Andy Griffith and Barney on Sermonspice.

Here’s a video that I made for sermonspice.  A good and easy way to make videos for church use is using clips that are in the public domain.  My dad’s a big Andy Griffith fan, so this one’s for him!

Download here: http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/22624/sin—the-loaded-goat

A New Effect

This was an especially fun video to make.  The concept was really easy.  I could’ve thrown it together in no time, with simple transitions, etc.  It might not have mattered overall, but I wanted to add to the production value.  I wanted to try out a different method of transitioning that doesn’t even use transitions.  I didn’t read anywhere how to do this, but since I’d seen effects similar to this, I was able to concieve how to do it.

Basically every slide was designed in photoshop to fit the screen.  But then I copied each slide into a huge canvas on photoshop so that the 16 slides or so are all in there with a black line between them.  Then in Premiere (my editing system) I centered at 100% scale on one of them.  After the time for the still image, I dragged the clip out one more second, but cut it so that I have a one second clip by itself.  At the beginning of that clip I ensured that all the keyframe settings are equal to the end of the clip before, then at the end of the 1 second, I centered on the next image that I want to use.  During that second the path that it takes is pretty random, but to mix it up I added rotation, and 3D tilt on one of them, paths that make it studder, etc.  I tried to be kind of randomn, but intentional about it.  It’s definately an effect not achieved by any marketed transition effects.  It was easy and fun, and I’m glad that I could pull it off, even with my limited animation skills.

Enjoy this funny countdown of Church Bulletin Bloopers!

Download: http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/22723/church-bulletin-bloopers

You see a Nativity…I see a worship background

Our church has this beautiful Nativity scene set up in our foyer, so I made it into a worship background.  It was funny, the owner of the Nativity didn’t even recognize it when he saw it up on the screen behind the song lyrics on one song.  I guess it did it’s job and didn’t distract.  Expect now, he’ll look for it.  Oops.

Incedently the word “nativity” simply means general place and time of birth.  So my Nativity is Santiago, Chile.  Mary’s nativity was Nazareth.  Jesus is so influencial that his nativity is now interchangable and synonymous with the word nativity.  You say nativity you automatically think of Jesus’ nativity in Bethlehem over 2000 years ago.  Wow. 

Also, there is a bunch of things wrong with our traditional Jesus-nativity scenes.  See my video quizes and you’ll pick up on some of them.  But oh well!  Que será será.

My Early Christmas Deals

One of my dear family members, who shall remain nameless, has made it know that all this blog does is make a “video center”.  SHE does not realize that this is a production blog and a how-to type of resource.  But she has reminded me to become more real on this blog, which is a fundamental of blogging, I guess.  So here I strive to add a more personal touch, in a whole new category new to this blog site called “personal”.  And it’s got some how-to in it as well.  Anyway…

I’ve fared pretty well this year for Christmas, I’m happy anyway.  Emily (my wife) and I decided not to give ourselves any presents this year except for stocking stuffers.  Instead we gave out several micro loans through kiva.org.  But I still got some b-day and xmas money and here’s what I got:

First thing is kind of funny.  As a pastor I know that machismo is a baaad thing.  But in a good pure fashion, I consider myself a macho man.  I’m a guy’s guy and all, but I thought a good home improvement thing would be (drum roll…you already see the picture anyway) A SHOWERHEAD!  Here you see the old one, in which many of the holes are corroded, and the new one.  It’s so exciting!  I don’t have to duck when I take a shower now.  This lovely unit has two different settings and is up high!

In this next pic you see that I got a Smartsound Album and free Sonicfire Pro, whatever that is.  The Smartsound albums are perfect for video soundtrack, but usually cost $99 bucks.  This really great one called PS10 Progress was on sale for $25.  Also I got the Universal Groove Kit from Sonic Reality with over 5000 loops in wave format for music creation @ 60% off.  I got 5 sets of guitar strings with a strobe on-string tuner on clearance.  And I got a new grip for my raquetball raquet.  The tennis balls are not for tennis they are for the last thing that I aquired.

While at the home depot getting our new showerhead, I also picked up four long pvc pipes.  These were for the construction of a track for a tripod camera dolly.  On the feet of my tripod went (you guessed it…maybe) the tennis balls.  It worked pretty well on my first test!  See for yourself.

Oh, and merry christmas!!

 

FishXpressions Christmas Media

Here’s my Christmas media that is currently active on the site:

http://www.sermonspice.com/bundle/19731/nativity-loops-bundle

http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/22264/name-that-christmas-carol 
http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/21405/bible-based-christmas-quiz
http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/21499/christmas-traditions-quiz
http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/21399/bible-based-christmas-quiz
http://www.sermonspice.com/videos/21609/christmas-traditions-quiz–countdown-
There also should be a Christmas quizes bundle with one loop and both quizes in both formats all for $20, but I don’t have the link for it yet.

Stock footage: https://www.pond5.com/stock-footage/293151/christmas-tree-timelapse.html

Worship Media Christmas Gift

My December article in Christian Video Mag is a Christmas gift with links to all sorts of free media for church use.  After I wrote and submitted it, as I previously blogged, www.worshiphousemedia.com decided to give away a free video every day until Christmas, so don’t miss out on that.

My article: http://www.christianvideomag.com/cv2008_12/cv2008_12gfish.pdf

Whole issue:

http://christianvideomag.com/cv2008_12/cv2008_12.pdf

The Reverend Entertains!

Tonight I was the entertainment for the Brownsville Winter Residents Club.  It was a good crowd.  I put on a 45 min. show or so.  Got some variety, comedy, poetry, the whole 9 yards.  It was well recieved.  I thought the check was ironic.  It’s written to the “Reverend Gregory Fish” and in the memo for the reason of “entertainment”.   So the reverend entertains!

Well, I think that only God should be revered, but oh well.  I had my son sing a bit, then I did the Texas version.  He was kind of hard to hear; I’ve boosted the audio.  He is saying “Grandma fed to me 5 layer cake, 4 black eyed peas, 3 meatballs, 2 scoops of rice, and a big giant brocoli tree, or something like that.

Shoal Creek Footage

lo-fi sample of new footage from shoal creek

it might look better if you go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQQUlIDfzNo and select “watch in high quality” which for youtube is still not very high quality.

Name that Christmas Carol!

I get asked sometimes, “When do you have time to make videos?”  The answer: yesterday I threw this one together working on it a little in the morning, during my lunch hour, and a little after work.  Here it is!  Have fun trying to figure out which carol or song each one is.

Our Tree Going Up in 10 seconds