Hey Gang! Two quick things. First....

As many of you know, I do visual effects for a living when not performing magic. In a way, they are both creating the impossible and tell stories in a visual way. I do want to say up front, I'm not posting this looking for work (and am actually not taking new clients right now, anyway).

We are in an exciting time. We've also seen some AWESOME videos produced by many people here on the Café and some of the critiques have been just as awesome. So I'd like to take my turn and ask for your thoughts on my latest video (just for clarification - "my video" meaning I cut it, not starred in it!).

My main reason for posting this? The danger for anyone getting involved in any project is getting too close to it and losing "the eye" as I like to call it.

What I'm asking is for your honest comments on what you think are good and bad. If you'd like to PM me or leave comments here, either is fine by me.

The second question is just a curiosity, anyone going to Kutztown in two weeks? I'd love to meet up with Café members at the convention!

Thanks for everything!

Scott

Where is it?

Guess I should have been a bit more obvious in my post. My bad! You can either click the picture above or use this link:

http://reelsinmotion.com/video/promo-hyp......tist.mov

I think we all learn much from feedback, both positive (by knowing what works) and negative (what isn't working). I look forward to hearing what you guys think!

Thanks again!
Scott

Oh well...I tried

Interesting. Are you running Windows? IE/Firefox?

I'm curious about why you can't see it. Is anyone else having problems watching it?

I down loaded the file and then tried to open the file with QuickTime Player and received the following message.

Error -2000: a necessary data reference could not be be resolved (promo-hypnotiest.mov)

I think I know what part of your issue might be. Hold on, this is going to get sort of technical!

Since so many people have various internet speeds, from dial up to cable and DSL to super high speed T3. Many are also accessing the internet today with mobile devices like iPhones, Blackberry devices and other smartphones or PSP-like devices.

Due to this fact that everyone's got different bandwidth requirements, I create a Quicktime file that first checks the viewer's connection speed, then delivers one of three files. Each of these three files is optimized and compressed for different screen sizes and bandwidth.

So that file you downloaded is just the pointer file and the reference movie cannot be found. This is also why the downloaded file you have is probably only a few kilobytes in size instead of several megabytes.

I tried playing the video using IE, Firefox, and Safari. I also tested on Mac OS X (my machines) as well as a several year old Windows XP machine, as well as a two month old iPhone using the AT&T network and also Wi-Fi network.

Try making sure your browser has MIME type set to play embeded quicktime files and then play it from the link and don't download it first.

After it has loaded, you will be able to download the file (one reason I use Quicktime instead of Flash... I think files should be downloadable).

So in the end, the key is let it play right from your browser first and not download the file first. That should work.

Let me know if this helps!

Scott

I got it by clicking on the photo. I think it is a great promo video and could attract a lot of clientele. hope the glitches are worked out so everyone can view it and review it. Good work.

Dr. Solar

Reset my IE settings and was able to view the video. Very good work.

That's awesome! Thanks for the feedback. I appreciate your comments.

As far as the browser, you might want to look into Firefox. It's a free download. I'm on a Mac and switch between Firefox and Safari and anytime I need to use a PC, I download Firefox. It's a much more secure and capable browser. Plus I feel (no empirical evidence) that it's faster loading various pages.

Again, thanks, and I look forward to any other comments!

All the best,
Scott

The production values looked quite good! You are clearly a pro. At one point I was thinking it was running a little long, but I am impatient at times so I wouldn't put too much stock in that unless you hear someone else bring it up.

I would think this guy will get a lot of bookings from this promo.

A little cheesy. but thanks for sharing.

Scott, I really enjoyed your video. Production values are a big deal for me, and too often I turn promo videos off 5 seconds in when it becomes evident that the video has been shot by a friend, on a cheap camera and edited in Windows Movie Maker. If you're going to try to attract clients, you need something slick, entertaining and polished. You have without a doubt succeeded here. Awesome job mate!

Chris

We're supposed to set our computers a certain way?
what if I don't have QT?

Try this link instead:

http://reelsinmotion.com/portfolio/hypno......deo.html

Its the same video, just wrapped in Flash.

Chris, thanks so much for your comments.