Who else drinks hot coffee on a hot day?
Today’s challenge was an experiment in ultra short-form video. I wanted to create a six second ad similar to those YouTube “bumper ads” that you can’t skip through. Just about all of them advertise something and they vary in their approaches. Some are pretty funny (like the UPS “Sorry we missed you” commercial) while others are simply product placements by another name (Reese Peanut Butter eggs?). Since I have no sponsor I wasn’t going to focus on any brand so, instead, I made a video about making coffee.
If anything, this video was a challenge in editing and pacing. I’ve included both versions for your reference, the longer one first, then the shorter one. If you saw the shorter one first, do you think you would still understand what’s going on? I mean, it’s not like there’s much to it in the first place.
The punch line I came up with as I was filming the last shot. Originally I was going to make a title sequence that promoted fresh coffee or simply making coffee at home. But, when filming the first take of the ending I realized I was drenched in sweat already. The thought did strike me, does anyone else do this? So I changed shirts and re-did the sequence.
Another challenge here was to see how fast I could edit down the footage I took. Overall, I took about 10 minutes of footage and squeezed it down to 44 seconds and 10 seconds. The longest shot is me asking the question, “Does anybody else drink hot coffee on a hot day?” Other than that, it’s all edited at fractions of seconds.
I tried to make it even shorter but it felt as if it was rushing. It’s not like I could just speed it up as that would cause blurring. And cutting out too much became disorienting to try to see what was happening.
Anyway, this was all shot on my cell phone in 1080p, 30fps. I meant to shoot 4K but I neglected to change the settings before I began. I used my Boling P1 light for extra light in the kitchen. Imported to Final Cut Pro, titles and sound effects added (clock ticking). I sped up some clips (pouring water, pushing down, pouring coffee) but most are left as is. Exported at 4K.
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