Introduction
Welcome to my page! I am Will Bettinger and this is my showcase website. In this website I will showcase my Zenith project as well as other projects and activities that I have done this year. This is my first year in Freestyle Academy. I chose to study film. Outside of Freestyle I spent my school year on Mountain View High School’s Football and Lacrosse teams, (where I rode the bench), playing classical guitar, reading about history, and hanging out with friends. My post graduation plans are to attend Brigham Young University where I will study Economics and Music, but before then I will serve a two year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Paris, France.
I spent the beginning part of this year in Freestyle learning how to use cameras, lighting, audio, and how to make a narrative film. My narrative film is currently in postproduction. My main goal in Freestyle was to learn the skills needed to create a music video. I am a classical guitarist and I have a lot of experience performing but minimal experience in making a stylistic music video. My videos in the past had been unedited, plain competition pieces. My goal with my Zenith project was to get valuable filmmaking experience that I can use throughout much of my guitar career.
The two songs that I chose to play were Danza Brasileira by Jorge Morel and Vals no. 4 by Agustin Barrios Mangore. These were songs that I had played before and had brought back for the video. I practiced the songs and then recorded them in Freestyle’s recording studio through the application ProTools. Using my basic editing skills I spliced together parts from many takes into a completed audio file. I then added fades to connect the takes. Finally I added basic plugins like EQ, Compression, DeEsser, and D-Verb to my ProTools file.
With completed audio files, I then started to film. My goal was to have many different camera angles at many different locations. The primary focus of my videos is the audio, but I still wanted to have the visual component be engaging with viewers. I switched locations and time of day to change the color and feel of certain sections of the music. Below is my showcase video and my showcase reel, as well as links to the full guitar videos.
Conclusion
I consider the videos to be a success. The guitar playing sounds good, and the visual elements of the film are engaging. I also got valuable experience using ProTools as well as Adobe Premiere that will help me on future projects.
That said, there are many things that I could have done better in the production process. I should have practiced the pieces more and improved the level of the recordings that I spliced from. I should have made a stronger effort to have a consistent tempo across all takes and the visuals. Both audio recordings have sections where the tempo doesn’t exactly line up and where it is somewhat obvious that it has been edited. From what I have learned about using ProTools, editing should not be used as a crutch when making a recording. Another thing that I should have done was to get more practice using plugins. My inexperience with plugins prevented me from using them to fully polish my audio. On future projects I will be more careful in both tempo and plugins to really get an awesome recording.
On the visual side of the videos there are also things I could have done better. I could have had better multi-cam angles to interest the viewer in my hands in the guitar playing. I also could have been more mindful of color and of the framing of shots in connection to the motifs of the songs. In the planning of these videos I had considered having storylines and b-roll to go along with the music. I ultimately decided against it because I didn’t want to distract from my guitar playing, but in future videos I would want to consider bringing in more visual elements to catch the audience’s attention.
Being in Freestyle Academy has allowed me to grow as a student, an artist, and as a person. Freestyle is full of extremely talented and driven people from a wide range of backgrounds. I am grateful for the opportunity that I had to spend this year with these amazing students. Working with them and learning about their interests and passions has introduced me to a whole new world of creativity. I also have made a lot of unforeseen friendships with my peers. Freestyle’s teachers are amazing. They really teach and care an awful lot about their students. The teachers are compassionate but also really push students to develop their talents. Freestyle has prepared me for real life in ways that the normal high school experience had not done. Projects in Freestyle are often really big and allow a lot of freedom to be creative. This was initially a struggle for me, but as the year has gone on, my skills at setting my own goals and activating my creativity have improved. I highly recommend attending Freestyle Academy to next year’s juniors and seniors.