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Editing: Layering Video (page 2)

Depth and Interest

With the power of multi-layered video, you can bring your audience a rich variety of images and allow them to experience much more than they typically get to watch in a single shot, but at a price. The price is the time it will take you to judge each of the shots forming your composite, note their action, direction, size, color and shape and how they change over time from beginning to end.

When you master the possibilities of layering shots, your video, like seeing the Grand Canyon for the very first time, will open up a world of depth, color and richness that will surprise your audience. So use up those overlay tracks, add a layer and let the exciting world of multi-layered video start to echo in your work.

The Bottom of the Canyon

You wanted to experience the Grand Canyon up close and personal and the mule ride seemed like a really good idea. You're glad you have the experience and you're sure you'll feel great about the whole thing, just as soon as your rear end stops hurting! It's a reminder that most benefits come with a price. Yes, you can now put nine or even 90 moving pictures on your screen simultaneously. The downside comes when you realize that you need to shoot nine (or 90) times as much footage to fill the screen.

This may not be a concern if you're working on a wedding or a special event or if you spent a week on some Greek Islands and you want to compress hours of raw footage into a tightly edited few minutes. But if you're shooting EFP (electronic field production) style, where you go and set up each shot and roll a single camera, running three or four shots on screen simultaneously can burn through a lot of footage in a very short time.

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