Collaborative videos - what's your process?

[jasper-isis]

Say you're talking to another editor, and you say, "hey, let's do a video together!" How do you actually go about the collab? Do you...

1] work on everything together, giving each other real-time feedback
2] divide up the song, each person editing only his/her part (but with betaing from the other)
3] leave everything up for grabs; each person claims a chunk when he/she gets an idea for it
4] something else?

And if it's #1, is it possible to pull it off without physically being in the same room?
How do you deal with, er, "creative differences"?

I haven't really worked on any (non-MEP) collabs since krzT and I made this video in 2004. We started by sitting down side by side and editing it together, which was cool but slow going. Betaing each other's work in real time, there's a tendency to want to perfect everything as you go along. So I guess it was hard for us to just throw something onto the timeline and go back to revise it later (whereas I'd have no problem doing that if I were editing alone).

After that initial burst of editing, we decided to just add to the project separately whenever inspiration hit. We made identical rips of the source material so that we could just pass the project file back and forth over the internet. This is a nice system because you get to build off of each other as the project grows, and it's possible to keep a history of the changes. But since Premiere doesn't have a "merge" option, we could only add to the project one at a time. It also potentially makes things hard when two people have ideas for the same section.

We did another video together, EPYC, but since it's structured like a MEP with separate "tracks" that we didn't really collaborate on, it's not exactly the type of collab that I'm asking about.

So, when you're making one video with one or more other editors, how do you make things work?


EDIT: attached an actual poll to this thread.

[JaddziaDax]

#2 worked for me last time i did one...

[Pas]

#2 about sums it up for me.

[AaronAMV]

2

[Niotex]

Closed thing you got there for me is #1. [I voted #4 nonetheless] Though I'm probably looking at it from a different perspective then most people here are. I haven't actually made a collab amv so I can't speak from experience. I do however have a strong opinion on collab's in this fashion.

When I see collab video's I generally expect people to "cover" or "compensate" for each others weak spots. This also includes speeding up compositing processes. Such as having one person prepare the background elements, another the foreground elements. And once those are complete move on to the next composition so the third person can mesh those two compositions together, while the other two work on the next section already. People wouldn't even have to be in the same room as long as they put all the resources on a central location such as a ftp. Even when meshing stuff together people don't seem to realize how flexible programs are these days with importing stand alone compositions. This method also means that if someone screws up on something or isn't as capable enough. It can be fixed by the other participants without allot of jumping through hoops.

I wish people would actually push this method though. I'd be all for it if I ever were to do a collab with people.

[jasper-isis]

Sounds like a good process, but it's also (almost purely) mechanical. Collaborations would be pretty boring if they were all mechanical. I'm wondering:

How would you make the creative decisions that get you to that point?
Does one person generally lead, with the other(s) mostly following that person's vision?
Do you toss around specific ideas and describe them to the others?
What if you have an idea, but it's really really hard to describe?
Would you make a demo first, or just plunge right into the compositing and hope that the result comes out as expected?
What if somebody else has a different idea for the same part?
What if nobody has any ideas at all?

[Amo-Chan]

When I did my collab, one person worked on it for a bit, sent it to the other, beta'd that section and added on to it...repeat. There were a few moments when we'd hop on messenger and figure some things out in real time though. All in all, it was pretty fun and I'm looking forward to doing another collab with her and others.
I was easier for me to do it that way, because sometimes I had more editing time or she'd have an idea for a part that I was clueless about...yeah, fun tiemz.

[Niotex]

Sounds like a good process, but it's also (almost purely) mechanical. Collaborations would be pretty boring if they were all mechanical.

I wouldn't say mechanical more so.. efficient.

How would you make the creative decisions that get you to that point?

Democracy is always fair game.

Does one person generally lead, with the other(s) mostly following that person's vision?

If you're dealing with a 2 man project then its strictly 50/50. Though I can see that when you are doing a 3 man or more project that you'd need a "team leader".

Do you toss around specific ideas and describe them to the others?

Thats pretty much how a "single track" collaboration would work. So you start off with a global idea of what you all want to get across. And from there on you sub divide every cut/composition. It would essentially be how you'd tackle an actuall video. Which is something I have been doing for my own stuff already.

What if you have an idea, but it's really really hard to describe?

Make a draft.

Would you make a demo first, or just plunge right into the compositing and hope that the result comes out as expected?

Drafting [demoing] stuff is always a must if you're doing more complex stuff. And generally once you get the idea across it would seem more then obvious that your other participants have some feedback of their own. Thus building and expanding on your draft.

What if somebody else has a different idea for the same part?

Democracy.

What if nobody has any ideas at all?

Then you shouldn't be doing a collab in the first place.

[inthesto]

Trick everyone into making an MEP and then get somebody else to put it together for me.

[mirkosp]

Is the info that comes out of this poll going to be used for the VCA, in order to dived non-meps from meps in a way that isn't just # of members? Oh well, either way, I personally think that #2 is what generally happens, although I can see #1 happening.