How Forefront Gets Down
So, we get asked on occasion how things happen here at Forefront.
Small Groups. Community Events. Reaching People Far From God. Music. Video & Design. Etc.
Well, recently someone visited and asked how we got our pre-service stuff “looking so smooth and connecting with people who need the info?” Great question! We focus a great amount of energy not only on making sure people feel comfortable and welcome during our service, but before it ever starts. The lobby has music playing with a party type vibe, people who volunteer are encouraged to be friendly & available, but not stalkers (the difference between the people at Target and walking onto a car dealership parking lot and getting attacked… ya get it?!). Along with that, we have slides that roll with announcements & funny stuff. Then, a few minutes before service begins, we play this:
The song is one edited from some work we did w/ Verve in Las Vegas, and the slides were created for Forefront and Verve, with color differences (their color is red, obviously we roll with green). But, if you don’t have super cool, video editing magic- and you don’t have the money to pay someone to use After Effects, Final Cut, or Adobe Premiere. Here is how to make something like this for your church…
Unfortunately, you need an Apple computer to do this. Many churches have at least one of these laying around, so you should be in good shape. Other things you need to get this done: iMovie, Keynote, a photo editor (either Photoshop-or a free program called Gimp).
Step One: Create Each Image (in parts):
- Make your image in your photo editor in layers.
- Now, save each layer you want to move around in your video, as a PNG file with a transparency (that means there is no background, just the image).
- To make it easier, for each batch of layers that create one whole image, create a folder and number them in the order they appear (i.e. 001.png, 002.png, 003.png, and they are all in folder “Missions Announcement”).
- Once you have all of your layers saved from your photo editor, jump over to Keynote.
Step Two: Create The Raw Video File:
- Keynote is a better quality version of Power Point. You want to create your template size as 1280 x 720 (this is the HD size for our screen, if you shoot 4:3, you can make it 720 x 540).
- Now that you are in your template, you begin to add each layer and with the “Inspector” tool, you can animate the way each item comes in, time it, etc.
- Continue doing that until all your layers are in and you have the animation style you want.
- Next, you want to record your slide show. Click, “File” and “Record Slideshow” and go through your show until it’s finished.
- Once recorded, you go to “File” and “Export.” You will export it as a Quicktime file and the default setting should work just fine unless you want to tweak something, you decide (I just left it as is).
- Then save it into the appropriate folder.
- Repeat steps one and two until you have all the parts to your intro video.
Step Three: Make Your Movie:
- Now, open iMovie and make a 16:9 new project.
- Import all of your videos into one Event.
- Move each of your movies into the project one by one in the order you think they look best.
- Make sure to go into each of the individual video settings and change the Saturation from 100% to somewhere around 135-145%. When exporting out of Keynote, the color goes a little pale compared to what the image actually was.
- Once all the videos are in place, drop your track* in there, export as a Quicktime HD file, and Viola! An opening video that will inform people, get them into service, and get things rolling.
*Our track was edited in Garageband, but there are free programs like Audacity out there as well.
Jason *over and out*
