Hey Everyone! So, through a twist of fate, I'm left home this Easter long weekend, and with some time on my hands. As I was getting an itch to play, I figured I'd set up the kitchen table and do a little game against myself to play around with a few units, maybe take some pictures. With everything on the table, and about to begin, I remembered that my little old camera could do videos. Playing with the camera settings, it claims it could do 1080p recording, (but I don't think I agree with that claim). So I decided to run a mock battle report filming to trial out the experience as the one doing the filming.
It is my ultimate goal to start my own video battle report series. I've loved watch the likes of Miniwargaming, Table Top Tactics and Striking Scorpion to name a few. Each series has it's own life and style and I'm inspired by these to try my hand at it. Having been now to Miniwargaming's Studio in Welland, Ontario, and played some games with them, I've had the chance to see how they do it behind the scenes, which gives me some basic ideas on how I can do it. There is a lot more to it than just pointing a camera at a game table and just pressing REC. There were times when I filmed my episodes where we had to plan out what was being said, what actions we were going to take, and how we were going to explain it.
Trying my hand at it this weekend, I definitely learned a few lessons.
#1) I need to be mindful of how I talk. I start almost every clip with "So...". What I like about other's series is that you get an idea of they're personality when they talk. It probably takes them a while to find their groove, and it will be the same for me. In my clips, I don't feel my personality. I sound a little confused and not sure what I'm talking about.
#2) When to film and not to film. As this was a trial run, I'm still trying to find out how I want to film my battle reports. One of the hard parts doing a report where you play against yourself is that you don't have someone else doing anything or able to help by holding the camera. I don't find it to hard to roll some dice, but for the most part, it was easier by the end to just film a recap of the events in a phase of the game than to film the events unfolding.
#3) Balance the armies. This is one that I knew was going to be an issue going in, but I was just playing around anyways. In my mock game, I had my Imperial Guard army out numbered 2:1 by the Tyranids. Seems like an epic event, with an under siege Guard force having to fight for their lives against a foe that out numbers them. What happened though was that there were many units that did nothing for the Tyranids and some that did all the work. The poor Guard got thrashed and it didn't make for a very interesting fight.
#4) Knowing the rules. Every host of their own series out there gets comments constantly about rules they'ed missed, forgotten or down right got wrong. There were many times playing the game where if I wasn't 100% sure, I looked it up just to be safe. Learned a bit too!
5#) Software, gear and editing. First off, there was little editing done to this first attempt. It was all the clips slapped together and a soundtrack slapped right on top of it. But it really is something else when you think that some of the guys out there film a report and it takes a few months some times before it shows up. That's why the quality is usually really good. I know I'll have to get some decent video editing software at some point. It took me nearly an hour or two to realize that I didn't have the windows movie maker on my computer, and that the "free" editing software I downloaded was not really "free" and that I'd have to buy it to finish the video. Plus I already knew I needed a better camera for recording. The one I use is meant for pictures and does a good job at that. But It's not a filming camcorder. I've been eyeing a few for a while now. And I'll need a bigger memory card as the little old 2GiB one I have only holds about a turn's worth of footage before I need to run to my computer and dump the files over then wipe it and start again.
So, for your viewing pleasure, I present my first mock battle report. This is by no means a high quality product, but I want it to serve as a piece of my hobby development that I will look back to after continuing to improve to see where I first held that camera and tried my hand at making a battle report.
Czar Ziggy
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