Phone Movies

Before we left for Boston I decided I would use the trip to experiment with my new phone. It would be invaluable in getting us around the city. Knowing which T to take without wring our hands at posted maps was awesome. Besides being a map, it was my gaming buddy, got us around PAX and feed us, but I wanted it to make movies too. Like I've said, life in the future is good.

I decided I would capture and edit a short film about our trip. There would be lots to see and do and sharing those experiences through video is more appealing. We own a semi fancy HD camera that has a small body, but taking it in and out of a messenger bag the whole trip is a pain. Having the phone in my pocket to take out and record in an instant is a big draw. I've edited 5-6 movies on the computer in the last year. We are both comfortable with the process, so editing on the phone was really just for geeky curiosity.

The product of that experiment is going to end up in two parts, but you can view the first already. Experiment complete I can now reflect on the experience here. Capturing video with the phone can be a shaky affair naturally. Learning to stand with a good base, pace my breathing and holding the phone with a feather touch all helped. The quality was no where near what our HD cam can capture, but I didn't expect it to be. That is the trade off I am willing to make. Vertical video is out too, as it doesn't play nice with any player on the web. We are a horizontal society.

As for editing, the interface of iMovie is great. Cutting and cropping through gesture and touch work really well. The big issue is performance though. I shot everything in 5-15 second intervals. Opting for lots of jumps to try and share a lot of story. Around two plus minutes of edited video the app slowed to a crawl. Taking a second or more between each action. It is why I ultimately split the video into two days. Now that iMovie is a sunk cost though, it will be nice to have around to make quick edits to short video. I have tasted possibility and I like it. Given the current state though, my desktop will still have to do the heavy lifting for the foreseeable future.