Why bother?
Apr. 13th, 2007 12:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aislynnI received some probably wise advice tonight: if I stress SO much over vidding, then why am I even bothering? If I'm such a stupid perfectionist (adjective mine) and it makes it SO hard to even choose the next clip on the timeline, then how can I honestly say it's fun? And if it's a hobby, isn't it supposed to be fun?
I've got no answer for that. I'm sitting here feeling literally exhausted from working on this vid for the past 2 hours. I have not advanced it any at all tonight. It's still at 1:39. I spent all my time trying to straighten out the INSANE timing and trying to smooth out the rough transitions where my clips were too short to fit the time I needed them to fit. Then I sat here for the past 30 minutes trying desperately to find the next set of clips. I've tried just sitting here listening to the music with my eyes closed (sometimes I'll suddenly "see" what's supposed to go next). I've tried sitting here quietly and just going through the bin thing (I've already closed Vegas and I guess I'm upset enough I can't remember what the "holding pen" for your eps/clips is called *sigh* ) and hoping that inspiration would strike (sometimes that works as well).
I've got nothing. I literally CANNOT find the next clip. So I jumped ahead to the next clip that I did know (it's so nice that Vegas lets you do that). I found that clip that's about 6 seconds down the timeline, cut it out... and it's got the blinkies. BAD. *sigh* If you know Vegas, then you know that that is its neurotic twitch. You'll have 50 split-seconds of black randomly strewn through your clip. I've found the quickest way to deal with it is to zoom in close, then go through it one split-second at a time, splitting the clip and removing each instance of black until you've got rid of them all. Then quickly re-rendering that piece and use THAT for your vid. If you wait too long, more blinkies will appear and you'll have this one clip cut into a zillion pieces for nothing. *sigh* I started to do that and realized...the clip really doesn't work there. So I didn't bother "de-blinking" it.
So, scratch that 6 second ahead clip. I'm back to nothing again. And I'm dead tired and I have nothing to show for all this wrestling and fighting I've done with this thing today. It's been 6 weeks today since I put the first clip on the timeline. At this rate, it'll be another month before I'm done with the last minute and, you know what? I'm sick of looking at this thing. I just want it DONE so I don't ever have to meet it in Vegas ever again. And that's a real great way to feel about my vid. It'll certainly show in this last minute, that's for sure.
I'm tempted to just switch off to something else but I know from experience if I do, then I'll never come back to this one. But maybe that's for the best. If it's THIS hard to do, then there's probably some intrinsic flaw I'm building into it that's going to make it look stupid anyway. So what am I struggling so hard for? To make a dumb-looking vid? Why do I struggle AT ALL to vid anymore?
I lost my writing this exact same way. This same sort of stuff happened at the end, where it became physically painful to try and write, to face a blank page and realize that I had no words left in me to put on them. I have no clips for this vid. Maybe I don't have any clips for any vids. Maybe I should just give up on vidding like I gave up on writing and just forget I ever thought I was a "creative" person. Maybe I should just shut up entirely.
My apologies for leaving this where you can read it. I probably should've deleted it or made it private or whatever. I know you've all got to be sick of hearing this same old idiot complaining from me on EVERY vid. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of hating what I love. But I don't know how to get around it. I don't know whether to leave this vid where it's at and sacrifice it to try and save my vidding as a whole. Or do I press on and force myself to use just whatever clips and finish this thing, knowing full-well it looks bad? (That's what I did with my first Supernatural vid, quite honestly, and now I can't stand to even look at it anymore. :S I let it be substandard and that's really embarrassing to have to admit.) So do I do that to this vid, knowing I'll be ashamed of it down the line?
And why am I making such a big deal out of this at all, right? It's just a stupid fanvid. It's not my career, not my only means of supporting myself or something like that. It does NOT matter at all in the grand scheme of things. So why do I make this so hard?
Which brings me back to that advice. If it's not fun anymore, then why do I do it? Maybe I should give some serious thought to giving up on vidding. It'll hurt but it can't be worse than giving up my writing. I identified myself as a writer from the time I was old enough TO write. I sold my first story when I was a teenager. I was a writer. But I'm not anymore. I can be a "has-been" vidder just as easily.
The other day, I saw one of my flisters mark her entry as "one I'll be sorry later that I wrote." This one is my "one I'll be sorry later that I wrote."
Again my apologies. I'm really tired and I just needed to rant a bit and get this off my chest. Sometimes, you just need to talk it out, just to try and put it all in words to explain it to somebody else so you can try to explain it to yourself. I'm sure that none of this is as dire as it seems right now. I'll probably wake up tomorrow knowing exactly the right clip for this next set (that has ALSO happened before *sigh*). But the question still remains: why do I do something for "fun" when it's really NOT fun anymore?
I don't know the answer to that.
I've got no answer for that. I'm sitting here feeling literally exhausted from working on this vid for the past 2 hours. I have not advanced it any at all tonight. It's still at 1:39. I spent all my time trying to straighten out the INSANE timing and trying to smooth out the rough transitions where my clips were too short to fit the time I needed them to fit. Then I sat here for the past 30 minutes trying desperately to find the next set of clips. I've tried just sitting here listening to the music with my eyes closed (sometimes I'll suddenly "see" what's supposed to go next). I've tried sitting here quietly and just going through the bin thing (I've already closed Vegas and I guess I'm upset enough I can't remember what the "holding pen" for your eps/clips is called *sigh* ) and hoping that inspiration would strike (sometimes that works as well).
I've got nothing. I literally CANNOT find the next clip. So I jumped ahead to the next clip that I did know (it's so nice that Vegas lets you do that). I found that clip that's about 6 seconds down the timeline, cut it out... and it's got the blinkies. BAD. *sigh* If you know Vegas, then you know that that is its neurotic twitch. You'll have 50 split-seconds of black randomly strewn through your clip. I've found the quickest way to deal with it is to zoom in close, then go through it one split-second at a time, splitting the clip and removing each instance of black until you've got rid of them all. Then quickly re-rendering that piece and use THAT for your vid. If you wait too long, more blinkies will appear and you'll have this one clip cut into a zillion pieces for nothing. *sigh* I started to do that and realized...the clip really doesn't work there. So I didn't bother "de-blinking" it.
So, scratch that 6 second ahead clip. I'm back to nothing again. And I'm dead tired and I have nothing to show for all this wrestling and fighting I've done with this thing today. It's been 6 weeks today since I put the first clip on the timeline. At this rate, it'll be another month before I'm done with the last minute and, you know what? I'm sick of looking at this thing. I just want it DONE so I don't ever have to meet it in Vegas ever again. And that's a real great way to feel about my vid. It'll certainly show in this last minute, that's for sure.
I'm tempted to just switch off to something else but I know from experience if I do, then I'll never come back to this one. But maybe that's for the best. If it's THIS hard to do, then there's probably some intrinsic flaw I'm building into it that's going to make it look stupid anyway. So what am I struggling so hard for? To make a dumb-looking vid? Why do I struggle AT ALL to vid anymore?
I lost my writing this exact same way. This same sort of stuff happened at the end, where it became physically painful to try and write, to face a blank page and realize that I had no words left in me to put on them. I have no clips for this vid. Maybe I don't have any clips for any vids. Maybe I should just give up on vidding like I gave up on writing and just forget I ever thought I was a "creative" person. Maybe I should just shut up entirely.
My apologies for leaving this where you can read it. I probably should've deleted it or made it private or whatever. I know you've all got to be sick of hearing this same old idiot complaining from me on EVERY vid. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of hating what I love. But I don't know how to get around it. I don't know whether to leave this vid where it's at and sacrifice it to try and save my vidding as a whole. Or do I press on and force myself to use just whatever clips and finish this thing, knowing full-well it looks bad? (That's what I did with my first Supernatural vid, quite honestly, and now I can't stand to even look at it anymore. :S I let it be substandard and that's really embarrassing to have to admit.) So do I do that to this vid, knowing I'll be ashamed of it down the line?
And why am I making such a big deal out of this at all, right? It's just a stupid fanvid. It's not my career, not my only means of supporting myself or something like that. It does NOT matter at all in the grand scheme of things. So why do I make this so hard?
Which brings me back to that advice. If it's not fun anymore, then why do I do it? Maybe I should give some serious thought to giving up on vidding. It'll hurt but it can't be worse than giving up my writing. I identified myself as a writer from the time I was old enough TO write. I sold my first story when I was a teenager. I was a writer. But I'm not anymore. I can be a "has-been" vidder just as easily.
The other day, I saw one of my flisters mark her entry as "one I'll be sorry later that I wrote." This one is my "one I'll be sorry later that I wrote."
Again my apologies. I'm really tired and I just needed to rant a bit and get this off my chest. Sometimes, you just need to talk it out, just to try and put it all in words to explain it to somebody else so you can try to explain it to yourself. I'm sure that none of this is as dire as it seems right now. I'll probably wake up tomorrow knowing exactly the right clip for this next set (that has ALSO happened before *sigh*). But the question still remains: why do I do something for "fun" when it's really NOT fun anymore?
I don't know the answer to that.
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Date: 2007-04-13 08:10 am (UTC)*hugs*
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Date: 2007-04-14 05:24 am (UTC)Oh, I know that "pulling teeth" feeling all too well! It's horrible! Especially when you were able to write before and then it's just been cut off!
Not glad to hear that you've had this happen to you, too, but it's good to know that I'm not out here all alone in it, you know? *hugs!* ♥
(That icon is made of the proverbial awesome! ;) ♥♥♥! )