Saber Forum

Hello Sabering community. As 2016 comes to a close, the air has gone cold, the decorations are in the windows, and it is time once again for people who love showing off with LED sabers to come together and show the community what you learned over the last year.

That's right, it is time for Spin Wars: Episode 3!!!

Simply put, most of us here tend to do our own things. We do choreographed fights, martial arts demos, spinning routines, costume work, etc. What if there was a way to get several of those things into one project that would showcase a wider picture of what we, as a community, do with lightsabers? That is what Spin Wars did last 2 years. For anyone unfamiliar, the archived videos are here.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_fabiOtA6Y
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOXLGXuPRQA

So what about this year? Anyone willing to volunteer, post a video in which you show us your saber work. You can choreograph a fight, you can give us spinning, you can film some freeform work, you can do it with lit or unlit blades, in costume or in plain clothes, outside, inside, or on green screen. This footage will be edited together into a montage. This year like last, if there are enough people interested,we may even look at two videos (a light side and a dark side). Preliminary interest tells me we may be able to make this happen this time around.

The criteria:

1. For editing and theme purposes, the video should be designed to accompany a piece of music posted below. Please have the music playing in the video so that I can hear it in the background for timing. If you record it without the music or while the music was playing through headphones, please attach the music track to it before you post.

2. Your video must include a lightsaber and be something recognizable as "a performance".

3. Your content should not violate youtube or forum rules.

The details:

If you are interested, please post and say so. Also please indicate if you will considering yourself dark side or light side for this performance. The initial interest will help determine if we are doing one video or two but I will operate as if we are doing 2 until the situation proves otherwise. When you have a video, please post it here. I can rip things from youtube without a problem for editing. Please include the name or moniker you would like to appear in the credits. If you have a signature move, pose, or other brief trademark, please post it as a separate video or still image as you would like it to appear in the credits. If none is submitted, I will use a short clip from your routine. If you have a youtube channel or web link, post it and I will include it in the description. Please try to submit material as soon as you are able. I would like to start editing in mid December with a video release on Youtube around the first of the year.

The Music:

We will be going with the music selections from last year since we did not end up using them and they are good tracks.

The Dark Side track is "Dark Side from Dyman
www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgsVBtvZQcg
Download mp3 here
www.jamendo.com/track/1121484/dark-side?language=en

The light side is Return of the Jedi (order 66 cut) by Darth & Vader
www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXVZPzYH5Qw
mp3 can be found on http://daimp3.net
search for "darth & vader - return of the jedi order 66"

Additional notes and disclaimers:

This is not a professional video and my channel is not monetized so there is no profit being made. This is by and for those who are willing to donate time and energy to make it happen. I will have to decide what makes it in and what does not. I will attempt to give everyone equal time (provided they submit a long enough clip to accomplish this). We are only working with 6 minutes between the two videos. I will try to include everyone, and if too many people are interested to do that, I will try to make a second cut. This may have to come out after the first though. If you have a favorite segment, feel free to let me know the time range and I will do what I can, but no promises. Other than that, feel free to discuss and ask questions if you wish. If there is anything I can do to help you put together a submission, let me know. Otherwise, happy sabering and let's make this one a good one to cap off the first trilogy.

Count me in. 

Dark Side of course.  ;D ;D

Done and point for being the first responder.

I'm excited to contribute this time.

All going well, you can count me in too  ;D ;D ;D . . . . and, I'll be representing the Light Side again  8)


DC, you previously mentioned you may be able to add the Echo Effect to some videos . . . would be very cool if you can offer that . . . .

I think I can manage that on request. One thing to keep in mind is that the echo effect will brighten the entire footage. If you don't want to look like you glow, keep it visible but keep it dark.

I am definitely in. I will be dark side, but maybe one of my friends can orchestrate a fight.

As much as it pains me to say this....and trust me it hurts....bad...

switch me to light side so we have some....balance...to the force....

Apologies Dark Jedi and Sith Brethren. ( No light side points!! Please....that would just make it hurt more.)

I'm going to try and be a part of this year's vid. And as always, consider me dark side.

Excellent... Oh and Ryan, through the people who have responded in various places, we have 4 light and 5 dark before you make your decision. I would say at this point, if you prefer dark, go with it. The numbers are not that far off.

When do you need videos by?

Informally around the 20th of Dec would be nice. I can push it to the 22nd if need be but not beyond that. Count is 5 to 5 now with Ryan undecided.

See...that's the problem with us Dark Jedi....always the call back to the light...but let's face it, I'm not a Jedi. I'm a Dark Jedi


Back to the Dark it is.

And that makes it 5 to 6 dark.

When I tried to add the music the quality of video took a hit.  I'm not really much of a video editor.  Do whatever you like with it!  Like I told you before this wasn't easy to film in costume on my own so sorry it's not much.

With music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCzr2XAdf8k&feature=youtu.be

No music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL-qaOiA2Z8

The 2 first episodes are awesome ... very excited to watch the 3rd ;)

I'll get something up. Darkside.

My son and I would like to be in representing the Lightside and this would be two separate videos from us.

Sounds good everyone. Looks like it will be a good turnout this year.

Had this video lying around from last night. Some of the strikes towards the end matched up to the music pretty well so I'll throw this on here for now. Will try to get around to doing a dedicated video or two for this, especially if I can get my staff weight sorted out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBja6wwN16I

Here is my contribution.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZwKbCjKi1Y


You can use this for a credit photo if you are doing that again in this one:

(http://68.media.tumblr.com/3da197923ea86e0c661778acb50ea92d/tumblr_nw2vjxbxXk1uil3dpo2_540.png)

Great work and good to have you back this year Venturous. I think the light side has their work cut out for them.

Agreed!   :o :o :o


Question - do you want us to PM you our videos so not to "spoil" what you'll be putting together?  Or posting them here is fine?

Posting them here is fine and actually preferable. The more that come in, the more people can get inspired to contribute.

Sounds good, thanks.

I'll see if I can contribute something this year. No promises, but I'd like to. I like the DS music better as I think it will fit better with my spinning style, but I like wielding purple blades better. Decisions, decisions....

First light side submission is in on another forum. I am posting here on behalf of the participant.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7zCiPYvgjw&feature=youtu.be

Looks like we've got a good turnout this year. One of these years a few of us are just going to have to get together a do one big video.

We need to all meet up at a con somewhere in the middle lol

If anyone can make it to Branson, MO this coming February, I'll be going to Visioncon all weekend. Not a big one like some of them, but the only one I am able to get to right now. One day I hope to make it to a Celebration in Orlando.

Well that is pretty much in the middle. Link me some info on it.

Unfortunately, I don't travel much right now. I just spent all summer flying up and down the west coast settling my father's estate. My traveling is done for a while until my son is a bit older. If anyone ever makes it out to Eugene or Portland though for their cons I would be down for a meet-up.

http://www.visioncon.net

So I shot mine yesterday. First though, this is the long cut of the footage. I had the song on repeat so I ended up shooting about 15 minutes. This is the best 7 minutes. There were a lot of neat tricks in here but only so much room in the final cut. Even less in the final edit.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zzd5219qk9I
This is the short version to the music. This demonstrated my flying saber with an echo effect added. I am pretty happy with it.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3jjo2Gagv8

Done. Still mastering this quick release.....my poor left thumb....

And very nice everyone. Lookin good!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeFlQsKW4-k

I love how that coupler looks in action. There is a lot of variety in the videos this year.

I'm getting better at it. Still needs a lot more practice. Now if I could just levitate it and snap it together at the same time!

I was practicing the other night with the watermelon blade and decided to shoot a light side submission. Don't know if I will use it, but I figured it would be good to have on hand if I needed some extra footage on that side.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7a8Xmgt7pM

You beat me too it. Was just for fun though. I stand by my Dark side submission.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRkVByEQj1w

Here is the submission for my son and I.

The music is in the background for his but it's really quiet for some reason.  



I don't want to give my son any online/forum name so referencing him as my padawan would be preferable pls :)






Was also thinking that although signature stills are really nice for the credits, I found it helpful for small clips with people's names to better to identify who they were.  Might be hard to tell who is who if we can't see their faces in the actual video compared to a still pic.  Just a suggestion, however I'm good with what you see fit Darth C.

 

I'll see what I can do. I think that makes it 5 videos on each side if we use doubles. Definitely enough to work with but we can always use more if anyone is out there on the fence. Still almost a month before I have to start trying to put it all together.

If you end up needing more light side videos, I can probably make one before then.

You can use this video unless I decide to shoot another one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FK1a1D_-f9k

Here's a submission for the light side.  I was going to do it in costume but it's too damned hot and I've had hardly any free time to record so I did it when I could.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm-cwiMTPd0&feature=youtu.be

Just in case you wanted to add some choreographed fights. There's a spin in there or two.  ;D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvxC6lvA9Es

Since we are all overdoing it here, I did a second cut of my light side performance with dual wield. I was trying out a few things and liked how it came out. The ground was wet, so I could pull off some foot pivots on the wet brick that I can't usually do. I also liked the way the water reflected the saber light.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZzfHIL3UMw

So with just a few more days left to submit videos, I figured I would post a quick reminder and an update. As a reminder, the unofficial deadline for submissions is the 20th. If you have something coming and let me know, I can fudge it a bit, but I will start making the montage on the 20th so try not to do that to me if you can help it. For the update, here is what we have so far. For those who submitted more than one video for a single side, please tell me which you want to use or if I should just cut the two together. If I don't hear an answer before I start working, I will default to the second option. Thanks to all the people who submitted. This is shaping up to be the busiest spin war to date, and it was made possible...by viewers like you. Sorry, that was a bit PBS, but I could not help myself.
Light side
Cephalus
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZzfHIL3UMw
Samhain
www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm-cwiMTPd0&feature=youtu.be
Thunder blade
www.youtube.com/watch?v=FK1a1D_-f9k
Hazard
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLMjjk5gNB4
Son of Hazard
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83j7V9QzEmU
Ryan
www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvxC6lvA9Es
www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRkVByEQj1w
Timotius
www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7zCiPYvgjw&feature=youtu.be




Dark side
Ryan
www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeFlQsKW4-k
Cephalus
www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3jjo2Gagv8
Venturous
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZwKbCjKi1Y
Enso
www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBja6wwN16I
Samhain
www.youtube.com/watch?v=bL-qaOiA2Z8
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LtOQGvXD4o&feature=youtu.be

I should also not that if anyone wants theirs pulled from either side, I can do that as well as long as you tell me. I just made a comprehensive list because I did not know what was for fun and what was for inclusion.

Just in the nick of time, phew . . . I had all these ideas, but no time unfortunately . . . So I just got this quickly done around midnight . . .  DC, can you add the echo effect if possible please? . . .

I recorded this without the music, just added it after, hope its ok . . . cheers  :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spwhtNxrzjc

Can Do

For your media library. I thought you might like the complete version. As of this post, it is still uploading but it should be done soon.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6xzUZ5WNtk

Arrgh I'm late to the party here, sorry! I've been out of the loop a bit recently. I could probably throw together something short tomorrow, but I see the deadline has passed so not a problem if you have to leave me out this year.

Go ahead and film it and I will see what I can do. Light or dark?

This looks sick.  Good call on the echo effect.

Thanks! I've rendered the video twice - for light side and dark. Feel free to add me to whichever side is most convenient for you. The actual video is the same, I've just adjusted the hue on the dark side version to make it look a bit more "Sith", so obviously you'll want to pick one or the other, don't use both! If you don't have any preference then I would prefer to go in the light side video.

Here are the links (use button in the top right to download):

Light Side
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B204x3tczmLcMWZ4a0lzYWhsMjg

Dark Side
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B204x3tczmLcbHJhdW1PSDcwNkU

And here is the still image:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B204x3tczmLcT0dvdkxZY2w1azg

YouTube links:

Light Side
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcy8hP_9wT0

Dark Side
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFJ173SHijs

Still shot
(http://i1383.photobucket.com/albums/ah283/tomfoyle/SpinWars2016Still_zpslvs04dva.png) (http://s1383.photobucket.com/user/tomfoyle/media/SpinWars2016Still_zpslvs04dva.png.html)

Update:
Just finished with the transitions and intro on the second video. Now I just have to add credits and QC check the sound. This year there were too many people so I went with list credits rather than stills as it was too long the other way. I will link to originals in video description.

Update to the update:

and...they're done! I will upload and make them live tomorrow night so people can watch them on New Year's eve.

Thx DC appreciate all your hard work for this and creating such an opportunity for the community to unite in a fun and interactive way.

I'm ready to see it!