IMRC YouTube, Take Two

By Brenna Martens

Making the “Tour the Labs” YouTube Video
It’s been a few months since we made the “Canon Tutorial” video, our first attempt at making YouTube content for the IMRC. That process taught us much about what to do and, more importantly, what not to do. Last week, I had an idea for a new video, a short-form vlog-style video that shows around the labs and explains what resources are available in each, while also showing the layout of the IMRC, locations of the labs, and how to get to them. 

This video is starkly different from the Canon tutorial in many ways. The Canon Tutorial was meant to be more serious and professional in style and look so that it was easy to follow the printing process as it was laid out. This video, however, has a fun, somewhat silly feel, making it more engaging and entertaining for the audience while still being informative. With the Canon video, we had a production team, with lighting, microphones, and specific days set aside for filming. It took about a week just to write the script. The complete filming of the Canon video took a few days, with the editing process taking almost a month to complete. We had to reshoot multiple scenes, and the voiceover section took a few days to record and edit. Overall, the Canon video was a complicated process filled with setbacks and learning opportunities. 

This video was the opposite. I had the idea and wrote the script in two days. Instead of having an entire team working on the production of this, it was just Mia and me with one vlog camera. The filming took only a few hours. Instead of having a set plan for what shots we wanted to get, we had a vague outline and general order of what we wanted to show and came up with the transitions and scene details as we went.

The new video was a lot of fun to make. Without the pressure of a production team and deadlines, Mia and I could be more flexible and spontaneous with our ideas, as you’ll be able to see in the video. There were a lot of fun things we did, like dancing in the background of the shots. There wasn’t a strict schedule to follow or a massive list of equipment to manage. We could just jump right in, have some fun with the camera, and see where it took us. It was refreshing not to worry about perfection with every take; in fact, I feel the small imperfections are what makes this video so fun to watch. We experimented, laughed at our mistakes, and moved forward, which made the entire process much less stressful.

The whole project took significantly less time. We wrapped everything up from concept to final draft in less than a week. The editing process was incredibly streamlined compared to our previous experience for two reasons: the first was that there wasn’t as much content to sift through, cut, and edit with this video, and the second was that I have more experience and understanding with Adobe Premiere now compared to last year with the Canon video. It’s partially thanks to the Canon video, specifically all the mistakes I made while working on it, that helped me learn the software better and avoid making similar mistakes this time around, enabling me to get the editing done in a few days.

There were no complicated reshoots or major hurdles with this project. We had the rough cut ready within days, and tweaking the final version has gone smoothly. In contrast to the Canon video, where editing felt like it stretched on forever, this time around, we quickly shaped the content into a cohesive, polished final draft. It was gratifying to see how quickly everything came together, and we were able to show the preliminary draft of the video at our staff meeting last week, which was only four days after filming. 

One of the major stylistic differences that saved us a lot of time and stress was how we approached the dialog. In the Canon Tutorial, we had actors speaking directly on camera, guiding viewers through each step of the process. This meant we had to set up microphones and take the time to edit out all the background noise, which was incredibly tedious. This time, we decided to do the entire thing as a voice-over, which Mia and I recorded after doing all the filming. This meant we mimed what we talked about, acting out the scenes while narrating the footage later. This allowed us to focus more on showing the labs in a visual, interactive way rather than worrying about on-camera dialogue. It made the filming process easier and kept the energy of the video light and fun. The voiceover format also gave us more flexibility in post-production, letting us fine-tune the narration to match the footage perfectly, and eliminating the need to remove background noise. It was also a great chance to utilize the IMRC Podcasting Studio to record both of our dialog lines simultaneously.

All in all, this video felt more dynamic and less rigid than the Canon Tutorial. It captures the playful, hands-on spirit of the staff at the IMRC and offers a fresh, more casual approach to showcasing what we have to offer. I am very excited to publish this video in the coming weeks, and I hope you have as much fun watching it as we did making it. 

I want to give a very special shout-out and thank you to Mia for doing this video with me and rolling with my constant random ideas. The video would not have come together as quickly without her, and she did an amazing job on screen, in the booth, and behind the camera. I am looking forward to making more fun short videos like this in the future and getting our YouTube channel officially up and running. That’s all for now. Thank you for reading, and I’ll IMRC you next time! If you liked this article and want to see more from the IMRC, follow us on social media.