During my visit to BlogPaws® I explored one of the city’s highlights, Union Station.
A Smartphone Movie
As part of my goal of showing readers how you can create and edit your own movies on a computer or on a smartphone, I gave myself a challenge and both shot and edited this movie entirely on my iPhone 6.
I uploaded the finished movie using wi-fi later on. Remember, video uploads can be large. [Can’t see the Movie I added it below this post.]
Union Station
I kept the story simple. The aim – give viewers a glimpse at the Kansas City Union Station. Showing a little of it’s history and the current refurbishment project that is transforming it.
I am glad I shot the footage when I did. The following day massively tall cream coloured curtains were placed across the platform hall area for a private event obscuring the magnificent ceiling view. I would have missed a wonderful opportunity.
Lesson: Carpe Diem – Live for today! Grab your smartphone, take that footage NOW. Something is better than the frustrating nothingness of a missed opportunity .
The Union Station renovation is an unprecedented collaboration across state borders, city jurisdictions and funding channels. The result is a tremendous city feature that hosts exhibitions, cafe’s and the Famous Harvey’s Restaurant.
Oh and yes, trains run through here too. I also recommend the Parisi Cafe too, their coffee is amongst the best in Kansas City!
Smartphone Movie Challenges
A few points to ensure a successful smartphone movie project.
Top Smartphone Tips:
- Keep your shots steady. You can use a wall to brace against or walk forward carefully while recording.
- Make sure you can import, edit and then upload with your smartphone movie software. Don’t try to learn while you are in the middle of a movie project.
- Remember there may be extraneous noise when you are outside. Don’t panic, this can be lowered/removed during editing.
- Have a few royalty free or purchased music tracks for your film. I used AudioJungle.com part of the Envato stable.
- For my movie I used VideoShop. This app is not hard to learn and is available for iPhone and Android.
- Buy our Movie Making eBook (50% goes to Place for Cats Foster Network)
The iPhone VideoShop Screen
If you are unfamiliar with what a video editor can look like, here is a screen shot of Videoshop on an iPhone. You can see the beginning of our Union Station movie. You will see various elements that will become more familiar as you practice.
At the top is the timeline of available footage, a timer to show wherein the movie you are, and a text box can can be repositioned. Below the movie viewer you will see tools such as Text, Voice, and Trim. Other options are revealed by scrolling left and right.
The box highlighted in white at the bottom is the clip currently being edited. A block can easily can be clicked and dragged to a new location, and if you want to add a transition, it will appear to the right of the highlighted clip. Further options include changing speed, rotating and resizing, playing a clip in reverse and adding a backing track of royalty free or purchased music.
What are you Waiting for?
Grab your smartphone, or your DSLR if you have one, and just get out there and make a short movie with a simple story. Our movie is about 1 min. 15 seconds and tells you about Union Station. What will your one minute movie be about?
Marjorie with the
The Dash Kitten Crew
