Hello All,
well my first edit uploaded

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=20CJ1QA9

Its this terrain buggy competition called 'Torque Gear' I just filmed for fun when I was in India (the buggies might not be upto 'world class standards' but the editing is )
Do let me know what you guys think - As much as I like imparting constructive criticism, I like receiving it too.
For some reason the final video is a little more 'grainy' before/after the transitions, any1 know why?

PS - Since the hosting site is free, you might have to wait a little less than a minute untill the 'download' link appears

Nice sense of occasion - it’s always good to video fun events. Handheld and fast-paced, it’s stylish, but I think a couple of things let you down.

I feel you could have done more with the available light. It suffers from poor contrast, and muddy colour, which contributes to the 'grainy' effect. It could be greatly improved with contrast & colour balance filters during the edit.

I like the final part - sticking in ‘extra bits’ is a cute little touch. It's enjoyable to watch.

Great i Really loved it,
I like the fast paced Films and this was one of them, no silly flip, trans all great trans

Good to see the people who race and their face expressions

The track was great i loved it

Going to watch it again ...........

It was Fast.. Informative ... great sound track .... made me want to see it again

Good one mate

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Thanks for the feedback guys - Nice to know you guys liked it.

tone33, Im very 'amateur' editing wise and Ive never once changed the contrast/colour of the raw video or used filters (Thats primarily becasue I have no idea how to do that). Is it really tough? Would i have to change the contrast of each clip? - I use Premier 6.5. Even the balance filers - how do I use that?
Yeh, I agree the colours of the video are very muddy - Id really like to change that.

Any tips would really help me out

No it’s very simple, just adding a little brightness first, then a touch of contrast to make the image crisp will improve things a lot. Try it, you’ll be surprised.

You drop the Brightness & Contrast filter onto the clip, then adjust its values in the effects control box. And yes, I add this filter to most clips to smarten them up. Try moving the sliders up to 20 for brightness, and about 12 for contrast (or just enter numeric values by clicking the zeroes).

This ratio – contrast at three-fifths of the brightness value – works fine for most things, but far greater values can be used very effectively.

(Colour balance isn’t usually so necessary. After years of adjusting colour balance in darkroom printing, I’m used to tweaking it to compensate for naff lighting and things, but it’s not a must, so don’t be too concerned about this.)

I loved using Premiere 6.5, it has a great nuts’n’bolts feel to it, more so than Pro 1.5 which I’m stuck with. Give this a whirl and post back.

sweet -
thanks for the tech advice,
will try and out and tell you how it turns out

Hey tone33,
that worked great. I tried that on a few clips and it make biiiig difference -
thanks heaps mate, no more 'mudd' in my edits now

Glad it helped.

Sometimes, the little things are the big things. It can make such a big difference, I'm surprised that many video help forums never seem to dwell much on it.

Of course, if you shoot under perfect lighting conditions all the time, then these adjustments aren't really necessary.

Forgot to mention, I liked the group-participation of your video. They all seemed like-minded, and keen to be part of the gig.