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Information

• Member: MeriC
• Title: Start Over
• Premiered: 2007-09-21
• Categories:
  • Character Profile
  • Fun
• Song:
  • Paramore Whoa
• Anime:
  • Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, The (TV)
• Comments: *** Winner - Best Upbeat, Anime USA 2007
  
  The Concept:
  As per the norm, I got the idea for this video in the car while listening to this song. The line that sparked the idea was "and I'll admit that I can be a little selfish", followed by the next chorus "and we've got everybody singing...". For some reason, I immediately thought of "The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya." Since I already had the R2s (thanks, AtomX!), I decided to go for it and make the video really fast. I figured that since I'd be making the video quickly for my own amusement, I should premiere it at my panel at AWA 2007.
  
  Anyway, the video itself is a rather simple character profile focusing on Haruhi, with Kyon acting as a narrator from the side. It's not really a romance video, but it does have some minor romantic elements.
  
  The story of the video begins with Kyon discovering Haruhi at school (just like in the anime, dur hur hur). She's a very bored girl, but decides to make things interesting by forcing unsuspecting victims in to her club. The video highlights some of the odd things she's done as she becomes less and less bored.
  
  In the middle of the video, there's a flashback scene with her as a child mirrored against the giants that are the manifestation of her boredom and anger.
  
  Flash back to the present, and we get the obligatory concert scene. I know it's damn-well predictable, but I had so much fun editing this section to the music.
  
  The video ends with her and Kyon facing the giants, and things going back to normal in the end.
  
  When it comes down to it, the video is about Haruhi not wanting to "start over" from the beginning, and not wanting help from other people... even though she secretly does (otherwise, why should recruit people in to her club?).
  
  Making the Video:
  The editing style is pretty darn old school (ugh, I can't believe I said it!). There are no effects in the video other than some cross-dissolves, white and black flashes and fades, zooms, blurs, and minor glows. Since I was making this as a quicky video for my panel, I didn't see the need to go over the top. I just wanted to make a simple character profile video with a simple story. I pretty much made the video in a few hours spread across three or four weekends in September 2007.
  
  I used Adobe Premiere for the raw timeline, and After Effects for the zooms and glow effects.
  
  Conclusion:
  This was a fun little video that I really enjoyed editing. Its simple nature really allowed me to get back to basics, as it were. Maybe this video could have benefited from more effects, maybe not. I really can't tell. Regardless, I'm happy with the results, considering I made it so quickly. Thanks go out to VegettoEX and Koopiskeva for beta-testing it, and to AtomX for the gorgeous footage (ahhh, it's nice to work with recent shows!).