GIVING LIFE TO STILL IMAGES
Video Credit: Arbuckle Industries
More and more, people are coming to us to create videos out of their current visual assets, which usually consists of photos, renderings and archival graphics. Luckily, options are becoming available to convert these assets into something other than the ubiquitous Ken Burns effect. We have nothing against this technique, or Ken Burns. As a matter of fact, we love him! However, there are a lot of techniques that exist that can significantly add production value (pizazz) to these assets. Check out the above video for a few examples of how we tackle, and enliven, this type of footage.
COMPOSITING
Compositing is a great technique that we often use with our architectural clients. It's where we merge video footage with still images to create a "film feel." This is usually done by employing some existing footage, masks and a slight zoom effect to the image.
2.5 DIMENSIONAL
In regards to archival footage, there are some simple, effective post-production techniques that can be applied to old photographs and graphics to better juxtapose and incorporate them with more modern assets.
TEMPLATES
There are also a number of templates that can be purchased to help integrate still images into a video. Many of these templates are relatively cheap to purchase and allow you to manipulate the speed, transitions and timing, which is absolutely necessary to make these slideshows fit seamlessly into your edit. The downside is that many of them are highly stylized and can really stick out in a video. Check out some of these templates for After Effects on Pond5.
