Reworking the website and have many "trip videos", basically made for ourselves, all in the 15min range.  I have tried cutting that down to 7-8mins for posting.  Is 7mins still too long?  What is the max you are typically willing to browse through?  I'm thinking no more than 3mins.  

The duration can be a problem... BUT only for low quality video.

If it's nice to show I have no problems with 15 minutes or more.

Otherwise  also 30 sec is to much.  😉

6 hours ago, aquabluedreams said:

I'm thinking no more than 3mins.  

Great question.  It really depends on the purpose and target audience.
 

If trying to reach the masses, think of the same rules of a pop song,  2:30 - 3:00 at most.  If targeting those who appreciate a more artistic video, then perhaps 7-8 mins, but no longer.  A mix may be good.  Either way a compelling hook or powerful intro in the first 15 secs is a must to catch attention.  

Regardless of the length, the quality and story are essential.  
 

Good luck!

chip

 

Good question - it really depends on the content - as a format I like short focused clips in the 30 seconds to 1 minute range, or well constructed videos in the 3-5 minute range,
I certainly watch videos more than 5 minutes long, but then for me it has to have some kind of driving direction otherwise I tend to skim watch, or technical-watch (looking at the lighting, angles, grading etc) - having long been a culprit myself, I often find myself quite bored by slide-show type content (even by the masters of the form...), and skip drone work as a rule.

 For longer formats, I love naturalistic documentaries styles like Nick Hope's /Bubble Vision work
This one is is almost 120 minutes long for instance, and certainly watchable
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ncUVddkK3Q 

 

their are plenty of other reasons to go long, especially if you have something to say and document - but if it's to showcase underwater life in an area and the great footage you got of it, then around 5 minutes is generally enough.

So in general I would say that for my attention span and interests short clips (vignettes, a minute max) or longer ones in the 3-5 minute range are really the sweet spot.

But watching on a computer and not on a phone, and being allergic to talking-head videos on youtube, I'm probably not much of a reference as a viewer base... 😁
cheers
ben

Edited January 12Jan 12 by bghazzal

One option is to break them down into clip lengths, have some short and sweet and others longer, maybe keep them in separate folders?  As for me a short sharp clip is nice, and if it has exceptional content etc I'll watch for longer.

I too have had a similar question - one longish video or multiple smaller clips. Now that reels/shots are what is in vogue, I am leaning towards creating smaller clips and then just putting them all together as a single longer video.

 

I still need to figure out what tools can help make this process easier.

Edited January 12Jan 12 by thejaguar

There is this ad series running on YouTube, the Masterclass... and there is one of them saying - "unless you have a story you don't have a way to persuade people" or something along these lines... most people's travel videos have story - for them. So the challenge is to come up with the story for general audience - based on shots captured as part of personal story. Not easy. Unlike Casey Neistat most people create stories after the filming, not before 🙂.

Yes, my own videos. Jokes aside, I actually prefer the slower natural history themed blue chips videos

The story, the story, the story... To offer a slightly differening opinion, I also think story-telling is sometimes going overboard in some cases, with the voiceover trend or over-dramatisation (recent BBC productions for instance, or more specifically the recent Netflix doc trends - on this, there is a very interesting snippet in Peter Rowlands' interview of Roger Horrocks in the latest issue of the UWP mag 142  btw).

One question to ask, do we really need a story to enjoy watching wildlife? And what are the differences in expectations when watching edited footage of said wildlife?
Do bird-watchers need to give their subject names, sound-effects and a dramatic storyline to enjoy watching birds be... birds?
Observing wildlife in its natural environment is not really the same as watching a movie or TV series, which is indeed really telling a story (most of the time anyway 😅)
We don't have to be making "art" to enjoy observing nature and documenting it as best as we can, and we don't necessarily need to add a extra scenaristic element to appreciate it.
We sure can, but then is it really to complement the footage or because the footage itself is seen as not enough to be a appreciated on its own, as a well shot freestanding element, offering us a peek into something?

In many ways, the animals themselves are the story, and tell a story through their behaviour, their interactions with their environment.
Just like a good picture doesn't need a massive text explaining it to be enjoyed, I find that most of the time good naturalistic footage actually "speaks for itself", with very little explanation needed.
The story is there, unfolding before your eyes.

But yes, this is a naturalistic approach, more than an "artistic" one. And it's also a question of taste, sensitivites, interests, etc...
Personally I dive to see the underwater world and its inhabitants. This is what drives me, and videography comes from a desire to document and somewhat preserve and extend this experience, more than by a drive to create "art" or express myself.

However, it seems letting the the animals and/or the footage  best speak for itself is not really the dominant trend at the moment - let's face it we live in a world where story-telling and branding (to which we could add selling?) are notions imbedded deep into our (sub)consciousness, and seen as the only way to keep our social-media-weary eyeballs focused (= engaged) for a few seconds more   - just look at Netflix "natural history" docs (are blue chip productions going chocolate chip cookie on us?), Behind the Mask endeavours and quite a few of recent award-winning entries in uw video competitions - to quote Ridley Scott's Maximus, are you entertained? (remember to click like and subscribe!)

Nothing that there's anything wrong with this of course, but let's say there are different cups of tea out there, eye of the beholder, all that...

However, to return to the fold and agree with the above, yes for sure, naturalistic footage does need something of a backbone, structure, coherence to make the most of it, and also to make it palatable.

And of course, if you really have something to say/show/tell, by all means, say it! Once it was all countryside here...
And yes, it's true animal behaviour does sometimes need to be given context, to be explained to be better appreciated - fly-on-the-proverbial-wall footage from camera-traps can only go so far...

But again, this contextualisation can be as simple as a title, it doesn't need to be a lyrical voice-over or an actual dramatisation following an invented animal protagonist... This little natural-history trick can get a little old (remember documentaries giving names to animals as we "follow them around on their adventure"?)

And also, this necessary structural backbone can be a thoroughly planned shooting sessions to capture a specific behaviour or to showcase a specific element, but it can be found after shooting as we edit our clips to some sort of coherence. Nothing wrong with that. We don't need to all be diving/filming with a storyboard to fill... An intention (shooting to edit), sure, but this is a little different from following an actual script...
To rebound on the Nick Hope long-scale documentary I mentioned above, I also really his "saturation" study.  The structural backbone here is the attention given to colours and textures, which was most likely found at the editing desk rather than as a specific shooting project.

To further flesh this idea out, ket's take the latest BBC Beneath The Waves Asia sequence on the moorish-idol spawning in Palau - Sir David Attenborough's unmistable narration gives us the context as the action unfolds: moorish idols in the Western pacific, aggregating on the reef before spawning, then leaving the reef to spawn while they are chased by grey reef sharks snapping away at the aggregation in blue water.
The sequence then follows the build-up on the reef, the sharks waiting in the blue, the moorish idols shooting off the reef into the blue and the grey reefs chasing them, seen from above and underwater.

Structurally, the sequence is articulated over 2 simple backbones: the voice-over giving us context, then the editing of the footage into a sequence following the chronological order of the action (which was planned in advance, as the sequence of events is actually already well-known and documented).

The resulting sequence is quite condensed, as the actual build up at Blue Corner was actually over 3+ days, but the chase sequence they captured happened on a a specific day. It was not the only chase off the reef of course, but the actual spawning and chasing events all happened pretty much on the same day. 

This is a good example of animal behaviour being, in itself, the story.
Sure, there are many editorial choices in structuring the sequence to illustrate the event, which we could call narration, but the focus is still primarily to document it, in a naturalistic way.
The border between telling a story and documenting an event is sometimes thin - is a filmed sports competition telling any story other than that of itself? This might be a shocking comparison, but I love watching baitball footage, predation and other scenes for what they are. The story of life, telling itself as it unfolds. Well filmed and edited, of course...

Back to the moorish idols, a still picture option might have been the fish shooting off the reef with the sharks in pursuit, or the sharks snapping at the ball of fleeing/spawing idols for instance, or the aggregations of moorish idols or sharks in the blue, chosen moments capturing a chosen aspect of the same story.
Or, for a more abstract angle, a close-focus wide-angle shot of moorish idol eyes, for a slightly different artistic "take" on the event...

While in this BBC video sequence the voice-over gives us the context, you can also find brillant examples of the same behaviour being captured by other videographers on youtube which no voice over, just a title / description, and which are also captivating imo...

However, BBC logistics for capturing the chase (long multiple day shoots, with a diver on a rebreather on the reef, and camera-boat + following the action action-cam loaded floats) definitely has the edge, as they managed to capture a moment of the chase which is very difficult to see in water (most of the other footage is either drones or shot from the boat, as in local Blue Marlin diveshop's clips of the same chases, captured on the same days).

To return to the original subject, this amazing sequence is less than 5 minutes long 😉

 

 

Edited January 13Jan 13 by bghazzal

One of my role models in underwater videography is Howard Hall. He has many underwater films without any narration, just long sequences of pure fantastic underwater scenarios with some neutral background music. Many people find them boring but I frequently rewatch them. There are few on Amazon Prime (Coral kingdoms, Bejeweled Fishes etc.) but he also uploaded many full movies into his Vimeo page: https://www.howardhall.com/short-videos/

I have recently filmed an eel garden in Bali and uploaded a long 7-mins video with some slow background music, which is, I hope, still interesting and I relaxing to watch.

Later I'm planning to edit a shorter version of it to include in a narrated movie about the underwater life of Bali. There are still lot to explain for non-divers about the behaviour of garden eels. I also use very short clips edited for phone users.

But personally I still prefer long natural history movies with some interesting good narration (there are bad examples as well).

 

22 minutes ago, Nikolausz said:

One of my role models in underwater videography is Howard Hall. He has many underwater films without any narration, just long sequences of pure fantastic underwater scenarios with some neutral background music. Many people find them boring but I frequently rewatch them. There are few on Amazon Prime (Coral kingdoms, Bejeweled Fishes etc.) but he also uploaded many full movies into his Vimeo page: https://www.howardhall.com/short-videos/

I have recently filmed an eel garden in Bali and uploaded a long 7-mins video with some slow background music, which is, I hope, still interesting and I relaxing to watch.

Later I'm planning to edit a shorter version of it to include in a narrated movie about the underwater life of Bali. There are still lot to explain for non-divers about the behaviour of garden eels. I also use very short clips edited for phone users.

But personally I still prefer long natural history movies with some interesting good narration (there are bad examples as well).

 

 

Very nice shots, how long it took eels to pop up after you sat camera down? I found myself unable to wait too long passing eel gardens on a group dives.

 

Back to subject I think that this eel movie would benefit from narration or even subtitles explaining the life of eels which would become a story and the video would become an underlying part of that. Without the story I think it's just too long.

12 minutes ago, RomiK said:

 

Very nice shots, how long it took eels to pop up after you sat camera down? I found myself unable to wait too long passing eel gardens on a group dives.

 

Back to subject I think that this eel movie would benefit from narration or even subtitles explaining the life of eels which would become a story and the video would become an underlying part of that. Without the story I think it's just too long.

Thanks, I dedicated two dives just for the eel garden and used several cameras (Insta360 X2, GoPro 12+AOI wide lens, A6400+30mm macro (first dive), 90mm macro (second dive). With the smaller cameras, they were out after 1-2 mins.

2 hours ago, Nikolausz said:

One of my role models in underwater videography is Howard Hall. He has many underwater films without any narration, just long sequences of pure fantastic underwater scenarios with some neutral background music. Many people find them boring but I frequently rewatch them. There are few on Amazon Prime (Coral kingdoms, Bejeweled Fishes etc.) but he also uploaded many full movies into his Vimeo page: https://www.howardhall.com/short-videos/

I have recently filmed an eel garden in Bali and uploaded a long 7-mins video with some slow background music, which is, I hope, still interesting and I relaxing to watch.

Later I'm planning to edit a shorter version of it to include in a narrated movie about the underwater life of Bali. There are still lot to explain for non-divers about the behaviour of garden eels. I also use very short clips edited for phone users.

But personally I still prefer long natural history movies with some interesting good narration (there are bad examples as well).

 

I like it a lot - really nice angles and intriguing effect with the 360° shot in the begining, lovely closeups (are these cropped in?) and but also really great to watch the eels interacting which each other like they do 3 minutes in, which is something I've never paid attention to - but I agree it's too long, with repetitive shots - I would restructure and trim it down to tight 3:30 and avoid the music change altogether.

Kudos on the patience to shoot these guys - now that I've seen them interacting like this makes me want to get some footage as well!
cheers
 

Edited January 14Jan 14 by bghazzal

8 hours ago, bghazzal said:

I like it a lot - really nice angles and intriguing effect with the 360° shot in the begining, lovely closeups (are these cropped in?) and but also really great to watch the eels interacting which each other like they do 3 minutes in, which is something I've never paid attention to - but I agree it's too long, with repetitive shots - I would restructure and trim it down to tight 3:30 and avoid the music change altogether.

Kudos on the patience to shoot these guys - now that I've seen them interacting like this makes me want to get some footage as well!
cheers
 

Thanks. The closeups are taken with the 90mm macro lens, in some clips I further cropped. This was the most difficult, because the eels always moved out of the frame or the focus plane. So I have only few short close-up clips.

After I uploaded this film I immediately started to cut a shorter version (3 mins). Probably, I will replace this video with it. 

I was really happy to see those behaviours in the film materials.

4 hours ago, Nikolausz said:

Thanks. The closeups are taken with the 90mm macro lens, in some clips I further cropped. This was the most difficult, because the eels always moved out of the frame or the focus plane. So I have only few short close-up clips.

After I uploaded this film I immediately started to cut a shorter version (3 mins). Probably, I will replace this video with it. 

I was really happy to see those behaviours in the film materials.

wow - the 90mm shots are really impressive, given how skittish these guys are!
Behavioural sequences are great - I'd never actually spent much time with garden eels (despite passing by them daily...), and this is pretty fascinating. I guess with the burrows being so close they must have some kind of competing / symbiotic relation.
Slipping down the slippery off-topic slope, there - to regain footing, a 3 minute-ish cut would highlight the material better I think, looking forward to it!
cheers

17 hours ago, bghazzal said:

wow - the 90mm shots are really impressive, given how skittish these guys are!
Behavioural sequences are great - I'd never actually spent much time with garden eels (despite passing by them daily...), and this is pretty fascinating. I guess with the burrows being so close they must have some kind of competing / symbiotic relation.
Slipping down the slippery off-topic slope, there - to regain footing, a 3 minute-ish cut would highlight the material better I think, looking forward to it!
cheers

I've just posted a 3-mins version. I can imagine a shorter version would even work better

 

Cheers

Marcell

Yes if the video is interesting.
I just started following a channel on youtube and his earlier videos with just music i didn´t watch it to the end, but the newer videos with his voiceover i saw them all to the end.
It´s much more interesting when audio has voiceover i think.

Best regards from Norway.

Here is his channel.

 

First attempt, still over 3min but a start.  Pulled from two "old school" +15min Bilikiki trip/travel videos.  

 

 

Edited January 18Jan 18 by aquabluedreams