camcorder
Power cord for camcorder
Extra blank tapes for camcorder
Extra blank media card (memory) for digital camera
Tripod
Lens cleaner and cloth
Owner’s manuals for digital camera and camcorder
Video cable (in case you want to hook your camcorder up to a TV to show your footage)
I just created a video scrapbook for my 4 year old son’s soccer team. Throughout the season I videoed various parts of the game. Then, I used my Mac (iMovie) to create a montage of the various plays and showed it at the end of season soccer party.
These are the top 10 things I learned when creating the soccer video.
Get plenty of close ups of the players. These are some of the best shots since you can see their facial expressions.
Video funny things they do on the field… such as skipping, picking flowers, watching the planes fly by, etc. Then, you can have a bloopers section on your video and set it to music such as “The Little Rascals” or “Linus and Lucy”.
Get shots of the crowd (parents) watching the game. This may not be that important to the child right now. But in 20 years, he/she will have fun looking to see who was in the crowd cheering them on.
Video the setting… such as signs and landmarks. Once again, in 20 years you might not remember exactly where you played. You don’t need a lot of this coverage. But a little is good.
Plan your video before you shoot it. For example, if you want to play a certain song in your video and you want the plays to go along with the video, you will need to make sure you get that coverage. For example, I videoed a lot of the kids falling down. It seems like they were always tripping over each other and the ball. In my video scrapbook, I showed various clips of the kids falling down and played the song “Tubthumping” by Chumbawamba. The lyrics go like this… “I get knocked down, but I get up again. You’re never gonna keep me down.”
Video the coach. Video the coach and the kids in the huddle. Make sure you get the audio of the coach. These clips make great transitions between songs. Make sure you give a copy of the soccer video to the coach when you finish. He/she will definitely appreciate it.
Don’t worry about videoing each game in their entirity. That would take too long to edit. Plus, to me, that’s not important. My goal was to show the kids having fun playing soccer.
Use a tripod. I thought I had a pretty steady hand… and I do. But when the kids made a good play, I would cheer and those clips ended up being shaky. Ugggh!
Move around. Don’t shoot all your video from one spot on the bleachers. If possible, shoot video from each end of the field, the center, etc. It will make your video scrapbook a lot more interesting. Plus, shoot at different angles, such as sitting down, standing up, standing on a chair, etc.
Learn from your mistakes. After each game, watch the video and see where some improvements can be made. If you see something you like, keep doing it. By the end of the season, you should have some great footage!
Just remember… your video scrapbook doesn’t have to be perfect. Whatever you create will be a treasure for years to come. Have fun!
A Video Scrapbook tells a very personal story. It combines some very powerful media–video, photographs, memoriabilia, music, narration–into a priceless video that will be enjoyed by your friends and family for years to come.
