Brewing Culture in the Malt Industry
For my Video Story I chose to create a narrative story segment that includes a section of an interview. This video focuses on the culture within the Malt Industry and explores the passionate people who create it.
Check out my draft below. Click here if the embedded video is not working. I look forward to your feedback!
Inspiration
After interviewing a coworker for our audio project, some her answers gave me inspiration for this project. I knew I wanted to incorporate a section of her interview, and I also wanted to briefly discuss the company industry and its quirky people.
To accomplish the heartfelt yet fun vision I intended, I planned to include pictures and video of the company’s exterior, clips of the interior that speak to its history along with people in the industry and various video of the product.
Filming Process
To the field! Not the barely fields unfortunately…
On a couple trips into work I took video of the exterior of the plant and General Offices. I also took video inside one of the older buildings. One of the office buildings was originally a Taproom, from when employees were allowed to drink on premises. In the Taproom, there are old paintings and other memorabilia, along with a collection of beer bottles. This film session makes up most of the building and interior shots included in this video.
The video of malt and beer was taken in my backyard with the assistance of my boyfriend. Once we had a sunny day, I collected some recruiting equipment (GWM table cloth and malt samples), a construction stool, beer and two glasses.
The glasses are actually from an Oregon Brewfest from years ago. Great Western Malt and Country Malt Group often sponsor local brewfests, so their logos are on the glasses used in these shots, which I thought was a nice touch.
Our brewfest enthusiasm paid off!
By the end of all these sessions I probably had at least fifteen to twenty minutes of video.
Gathering Other Materials
Before beginning the editing process, I also sifted through photos that I thought I could incorporate. Some of the photos used in this video were actually taken as we were working on our Graphic Design Project. I also found pictures I had taken last year at the Pink Boots Brew Day.
Malt Innovation Center- Vancouver, WA 
Malt Innovation Center- Vancouver, WA
Pink Boots Society
If you don’t know… Pink Boots is a society founded by an employee of Great Western Malt to promote the community of women working in the beer industry. Every year, near International Women’s Day, Pink Boots Society members across the world gather together with local women in the industry to brew together and share their industry knowledge.
It is probably one of the most fun work days.
One picture was used from this year’s Pink Boots Brew Day that was not taken by me. This picture was taken by a Pink Boots Day participant and was shared with my company for use.
Audio
Once I had gathered most of the video material I intended to use, I started working on the audio. First, I decided what section of interview I wanted to use from the interview conducted with Tabby Decker. Once I knew what section of her interview I wanted to focus on, I drafted up the narration to surround it.
To the left you can see the audio and video from the interview being combined with the narration. Here I also marked the sections of the interview I intended to use for the video.
Narration
I recorded myself using a recording app on my cellphone somewhere between five and ten times. Each time I recorded the narration with slightly different fluctuations of my voice.
In at least 50% of my recordings you can hear my dog’s collar jingling in the background, or them commencing a howling match… so those recordings were automatically out.
Combining Audio
I imported the interview with Tabby and the narration I recorded into Premiere. Using the markers and the mark in/mark out tool I selected the section of Tabby’s interview I intended to use. While editing the narration audio to align well with Tabby’s interview, I edited out sections of audio using the razor tool and marked which sections of Tabby’s interview would include video of her speaking.
The volume of Tabby’s interview was increased to 6.05dB. The volume of the narration is -0.00dB.
Music
The music selected is Paradise by Ikson, found on Sound Cloud. I reached out to @Ikson for permission to use this track in this project. The music fades in and out using a Constant Power fade. Throughout the interview the music volume is -32dB.
Editing Process
Once all the audio was aligned roughly the way I wanted it, I began organizing the video.
Storyboard
To begin compiling the video, I first developed a storyboard. The storyboard was a great tool to organize my ideas, even though I ended up straying from it. Here you can see what my initial storyboard looked like.
I first selected which building shots I wanted to use as my establishing shot. I then identified areas of the audio I wanted to be associated with pictures of people versus pictures of malt or beer.
I added a section for the introduction title and ending credits, although the title was still in the works at this time.
Video Splicing
Next I imported all of the video and picture files I intended to use in the sequence. Before adding any videos to the sequence, I organized all videos and pictures into bins and named them.
I went through each video and selected 5-10 seconds. Using the mark in/mark out tools. I added these sections to the video sequence along with the pictures I selected.
Once the videos and pictures were all placed in the sequence, I used the razor tool, slip tool and ripple edit tool to adjust the lengths of the videos. This step took awhile. I wanted each shot to be roughly the same length and to correspond with certain pieces of the audio. During this stage I also changed the order of some of the sequence.
Effects
Once the sequence had the narration, interview, music, videos and pictures aligned and the lengths edited, I added the introduction, ending, and text. Then I started playing with various effects.
Introduction and Ending
For the introduction I added the text Brewing Culture in the Malt Industry. I gave this a cross dissolve effect as it fades into the dip to black at the beginning of the first establishing shot.
At the end of the video I added credit text after the last video dips to black. This text fades in and out with a cross dissolve effect.
Interview Effects
A cross dissolve transition is used at the beginning and end of the video of Tabby. The cross dissolve transition is also used on the entrance and exit of the text of her name and title. This text intentionally dissolves out right before the music picks up again and the interview segment is about to end. This text follows the Lower Third technique.
The scale, position and rotation of this video clip was also edited to better follow the Talking Head technique.
Scaling and Position
There were several clips that were adjusted by changing the scale and position, or by rotating them to be more level. Every picture that was used had to be adjusted to better fill the frame. I also considered the Rule of Thirds as these adjustments were made.
More Transitions
Next, I spent some time playing with video transitions. After the video transitions were added, I also adjusted the length of some of the transitions (making the transitions longer or shorter) depending on the two clips.
The video transitions used throughout this draft are:
- Dip to Black
- Cross Dissolve
- VR Light Rays
- Iris Box
- Additive Dissolve
- VR Iris Wipe
- VR Spherical Bluer
- Film Dissolve
This is what the sequence looked like after all the effects were added:
That’s a Wrap
I look forward to your feedback on this draft! Cheers!
Citations
Music:
1. Ikson. “Paradise.” 2018. https://soundcloud.com/ikson/paradise-free-download?in=jada-garrick-1/sets/free-to-use-music.
Picture:
1. Pink Boots Society Collection. “untitled.” March 2020. Vancouver, WA.
Matching Talent 
Hello Rachelle,
Your video was easy to watch and very enjoyable to watch!
So many good things to talk about with your work, but for this feedback I’ll focus on these areas:
• You hit it out of the park with your opening title “Brewing Culture in the Malt Industry” and tying that together with your ending “These people brew culture like no other”. Loved it.
• You had a good diverse selection of shots to use in your video. I saw a lot of the 3×3 method in there.
As far as suggestions for improvement:
• I do like the background music you selected and think it’s appropriate, however I think the volume can be lowered slightly to make sure it’s not too distracting
• At :19 seconds when you say “These groups make up United Malt Group” and you talk about United Malt Group for a moment, I felt like you could have a quick logo or picture of that name because the corresponding shovel picture didn’t match with the dialogue.
Nice work Rachelle! The bubbly beer video was my favorite – great shot!
LikeLike
Hi Rachelle,
Your video was nicely executed. Your narration was in depth and your voice-over was clear and pleasant. I like how there was variety of different video footage, photos, and an interview with your coworker. The shot of the bubbles from the brew at 1:30 was aesthetically pleasing. The background music was charming, and it fit well with your video. Your blog post was detailed and organized.
My suggestions for improvement are:
• 0:00-0:03 – Add color or a background photo relating to Great Western Malt or brew to make the title page pop.
• 1:38-1:58 – Move the text higher so it’s not too low.
• 2:23-2:25 – Change the font in the credits to something simpler and cleaner and include “Tabby Decker” in your credits.
• 1:38-2:03 – Enhance the quality of the video of Tabby because it does not match the quality of the rest of your video. Here is a video tutorial that I found: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oq7bgHUVPE4. Or you can ask your coworker to re-record the video in a higher quality.
Well done! Good luck on editing your final video! 😊
Best,
Joanna
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks for the great feedback! That youtube video you shared was super helpful!
LikeLike
Love the video, nice work!
I think you had a great subject, clear narration, and a good mix of both photos and videos for this project. I like your fun transitions, but they can be a bit distracting to the content. I would choose a few to use throughout the video so there is more consistency in the transitions.
At the 1:24 mark when you introduce the employee it would make it more personal if in the narration you said, her name or title before she begins speaking.
Also, I would change the font in the credit slide to make it cleaner.
As a former brewery employee, I was interested in your subject and your video was well produced.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You are totally right about the typography for the credits! Thanks for the feedback!
LikeLike
Hi Rachelle –
Great video! I enjoyed the way you were able to use many different elements to tell the story — music, photos, video, and an interview. I found myself tapping my feet to the music — it was upbeat and matched the pacing of your video. I only have a couple of suggestions:
— One thought is to consider changing the font type and color on the screen as the interview begins. The black color of the font blends just a little with the bottom of the screen.
— I love your music, but it might help separate your narration from it a little more by lowering the volume. I don’t think you need to lower it by much — I could hear everything you were saying — I just thinking lowering it by just a bit will make your narration stand out more.
Your video was fun and informational — I look forward to seeing the finished product.
Mikal
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks for the feedback! I agree with you about the volume of the music. I’m definitely going to adjust it!
LikeLike
Thank you all for the great feedback! I am definitely going to implement some of your suggestions! I really appreciate the specifics in the feedback each of you gave.
As for feedback to myself….
After some time away from this draft video, I am still mostly satisfied with the narration and integration of the interview segment. There are certainly some areas to improve still, however.
As for feedback to myself for this video draft project:
• I was also thinking of incorporating a picture of the United Malt logo in the beginning when the narration discusses the structure of the company, after receiving this feedback I will experiment with this.
• I am also considering changing the color of the title text, and I may use a classmate’s tutorial to alter the effects of the credit text.
• As some of the feedback indicated, I will also adjust the volume of the music.
• I might also slow down the “cheers” video at the end.
• When I watched the video again, I realized that the picture of Tabby is not aligned properly, so I will adjust this rotation and scale.
Thank you all for the feedback!
Rachelle
LikeLike