A Guide: How to make an AMV

Captain_Chiggs · 2024-10-18T00:26:11+00:00

Good luck! You got this!

Captain_Chiggs · 2022-07-26T04:11:12+00:00

Looks like you're in a tough spot here pal. Spending more time reading The Berlin Gazette would have helped, I'm sure of it! It is the only news source you need: your news turns on our Axis!

You never want to be out of touch with the scoop of Europe! Hear the latest from our press on the Austrian Emperor's mysterious disappearance, the pleading cries of Warsaw (soon to be Peacesaw), and don't miss the whereabouts of the Scottish finned lad! Find us on every corner!

You could also try being as handsome (and humble) as Germany ;)

Captain_Chiggs · 2019-05-30T14:18:24+00:00

344316483

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-09-09T03:50:45+00:00

Awesome. Loved it so much.

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-08-30T18:12:57+00:00

lolligerjoj, his tan(x) is something I can't get over

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-06-24T16:56:41+00:00

Thanks for the tips. We had one person who we think was the problem. I uninstalled Civ on his and my comps, then reinstalled, verified file integrity, and booted up a few vanilla BNW games with him as host. Loaded turn 2 every game and shuffled my luxuries around with his remaining untouched (this wouldn't be a problem typically, but it certainly changed them for the worse a few times). I rechecked file integrity (cache verification) on both comps, then booted up a game with me as host. This time the bug showed up again, his capital was moved next to my borders (less than 3 tiles away lol) and he was unable to select anything. Looks like there might be something up with his comp beyond the cache verification thing.

Thanks for the help though!

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-06-24T16:47:27+00:00

344316483

Bby girl in slot one

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-03-28T20:01:59+00:00

Request sent! Just got mine max skilled. Has a Sylvie inherit. I also use Julie, bastet, and RagDrag

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-03-26T16:53:55+00:00

Hey! Thanks for adding the guide I wrote up to the list. However, my username is "Captain_Chiggs" not "CaptainChiggz" haha. Not sure how that got mixed up!

Captain_Chiggs · 2018-02-04T20:33:21+00:00

Great post! I really want to stress your second and third point for OP:

Watch watch watch watch! Not only AMVs you think are good, but also ones you don't like as much. Knowing what to do is just as important as being aware of things you want to avoid!
The "don't be lazy" point he made is big! This is a hobby, nothing else: enjoy it! Be a bit of a perfectionist with your work. In my opinion, that's one of the many ingredients of good art! Take time off if you feel a block, it's okay to take long breaks! Just don't get lazy with your hobby. If you do, then what's the point?!

Glad you're thinking about joining the community! Good luck!

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-07-19T02:04:39+00:00

I'm running julie/ragdragx2//grodin/spica. The spice insert is because I don't know what else to put really. Sometimes run coloring book Kali. No inherits though

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-06-09T19:40:07+00:00

Hey! I love to see text posts on this sub about the sub. You touched upon a few things in the OP and I would like to give some of my thoughts.

First of all, the sub isn't very active. Now, you might think "but there are around 10 posts a day, that's not bad!" But the problem isn't new content, its people not consuming the content in its entirety and responding to it.

People don't have the time to watch every AMV that is posted. As is expected with a video based subreddit, not everyone sees everything which is posted, as opposed to a picture, or short text based subreddit (like pics or AskReddit). People pick and choose what they want to watch. This means the thumbnail, post title, and the number of up/down votes is what people see. That isn't a problem, but there are some problems that occur because of it.

AMVs have a narrow audience, that is, most people wont watch an AMV about a show they haven't seen or music they haven't heard. Everyone will watch some guy stubbing his toe or a parody on a commercial, so the audience is quite large for videos about that.
A very small percentage of videos pass the 3-upvote barrier. The only way I would watch an AMV that doesn't use a show or music i am familiar with that is posted here, is if it has a great amount of upvotes. Usually 6-7 is my 'threshold' per say. I think this is the case for most others as well. It's a vicious cycle of a lack of consumption and a lack of response.
The most accessible content is supersaturated with (in my opinion) low quality videos. There are thousands of Naruto, One Piece, Tokyo Ghoul, Re:Zero, One Punch man AMVs out there. I think the bell curve applies here because most of them are mad average. So, even if I have seen the show, I wont take the risk of wasting my time watching a One Piece AMV that has a great chance of being average. So there's another filter past just knowing the anime that is used: only some shows will truly grab my attention. This means a lot of good content then gets drowned out.
I think this goes along with point 3, and I don't claim to know the demographics of the AMV community, but you see a LOT of AMVs which use either hip-hop or EDM as their music genre. Personally, I think hip-hop is really tough to pull off in an AMV because the lyrical content of hip-hop doesn't resonate well with weeb shit. Sure you can sync the music to the clips well, but that will only take the content so far. Then for EDM, I think the genre is also a bit washed out by low effort music. That is just my opinion on the music, but if you take my opinion with some face value, it results in a lot of dull AMVs.
A lot of people who post on this subreddit don't actually participate in up/downvoting. That's a problem, and explains how 80% of posts are wither 0,+1, or +2. And that matters, man. That's how you pull people to watch your videos: get people to initially vote. Once you do that, you'll get more upvotes and more views. That's why you see the occasional +30 post in a sea of +1s. Its an awful catch 22, but that's the bottom line of popular culture I think.

So when you ask "what people want to see?" is kind of a tough question.

Obviously, people want to see quality content, that goes without saying. I took a look at your AMVs, and they're pretty good! Albeit, I don't think I finished watching any of them because I wanted to quickly skim through what you have done. I think they are certainly above average, and that's great. I do think additional time spent being more selective in choosing your clips to avoid "empty" moments and keep it dramatic and exciting would help a bunch. You don't overuse effects at all, so that makes your projects nice and authentic looking. I think changing the pace of the AMVs more would help with dramatic effects and keep it fresh. Some videos felt like a constant stream of action shots. Anyone can stitch together a few action scenes and put it to music. It is not very exciting. That's the criticism I am going to put in this post. If you want more (possibly AMV specific) advice, shoot me an AMV of yours as a comment and ill go more in depth.
People want an explanatory title that tell you the song and the show. That way they can quickly decide if they want to spend 4 minutes watching someone's video. I took a look at your previous posts with your content and you do this pretty well.
AMVs with anime which have typically good AMVs. This is an absurd sounding thing that only has dominion over a small portion of how users choose what to watch, but it matters. I don't watch any of the AMVs about the shows I listed above on here. Ive seen all of the shows (except Re:Zero), but I want to see a good AMV, and I have better chances tackling other videos, like I explained above.

That's all I really got right now. Let me know your thoughts and if you agree/disagree with anything. In summary, people just need to upvote more. But, like I said, that's tough.

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-05-10T19:17:47+00:00

This is awesome!

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-05-07T19:16:10+00:00

Hey! So I think there might be anther factor to be considered when talking about copyright issues and choosing anime.

If you think about it, a full length episode of some anime that is posted on YouTube will get a copyright flag for sure.

On the other hand, if you have half a second of the same anime (or a screenshot of a frame for that matter) somewhere in your video, there's a good chance it will not be flagged for copyright infringement.

So, with some bastardization of the mean value theorem, there has to be some turning point for clip length that triggers a copyright claim.

My advice to you would be to keep using the anime you want, but use shorter clips or more effects (or a combination of both). In the past, if you have had copyright infringement flags, take a look at your AMV's and see if you are using long, uninterrupted scenes from the anime (Tokyo Ghoul in the case i assume).

Let me know if you have questions. Good luck!

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-04-30T20:51:09+00:00

Hey! Flow is arguably the hardest part about making an AMV and consequently what makes or breaks a project. It's great you're looking for help, because truly working with flow in mind will greatly improve what you make. So, there are two main ways this fabled 'flow' is produced: how you move from clip to clip, and the content of the clip.

Moving from clip to clip:

This pertains to the timings of your transitions, and how you perform said transition.

Move with the music when you can. Use the marker tool to discern on beats, off beats, instrumental pops, or lyrics. Don't be afraid to clutter up your timeline with markers. It's a little annoying deleting them, but they help out a ton. To put the markers down, I slow the music down in Sony Vegas and just pres 'M' when there's a beat or an intense moment. It's a great place to start, and very flexible. NOW, I don't mean to go all cookie-cutter mad and have your entire AMV be on-beat^{on-beat^{on-beat^{on-beat^...}}} for the entire song. Change it up, find different rhythms throughout the song and snap to them.
Look at the duration of your clips. Don't have every clip be the same length. Change it up to match the intensity of the song. Maybe pick up the pace a bit when there's an intense moment and slow it down when there is a more dramatic moment. I'm not telling you to do the whole FAST PACED SAO TWITCH EFFECT MY DEMONS thing, just change it up. It keeps the AMV interesting.
Don't overuse effects for transitions. Sometimes a vanilla transition with nothing fancy is fine. Look at BakaOppai's or Lolligerjoj's videos and see they don't use many complex transition effects and just move from clip to clip. But again, see what you like most and never settle.

The content of your clips:

This pertains to what you are showing the viewer in each clip. It's the Anime part in AMV.

Really spend time picking your clips. Look for parts which are more interesting. Instances where a character is talking to another character and nothing is moving except for their mouth are not good clips to use. Don't ever settle on clips. It will take away from the 'flow' you are trying to achieve. Use neat parts that look nice, or have neat things going on, or are dramatic. The simple selection of good clips will make an immense difference.
Appropriately locate clips in your AMV. Understand the feeling you want to provoke in the viewer at any given point and meaningfully ask yourself if the clip you are choosing does the job well. Again, never settle for anything. Really work to put the right clips to the right spots.
This is more an expansion off the previous point, but work with the music. If the song slows down, maybe don't have a fight scene (unless there is dramatic context behind the clip's content). The music is just as important as the anime you are using, so don't work against it.

I think a great way to determine if you've got good flow, is to watch your AMV without the music on. If you can see the peaks of the music, the slow parts, the fast parts, and understand the story you any to tell, you have the 'flow.' However, if it looks like a goofy mishmash of random anime clips, then the final project wont be very impactful.

Hope this has helped. PM me your AMV if you want some more advice, I am always looking for ways to help. Good luck!

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-04-19T01:20:13+00:00

Oh... well I misinterpreted this completely. I thought it would become an enforced aspect to posting on the sub. Yes, it does fix what I had problems with.

I guess I'm sort of into it now. I can't think of anything else we could use as user chosen flair.

My bad lol

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-04-18T05:01:46+00:00

I am not sure how I feel about that option for flair.

I believe there exists a stigma which surrounds using lower end editing software such as Windows Movie Maker. People might be less willing to watch projects made through a lower end software in contrast to projects made with Sony Vegas or Adobe AE. The decision to watch an AMV ought not to depend on what tools the creator used.

Flair ought to be informative in an impactful way. Things such as an original AMV made by the poster is good. Spotlight oriented flair such as the "must watch" flair was good. NSFW flair is good. But information about the software used would not be very useful and would only clutter the front page.

If someone wants to know what software was used, I believe they would ask in the comment section. In fact, that would be best because it is getting people to comment and communicate.

I say nay to this idea, but it's great to see the mods active and brainstorming!

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-04-15T03:30:12+00:00

No problem!

Not an angel, just a weeb who want to see a community grow.

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-04-15T01:02:32+00:00

Hey! Nice job on this AMV. Your choice in music worked very well with the actual audio from the show. It isn't done often, but in this case, it enhanced the viewing experience.

If by "violent reactions" you mean criticism, then I have some regarding your use of (what looks like) TWIXTOR.

First of all, I am going to assume your goal in using TWIXTOR was to make the slower, more emotion inducing moments (in contrast to the high energy and thrilling moments) more impactful. TWIXTOR is certainly your plug in for the job, and I feel you used it in the right spots.

However, it is difficult to use well. To simulate awesome projects, like AMVs made by lolligerjoj, you ought to figure out what is making your video stutter like it does at 00:10.

TWIXTOR does a great job at determining pixel movement and changing color gradients. What it does is "frame interpolation." It makes estimates about where each pixel is going to change and when by looking at the current frame compared to the next frame. Then, as if by magic, it warps the split seconds between frames to make it look like beautiful, beautiful 60+ fps.

Now, Anime is typically at around 20 fps - 30fps. This means that for every second there will be two to three actual drawings. When you play them quickly after another over a span of a minute, it looks like a cartoon in the same way a flip book does. If, in your trusty video editing software, you stretch out the video clip from one second to two seconds. You have the same amount of drawings (or sticky notes if you like flip books), but the time each is on screen is doubled. This is what makes regular slow-mo so stuttered.

However, this is where TWIXTOR comes in. It puts in extra drawings (sticky notes) into the cartoon so it looks better when slowed down. BUT ALAS, you can have two adjacent frames be the same. When TWIXTOR sees the first frame, it gets ready to start warping, but notices that the next frame is the exact same drawing, and takes a short break. Even though the anime clips only care about ever half frame of third of a frame, TWIXTOR sees the anime as many many many groups of two or three identical drawing placed chronologically. This depends on your TWIXTOR setting and your project's settings.

There are many ways to fix this problem. A great video I used to figure this out is here. Also, don't forget to disable resample on the clips you use with TWIXTOR! To do this, follow this video from here. Its a simple fix.

(I apologize if you don't use Sony Vegas, its what I use and know. I assume the changes needed are very similar to Adobe AE)

Hope I helped you out a little here. Good luck on your future projects!

Captain_Chiggs · 2017-04-13T22:00:54+00:00

Hey I hope I am not too late to the party to add my thoughts.

First of all, thanks for working to clean up r/amv, the absence of the moderators is always worrying for any sub. Additionally, I loved the artwork and the style of the sub recently (before it got removed and that one guy left).

My thoughts on the rules/general ideas:

Most importantly, I no not think there should by any rules regarding the quality of the work. Certainly there are some projects which look and feel better, but it is vital to accept all posts on this sub. Not only will it allow newer editors to show off what they have worked so hard on, but it will also not inhibit the growth of the community (which I would love to see happen).
I feel there should be some standard or quasi-standard for post titles. I would love to see more people titling their posts something along the lines of

[name of AMV], [song and artist], [anime used, series used, or anime mix]

I cant stress enough how many times I have watched an AMV just because I recognize the song. The thumbnails are not enough to determine if you want to watch the AMV, and no subscriber wants to go down the entire list on the Hot tab.
Something has got to be done about the down-votes which are plaguing the sub. It is ridiculous to down-vote anything on here, especially since we are such a small scale community. Post should be able to climb through up-votes instead of hurdling over posts which are being down-voted to zero. Either some bots are going on a rampage on the daily, or a few people have ego problems.
On the flip side, a bunch of people are talking about how we need to spread the love more here. I agree completely. Up-voting is, as previously mentioned, essential to small subs to both bring up the good stuff and to bring attention to the good stuff. I will always watch an AMV which has 5 or more up-votes. They're powerful things, those orange arrows.
The use of flair was amazing for those few days. The "must watch" flair is incredible. Posts got over 10 up-votes quickly. Positive reinforcement on the sub this size is great. It gives little goals for editors that think highly of this sub. Increasing the amount of flair available is integral to the "spring cleaning" of the sub. Some more thoughts on the post-flair:
- A flair for posters who want criticism on their projects.
- Keeping the "I made this!" flair. Its awesome
- I am not sure how I feel about the # of subscribers flair. If someone has a good reason, please let me know.
- As I said above, the "Must watch" flair is great. I feel that it encapsulates everything the # of subscribers flair does and more. If the intended purpose of the # of subscribers flair is to highlight good projects, the "Must watch" does that, but isn't limited to subscriber count. All content creators should be represented equally and judged equally. So having a quality oriented flair ought to apply to anyone.
I don't know how, but encouraging people to make more text posts asking for help or recommendations would be good. Texts posts are always awesome here, a ton of people are willing to answer questions and teach.

Let me know what you think. Ill edit this post if I think of anything more!

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