Final Proposal

The Final Throw

Zane Thompson-Bradley

The purpose of my thesis is to showcase my video editing skills while being able to show and re-live the best of our Ultimate Frisbee season. I get the ability to combine the best catches, best defensive plays, and the best throws while adding my own spin on everything. The project will also feature the introduction announcements of  the captains and our team that we put on the field in clutch predicaments.

History of the field:

My idea is to create a highlight reel for the ultimate frisbee team showcasing our greatest moments in our season. For audio, there will be background music corresponding to the video, as for the songs you’ll have to wait and see. But, the inspiration for my thesis comes from my love for both playing and watching sports. Creating highlight reels for sports helps keep this passion going. It’s like rewatching a sport and cutting all the bad and boring parts out of it. I combined this with me discovering that I actually really like video editing during both the sophomore and junior spring and there you have it, my senior thesis and we will see how it goes.  My project combines the two things I love, which are sports and video editing and i’m super excited and nervous to see how it turns out.

My dream job is to create sport highlight reels for a company like ESPN or NBC but, if I end up just video editing for a company and helping them on the marketing side that’s ok too. Overall, I just want to video edit for a company that pays me well enough that I can travel at times and live in a nice average house. Although, if none of this happened, my backup would be doing photography for a company and helping with their advertising at their marketing branch.

People should be interested in my project because it won’t just be a highlight reel of the frisbee team but also, a visual of my overall skills and progress over the years in video editing, and it will be a sight to see. The video will drag in the users interests by showing them what’s so special about ultimate frisbee and what they have been missing by not playing or seeing it. Their interest will be peaked when they see that my thesis is about ultimate frisbee in the first place because not a lot of people even know about ultimate frisbee. On the other hand, when people think of ultimate frisbee they just think of people casually throwing a disc with no challenge or skill required. I also feel like a lot of people couldn’t imagine how you could get hype over the sport ultimate frisbee or even play it competitively in general.

My idea is interesting because it will also help bring more attention to the sport, get more people to want to play it knowing that they too could do all of these crazy things, and it will interest the people who have or have never thought about trying Ultimate Frisbee to actually give it a chance, and see how cool it looks. The idea will answer the questions, “is Ultimate Frisbee even a sport?”, “what do you even do in Ultimate frisbee”, and  “It has to be boring right, there’s no way throwing a frisbee can be made fun right?”. It aims to answer these questions by visually showing how fun Ultimate Frisbee really is, and why it takes being in shape and actual skill, plus practice, to be able to even be good at it.

My target audience are the people who have never played Ultimate Frisbee or never seen it being played, to pick up a disc, give it a chance, and see how much fun it is for themselves. I’m also targeting the people that don’t believe that ultimate frisbee is a sport and don’t see how you would require skills or technique to be good at it.

The way we ended up here today doing this project is that in sophomore spring I created a highlight reel from pictures a parent took at our Ultimate Frisbee games in high school. When I realized I had so much fun doing this even though it didn’t turn out super well, it was fun and interesting. Then during the summer, I was unable to get an internship so I focused on learning Premiere Pro on Youtube. The next summer I was able to get an internship at Homeworks Trenton and to confirm my actual passion for video editing. This prompted me to try and combine my two passions to make a highlight reel for the frisbee team. Previous technologies like Youtube, played a big role in my development in my area and helping me learn to video edit. I utilized Youtube to learn everything I know about Premiere Pro today. Of course, also having Premiere Pro and a laptop to constantly work on and practice helped me advance in my area.

The predictions were that I would only get better as I gained more experience and that turned out to be true. This came to my realization during my internship when I was met with multiple situations when my boss asked me to do something and I didn’t know how to. But, instead of giving up, I pushed myself and my boss motivated me to learn the things I didn’t know before, and as a result I came out way better than I was before I started the internship. Other methods I have taken up to help get better are looking at advertisements and youtubers very particularly in order to understand their editing types and to analyze how they utilize their transitions. In particular, I began watching other professional video editors that have lessons and that teach their subscribers how to use certain transitions or how to use the Premiere Pro as a whole. One youtuber named Orange83, taught me what Premiere Pro is, what tools it has, and how to take advantage of what the program has to offer. One of the best things about video editing is that if you don’t know how to do a certain transition or what to do with a clip you have. Their are thousands of videos of great video editors that can teach you how to do it in a really helpful and understanding way. As I continue video editing different projects and experimenting with different strategies and techniques I always find myself getting better and more able to find better ways to do things in a video.

Dorothy Spencer was a pioneer in video editing, she received three Oscars for best film editing for editing Cleopatra, Stagecoach, and Decision Before Dawn.  Another one is Michael Kahn, he edited Jurassic Park, Indiana Jones, Catch me if you can, and more. Lastly, Alan Edward Bell who edited all of the famous Hunger Game movies, The Amazing Spiderman, and Water for Elephants. My work will build off of these editors because I will look back on how they edited certain films and how they utilized their editing skills to bring the best out of the movie in order to help me improve my editing skills on my thesis along the way. Nathan Kolakovic is a great video editor who still filmes and edits for USAU to this day, I will definitely look at his videos and see what I can change in mines compared to his to help them look better. I have also been able to get in touch with him and had the privilege of receiving advice from him about how I should go about doing certain things for my thesis and important things to consider while executing this project. I fully intend on taking advantage of his advice to this fulles right and in the future in order to make sure my thesis is the best it can be. Another leader in my field is Aidan Shapiro-Leighton, he is a great person for me to watch their videos and take bits and pieces of insights from. He has edited for Ultiworld too and I think I can learn from watching his work too.

Leaders in the Field:

One of the top leaders in my field would be, Aidan Shapiro-Leighton who is also a great person for me to watch their videos and take bits and pieces of insights from. He has edited for Ultiworld and I think I can learn from his work. He both videotapes and edits the video at each tournament all by himself. So, you can infer he has a very busy schedule and works a lot to look through all of this film. Looking through his videos he has inspired me to utilize slow-motion and zooming in more. This is because it adds more to the video, can bring out more emotion from the viewer, and makes things more clearer in some cases for the viewer to see. All of his videos are under the Ultiworld youtube channel. Another one would be Nathan Kolakovic, who is a great video editor and as I said before films and edits for USAU, I will definitely look at his videos and see what I can change in mines compared to his to help them look better. Exact same thing as Aidan but with different companies and visuals. Looking at Nathan’s work I have learned that if can find close visuals in games to take advantage of that and add some slow-motion to it because it gives a great dramatic effect. All of his videos are under the USAU youtube channel. My last one would be Luke Lorentz, who was the editor and producer for the show Last Chance U, the way the show is showed and edited always conveys the message they want, especially when it comes to the games. Although he doesn’t do frisbee, the way the show is edited and how they carry out the games and story will play a part in how I do my thesis by opening my eyes to helping convey emotion into my video and the different way of doing so. He also had a part in Midnight Family and New York Cuts. 

Industry events or group:

In the recent week, I have taken part in the Diversity and media summit where I got to have the ability to form connections with Hearst Television, Culture House, Nielsen, and Gates Preserve. This taught me better ways to reach out to companies, how to make connections, and who I should be reaching out to inside the company for a job. I reached out to people from these companies and connected with them to be able to have people that know my name and have good things to say about me in these companies. Being able to get connections and understand more of what companies are looking for has encouraged me to think of more ideas I want to do in my thesis covid or no-covid and to really try to apply what I see professionals are doing in the sports/video editing field to my own work. It also made me more open to consider video editing for other companies and for other occasions like ads, storytelling, documentaries, or maybe televisions shows, or movies.  On the website they say, “Join us for three days of inspiration, motivation, and connection at our 3rd Annual Diversity + Media Career Summit.  Presented virtually this year, the Summit is designed to help students and recent graduates break into the business and be successful in their early careers. You’ll hear wisdom and actionable advice from trailblazers across the industry, and have the opportunity to network with recruiters from such leading media organizations as Discovery, Disney, Hearst, Hulu, NBCUniversal, Nielsen, the NYC Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, and more. ” https://centerforcommunication.kindful.com/register/diversity-media-career-summit-2020

 (Links to an external site.)

          I also joined a video editing group on facebook where they post their work and jobs that are available around me. This has allowed me to meet and look at other peoples work in order to compare it to my own. While also, being able to analyze the cuts and transitions they use in their videos in order to possibly use the same strategy that they used in the those videos in the future. I have also been able to show other people my work and receive tips and critiques that my eyes initially missed. All of this from the group will help my thesis and my work in general be better and look more clean in order to make sure it looks visually appealing and the best it can. I have also been able to see and apply to jobs and internships posted in the group so I hope to hear back from them soon.

Also, I have been able to attend company events like the Dentsu Aegis Network, the Booz Allen Hamilton networking event, and the Monelez networking event. All of these events with professional companies have allowed me to form more connections within bigger companies that could help me in the future. While also, being able to learn what certain companies are looking for on the video and marketing side of things, to help me learn where I should focus my skills more. Some of these events actually allowed me to be able to talk with companies one on one and be able to allow them to look at my work and tell me where to improve. To top it off, I was able to connect with multiple people from some of the companies on Linkedin so that I will be able to stay in touch with them and know when jobs or internships for the company will be available and have a person who can help in getting the job or internships I apply for in the future.

Prototype: 

          For me prototyping was me experiencing my first internship and being able to work under a real company and with actual instructions on what a person wanted me to execute in the video. Throughout this experience, I learned how to transfer verbal requests into the video content and transitions. I also learned how to consider what the consumer may want and not want, based on seeing my work being put on social media and how many likes and viewers each one got compared to others.  It also taught me how to teach myself new skills when asked to have a certain transition or attribute in a video. Throughout the time doing the internship I also had a mentor who was there to help me when needed and to answer any questions I had. Having a mentor gave me the first chance at actually being able to be in contact with someone that has more experience in my field than me and being able to learn from them. It helped me understand how to ask for help and how to phrase questions as a person asking a question, referring to what content should be in a video and how it should be delivered in a video.

Make a Working Prototype:

Right now I have everything I will need in order to fully execute my thesis to what I originally intended it to be. I have a laptop, Premiere Pro, the poses for each person, the highlight footage, a phone that can shoot quality footage if needed, and the ideas for how I want 99% of the thesis its self to go. However, there is another thing that I would love to attempt to add to my thesis that I will keep hidin in case I end up not being able to do it or don’t have enough time to do it. But, in order to execute this I would need at least some of my team members present, more notes around it, and possibly a person to hold the camera videotaping me. These all would 100% be necessary in order to do this other part, because I would be in the video and need to think fully on how I could conduct each part. I fortunately don’t need to worry about a budget because I have everything I need and didn’t have to spend money in order to obtain any of the things. 

My timeline for the rest of my thesis would start with finishing my thesis trailor by the end of thanksgiving break and have it ready to be submitted and posted on social media and for AIMM after dark. After, I finish the trailer I will handle the reformatting of the player introduction and have accomplished my goals for this semester and won’t really have to do anything for the christmas break. Then, next semester I will begin editing the highlights to correspond it with the music. After or during this process, I will add in special edits and transitions to the highlights to make them look more visually pleasing and to make the video look better. Next, I will combine the player introduction and the highlight reel into one project and that would be the end of my original thesis. On the other hand, if I still have the time and the resources to execute the side-plan I would love to, additionally I would begin organizing gathering people from my team, and planning a day to meet up safely. Following this, I would begin to brainstorm the shots I would want and how I would be able to get them. I will finish planning this out prior to meeting with the team on an open field and take the shots. Then, after I have finished gathering the shots, I will begin editing them in Premiere Pro in order to organize and combine them so that it looks clean, organized and visually pleasing. When I finish this process I will add it to the highlight reel in the correct order. Lastly, there will be one other thing I am adding to the thesis but, it’ll be really easy and short to add-in.