How I make Videos on Youtube · 12:59am Jul 21st, 2019

Firstly, let's watch one of them...

the Starfleet/MLP Cast playing "Wind Waker's Theme"

The video may be just over 5 and a half minutes long, but it took me 27 days to make.

Here's the Equipment I use...

Microsoft Paint.

Windows Movie Maker 2.6

(As for downloading audio and visual, I just use a basic Youtube Downloader, or download things directly off the sites)

Since I don't have very fancy equipment, and only very little resources even with these programs, I have to do it FRAME-BY-FRAME... draw/paint/edit One picture at a time, and depending on the movie I'm trying to make it can take a while.

To make this vid, it wasn't easy because all the drawings had to be made from scratch.

Let's observe Celestia playing the harp...

The first thing I had to do was scout for a GIF of Celestia with her mane fluttering, or download a vid of her.

Then, I copy, paste, and resize every image to make Celestia's mane flow properly, which took 12 different frames.

It's very important to keep each frame the EXACT same size to the MILLIMETER, and each frame has to be properly sized so the movie maker can show it in full screen. If even ONE PIXEL is off, or the size is ONE SMIDGE off, the images will shudder and shake during the play back.

That's only the first step though (Getting the mane to move)

Since every pony in Starfleet is humanoid, the next step is to alter Celestia, so for each of those twelve frames I had to...

-Remove the original background by hand (By use of a polygon painting tool)

-Carefully get rid of Celestia's pony body, while keeping her head

-Then its a case of drawing (As close to the MLP style I can do with my tools) and draw her human body, as well as her royal garbs, and her fancy crown was cut and paste, but edited all in the same way,

-Then I have to get her a harp so she can play it, which is also copied, edited, resized and carefully positioned the same way... 12 times.

-To make it look like she's strumming the strings, I had to give her one set of arms and hands (she's wearing long gloves), and place them in different potions in each of the 12 frames to make it as smooth as I could.

-Then finally, there's the background, which is copied, pasted, and edited and reshaped to fit the needs.

...So, when all said and done there, There are exactly... 72 different pictures of Celestia playing that harp, and twice as many PROP and ROUGH copies to make it all work.

...OYI!! Can you imagine how much data that is?

When all 72 pictures are satisfactory, I take them to the movie maker.

With the soundtrack already pasted inside, it's a matter of import all the pictures into the selection area.

Then, one picture at a time, carefully drag each one that is needed into the track, and size the cell so that it matches in sync with the sound.

Remember: It's not just Celestia's hands that have to move in sync with the sound, but her mane has to stay fluttering at all times, even when she's holding still. That's why I have 72 different pictures of her.

Some of them may not even be used in the final print...!!! But it's important to have them anyway.

After days and days of hard work, you put the track together, render it and test, and you get... only a few seconds of fan-made animation. (Not as good as the actual animations, but not really too bad)

And remember that was just ONE PIECE of the entire puzzle. Celestia's only ONE character in the vid. Still have to do ALL THE OTHERS as well, and they are all done the exact same way-- copy, paste, edit, paint, background, motion, size, resize, fitted, and tested.

27 days of hard work just to make a 5 and a half minute vid.

and this is just a vid without people talking or singing... now those can be just as rough.

This vid tutorial I have will give you an idea of how I make singing vids...

But as I said, this is all I have...

-Many people who marvel at my vids are STUNNED that I could animate like this, and with low quality resources, but it does show what you can do, even with the weakest stuff, and don't HAVE to upgrade.

-I could get better equipment, yes... but then again, this is just a hobby, and that's all it's for. This isn't for money making, and I don't intend it to BE for money making.

-Even with what I have, there's lots of effects and tools I don't have. (I can't do blue/green screen backgrounds, or past such effects onto my vid) for those, I work in a partner ship with another Youtube channel (They like my vids, and agree to help me give them a little more zing, in return for my voice acting for their fan-made vids.)

-Microsoft Paint can only rotate the images by 90 Degree angles, and if I try to resize images IN THE PAINT itself, they pixelate and get distorted. So I use my Microsoft Word Processor, which can handle pictures as well... there, I can rotate to the proper angle, and size images carefully without damaging the image, I can even give a few effects that my PAINT and MOVIE MAKER can't do.

-Still some effects, they have to be done by hand...

In this vid, I made the snow falling by hand (My partner wasn't available at the time to help)

And some effects I have to CHEAT at to make work (Like how real film makers do)

2:13

When the ponies teleport down in those colored lights (light Power Rangers) I used several images and transitions (Special overlaping effects for the images)

When you see the lights coming down, I'm using an effect called WIPE, WIDE DOWN, which changes one image to another in the form of that clean sweep.

The problem is... there is DOWN angle.. and a RIGHT, but there is no LEFT or UP effect. The movie maker just doesn't come with them

5:18

Which means I can't make the ponies teleport AWAY, going up like that, unless I cheat my way around the effects. (The images were filmed upside down, so I could use the WIPE, WIDE DOWN effect, and then render that skit alone, and paste the small vid into the track, and flip it right-side up... the system works)

It's like in movies, flying model helicopters on wires can be difficult because of the spinning rotors. So, film the helicopter begin flown upside down, and then flip the image right side up.

Still, that's basically how I make my movies, and it did earn me a great rep on Youtube (Over 12-thousand subs and rapidly increasing every day) but it's not a contest.

It's hard work, it comes with headaches, weariness, insomnia, and a few freak-outs when the programs malfunction and freeze here and there (It's part of the business) but it's worth it. It all looks so magical when it's done...

The best part of all is... you can watch things come to life, by YOUR HAND, and finally see things the way you want to see them. (Even if it's not the real deal, it tastes just as good)