Dabbling with Creative Technologies
Component 4
Cameo Microfilms
Being an avid podcast and audiobook listener, developing my own audio-based project was something I was just itching to do…
My cameo microfilms are 12 very short films (two-and-half minutes or less) that I produced using Vimeo’s now defunct Cameo video editing app.
The original version of the app allowed you to edit together a sequence of shots, with or without applying image filters and text, alongside a piece of licensed music available within the Cameo app’s music library.
The footage I used to create my 12 cameo microfilms came from the footage I shot for my 365 FRAMES 2015 project which I was undertaking at the same time.
Ultimately, my 12 cameo microfilms represent a somewhat more refined expression of the short form filmmaking I was evolving in my 365 FRAMES Project.
My Cameo Microfilms
Microfilms 1 and 6 are my personal favourites.
I just feel that those two best tell engaging micro narratives that are for the most part conveyed visually.
Making my Cameo Microfilms
I discovered the Cameo video editing app by Vimeo not long after I purchased my new iPod Touch 5 in 2015 and saw the Cameo app recommend in the Apple App Store.
I had already made 34 videos for my 365 FRAMES 2015 project when I started playing around with the Vimeo Cameo app and I immediately saw the potential of turning the footage from my video a day project into cameo microfilms.
My 365 FRAMES 2015 videos can be viewed as the rough workprint cuts; whereas the microfilms are the refined final cuts.
Making the cameo microfilms gave me a second chance to think though my editing choices in the original 365 FRAMES 2015 videos.
Comparing the 365 FRAMES 2015 videos to the cameo microfilms also demonstrates the transformative presence music can have within a video.
When looking through the Cameo app’s music library I always tried to select tracks that were relevant to the focus of the footage and my personal mood when I had been filming it.
Some of the microfilms work better as mini-narratives.
I feel that some of the latter microfilms have very poor and/or no narratives within their presentations.
In my mind, the kind of free-flowing arthouse narrative-less video was better suited with the daily videos of my 265 FRAMES 2015 project; whereas the cameo microfilms where better served when they told a mini story.
I was very much encouraged to assemble a narrative microfilm within the confines of the cameo app’s simplified user interface.
One of the reasons I enjoyed using the cameo app so much was its ease-of-use when it came to assemble a microfilm complete with image filter and music track.
I was incredibly disheartened when Vimeo re-configured their Cameo app into to just a regular video editing app that removed the simplified interface of the earlier version which I had enjoyed using so much.
This is one of the reasons why I only have 12 cameo microfilms.
My cameo microfilms also hint at the vast amount of footage I shot for my 365 FRAMES 2015 project because some of the microfilms use footage that I did not post up in the final daily vids for my 365 project.
I used the creation of cameo microfilms as a further means of refining my practice with short form filmmaking and the microfilms very much exist as an adjunct project to the experimental filmmaking I was undertaking in my 365 FRAMES 2015 project.
Overall, making my cameo microfilms greatly strengthened my aptitude of producing short narrative driven video content.