I began this video production class with little to no knowledge on editing via computer. I was very intimidated in the beginning because other students in my class had been editing videos for years. Our first assignment was for us to create a website over a specific beat or topic. I am a player on the Northwestern State Women’s Soccer Team, so I thought it would be interesting to give people a perspective that is not usually seen in collegiate athletics.

Making my website was difficult at first because I had never created something on the computer before. I knew this class was going to be full of firsts and that I would have to figure things out as I went. We began our websites by posting an excerpt on ourselves so that people viewing our websites could get to know us a little bit. After we made our first few posts, it was time to start editing videos. We began by making a five- shot sequence, which is basically five clips at different points edited together to capture the action being done. The five-shot sequence videos allowed us to be as creative as we wanted within specific guidelines.

Next, we learned how to do voice overs. Voice overs were not hard because it was the same concept as overlaying music; however, we had to make sure we were including all viable information so the audience could understand what was going on in the video. This type of video editing was probably my least favorite because it just was not very interesting to me. The level of volume was difficult to control in my voice overs sometimes depending on how close I held the microphone to my mouth. Other than that small inconvenience, voice overs were fairly easy.

Once we became comfortable using voice overs, our next assignment was to include an interview at the end. Interviews were exciting for me because I got to include my teammates into my website. This was a little challenging at first because some of my teammates did not want to be interviewed. But as time went by, more of my teammates wanted to be featured. Interviewing my team was really fun because I liked giving my audience a behind the scenes look at what it is like being a student athlete at NSU.

We continued to develop our editing skills by including multiple voice overs and interviews within one video. This actually was pretty stressful because each video needed to flow together and needed to have a basic lower third so you can see the name of the person being interviewed. The editing itself was not so difficult to do, but the overall process was tedious.

Once we got the hang of multiple videos strung together, we had to insert what is called a stand-up. At first I thought that meant stand-up comedy and I got worried because I am not that funny when put on the spot. However, a stand-up is when an anchor says a couple sentences to connect the two parts of a video. This is often seen in newscasting where people hold a microphone. I did not have a microphone, but sometimes we would roll up a piece of paper as a prop. Coming up with what to say for the stand-up was difficult because you have to connect the two videos in a short amount of words. This was a cool assignment to learn, and it helped me with my future projects.

In March we made the transition to online courses because of COVID-19. This was sad because I really enjoyed going to this class every week. Going home affected my subject of soccer since I was no longer with my team. I had to figure out a new way to provide good content for my website. My professor began assigning us video diaries to examine how this pandemic has impacted us. I had the idea to have my teammates and coaching staff send me a short clip explaining how their lives have changed since going home from NSU. I edited each of our videos together and posted it to my website. I thought it was a very unique way to incorporate my team even though we were not physically together. I received a lot of attention for this specific post because my professor sent it to some colleagues of hers. The NCAA Associate Director of Communications reached out to me to write a paper about what it has been like as an athlete to make this transition home in the midst of our Spring season. This is when I realized how creative this class has let me become and that I am able to do so much in video production.

I have had an amazing time learning and growing in this class and will continue posting on my website after this semester.