Torn between music videos!!!

After thinking and thinking about which video to post to the blog, I chose Brad Paisley's "Online" because its a really funny song, fitting for the class, and a complete story video that matches the lyrics. However, my second choice was Alicia Keys "Like You'll Never See Me Again" because it is a beautiful song and emotional song/video.

The video plays with the concept of time by showing you the story in reverse. It begins with Common in the emergency room crashing on Saturday at 1:45am. The story unfolds in reverse by showing you that Common was on his motorcycle, then he was in a fight with Alicia Keys at their apartment, then he was on his motorcycle again, then he was waking up on his friend's couch, etc. The video is pretty self explanatory. The song is all about not knowing when you'll see the people you love again so make the most of every moment you have together and be sure to say goodbye when you part.

Lyrics:

If I had no more time
No more time left to be here
Would you cherish what we had?
Was it everything that you were looking for?
If I couldn't feel your touch
And no longer were you with me
I'd be wishing you were here
To be everything that I'd be looking for
I don't wanna forget the present is a gift
And I don't wanna take for granted the time you may have here with me
'Cause Lord only knows another day is not really guaranteed

So every time you hold me
Hold me like this is the last time
Every time you kiss me
Kiss me like you'll never see me again
Every time you touch me
Touch me like this is the last time
Promise that you'll love me
Love me like you'll never see me again

Oh Oh Oh

How many really know what love is?
Millions never will
Do you know until you lose it
That it's everything that we are looking for
When I wake up in the morning
You're beside me
I'm so thankful that I found
Everything that I been looking for

I don't wanna forget the present is a gift
And I don't wanna take for granted the time you may have here with me
'Cause Lord only knows another day is not really guaranteed

So everytime you hold me
Hold me like this is the last time
Every time you kiss me
Kiss me like you'll never see me again
(can you do that for me baby)
Every time you touch me
(see we don't really know)
Touch me like this is the last time
(see everyday we never know)
Promise that you'll love me
(I want you to promise me)
Love me like you'll never see me again
(like you'll never see me again)

Oh oh oh oh oh

After Effects

I HATE After Effects. It is entirely too complicated for what it should be. The entire interface is NOT user friendly and the help section is worthless because it just does a Google search!! It took me over 4 hours to figure out how to do a 007 blood drip down the screen and then we didn't even use it. I was also having a terrible time trying to figure out how to speed up some portions of the video and slow down others. I had to cut the footage, separate them into two levels and then speed up and slow down accordingly...which wasn't very smooth. I tried doing that in Premiere...still not intuitive. That took another 3 hours. At about the time I was ready to smash my computer because I hate Adobe, I gave the files to another group member to work the sound. 20 minutes later he tells me he CANNOT see anything I did! Then, he could see the blood drip and no video or text. So he and another member tried to figure out how to see it. The third member who got involved saw it, changed it, and sent it back out right when 2nd group member got to see my video! Its really stupid that After Effects doesn't save and export the video on it's own...as in if you don't have the actual footage you can't see the composited AF video! To make it even less useable, you can't export it into any format other than AF or Flash! Thank you Adobe for making a completely unintuitive, non user friendly, and unhelpful product built by masters for masters...