Pechakucha! (Black Panther)

[sholio]

I did the first challenge at vexercises this afternoon, and it was a lot of fun! (Also very hard to make myself follow the rules! I kept wanting to trim or recut the clips.)

Here are the instructions:

1) Pechakucha 2 ways

Create a video edit of exactly 60 seconds consisting of precisely 10 video clips from your chosen source text, each lasting precisely 6 seconds, assembled with straight cuts. Make two versions of your pechakucha, with 1 minute excerpts from two different songs as audio. Fade in and out on your audio at the beginning and end of the audio clip.

[Word to the wise: Most six second clips that you use are bound to have in-clip cuts--you don't have to go looking only for clips that have no internal cuts. But you can make those internal cuts work for you rhythmically or thematically etc!]

I decided to do a Nakia/T'Challa vid since I already have all of Black Panther imported into Final Cut and there are a relatively limited number of scenes featuring both of them, so I wouldn't have too many clips to choose from. I did cheat a little and let the last clip play out for an extra second or two so I could fit all of the Survivor chorus without losing the first few words of the lyrics.

Version 1: High On You (Survivor)

Watch on YouTube

Version 2: Amacala (Siphokazi)

Watch on YouTube

(Note: At the moment, for me, the streaming versions aren't playing, but they play fine if you click through on the Youtube link. Hopefully whatever glitch is causing it will go away soon.)

Comments

[kore]

Aww, these are great! I love Nakia/T'Challa.

[sholio]

Thank you! :) They're so sweet - one of my favorite MCU couples.

[kore]

QUEEN NAKIA <3 What is the song in the second one?

[sholio]

It's "Amacala" by Siphokazi, a South African singer who sings in Xhosa. The lyrics don't fit the characters, but the song is so pretty and it paced well to the images I already had.

[kore]

It sounded so fitting!

[sholio]

Yeah, I had decided ahead of time that I wanted one Western song and one Afropop song for the contrast, so I tried some different songs from my Afropop playlist 'til I got one that paced well to the same visuals as the Survivor song. I looked for a translation beforehand and couldn't find one, and it didn't occur to me until after I'd made and uploaded the vid that I could simply run the lyrics through google translate to find out what they are, at which point I discovered it's a cheerful, upbeat song ... about an abusive marriage breaking up. XD Oops.

Though fortunately, the middle part of the lyrics (the part I used) actually work reasonably well for someone coming home and starting their life over. It's just not really a love song. Oh well, next time I know to check the lyrics beforehand. It's such a gorgeous song, though!

[kore]

at which point I discovered it's a cheerful, upbeat song ... about an abusive marriage breaking up. XD Oops.

OH DEAR

Yeah, I remember the first couple of times I listened to Ane Brun's "Do You Remember," "What a happy upbeat song!" It's about a long term relationship fracturing. /o\

...Afropop playlist? Do you have a tracklisting? (Is it on Spotify?)

[sholio]

To be fair, there are quite a lot of songs in English that I never noticed the song was about, say, domestic abuse or rape until listening to the lyrics more closely and being like ".... oh."

...Afropop playlist? Do you have a tracklisting? (Is it on Spotify?)

It's in iTunes - I went through a phase about a decade or so ago when I was listening to a lot of African pop music and collected a bunch of music then. It's kind of a mess and has a bunch of stuff in there that doesn't fit the theme; maybe I could post some songs to DW or something? Most of them are probably on Youtube; that's how I found most of it in the first place. :D

One of the things I like about the videos for these songs is that you see a lot of the urban, stylish side of Africa, which you don't see in the media much here.

[madripoor_rose]

Wow, both are really cool. Knowing nothing about viding, that sounds like a difficult challenge!

[sholio]

Thank you! :D It was really challenging, especially getting two songs to pace to the same set of images.

[brightknightie]

Just watched the "High on You," loved it to pieces and am grinning hard.

(Survivor seems to have an endless supply of songs that fit and enhance fandoms and characters I love.)

[sholio]

Awwww, thank you so much! :))))

Survivor are fun to vid to; their songs have a pacing I enjoy.

[cornerofmadness]

These are fantastic.

[sholio]

Thank you! :)

[cornerofmadness]

You're welcome

[goodbyebird]

Awww this put a smile on my face.

[sholio]

Thank you!! :)

[rissabby]

Good work! You really made me want to see the movie again. And, the vids and the comments are inspiring me to look into more and broader music.

[sholio]

Thank you! ♥ I really love that movie. And I like pointing people to new music, too!

... btw, I am by NO MEANS an expert on African pop (I just got into it for a few years back in the middle 2000s) but someone above was interested in it too, so I could post some Youtube to some of the songs I like, if people want me to do that!

[leesa_perrie]

Great vids! :D

[sholio]

Thank you! :D

[bonibaru]

These are amazing!

[bonibaru]

I kept wanting to trim, move things around, cut on the beat, transition, ugh ugh ugh it was really hard to get out of my picky habits, lol. But I sort of enjoyed the self imposed limits too, and trying to work with internal cutting in order to get my beat timing fix lol.

[sholio]

Thank you! :D And hahaha, I KNOW RIGHT??? It was SO hard not being able to adjust clips or do finer-grained cuts. But it was also kind of relaxing, once I got into it; it really lets you calm down and not worry about making every transition perfect.

As someone who both writes fic and vids, I think there is a lot of pressure on vidders to do things "right", a lot more so than on fic writers. There's more support for fic writers to do things sloppily and carelessly just for fun, to experiment and play around for a fun-but-imperfect end product. I really enjoy having a space to do that for vids, where playful, less-than-perfect vids are welcome and encouraged. <3

[naye]

These are both wonderful! ♥ I was smiling hugely through both of them - the first one is so amazingly shippy! And the rhythm and beats of the second (South African?) song were perfect. I love how it ends on the kiss and upwards pan, too.