(light melodic music)
- So, this is the drone boomerang effect,
and in this video, we're gonna go through, step-by-step,
how you create one of these in your videos.
Now, I really like using this effect
to just show the scene.
It's really easy to be centered on your subject
and then whoosh, you see the entire view
of wherever you're at
and it doesn't take a lot of time.
And the whole idea behind creating the boomerang
is that you can loop this backwards and forwards
so that you can create a cool effect that loops infinitely
that you can use for social media.
But you can also just use the quick swoop out
or the quick swoop in, in all the other videos
that you're creating so you can get this quick bounce
between a subject and a viewpoint or vice versa.
So how this video is laid out is step one, filming;
step two, speed ramp; step three, motion blur;
step four, sound effects;
and then step five, music and step six, color grading.
So first let's just get into filming.
What are the things that you wanna do to be able
to film your drone shots so that you can get
this cool, expansive boomerang looking effect?
So first is that when you're flying,
you wanna start in on a subject
and then fly out to reveal the scene.
And this is what the shot looks like
without any editing on it at all.
You could see, I just took my time and flew it straight out
to be able to get this big viewpoint.
Now, a couple of things to think about:
When you're flying manual,
you wanna make sure that you're not bumping the drone up
and down or left and right,
because all of those movements
are gonna be accentuated even more when you speed it up.
So you wanna try to create the smoothest move
from your subject to this viewpoint,
and you want to do a straight line.
Now this is where quickshots will come into play
because quickshots make it super easy
to create these super smooth lines.
And not only can you do this pull out effect,
but using one of the quickshots like the helix,
you can create this crazy arc around your subject,
and it's gonna be perfect because of the automation
that's built into your drone.
So that's why using a DJI drone like the Mini 2
that has quickshots built into it
will make this effect just look that much better.
You can use these automations to perfect the movement.
So if you're using quickshots,
you'll just lock in on your subject
and then set your distance away from camera.
I highly suggest bumping it up to the furthest distance
that you can, and then let the shot play out.
So you can see right here,
this is the helix shot from the DJI Mini 2
and this is just a quickshot.
And you could see that the drone goes all the way around us
standing on this viewpoint,
and it's just gonna keep going and going until it gets
to the final spot where it stops and just sits there.
Now that's key.
You wanna have a moment where on the front end,
you're just locked in on your subject.
And then a moment on the back end
where you're locked in on the vista,
because those two moments within the video
are gonna play out in real time.
So a few key things when you're flying:
One, if you're shooting manual,
make sure that you're smooth from beginning to end.
And two, you could flip it into one of the automation modes
and be able to get a super smooth shot
and just let the drone do all the work for you.
Alright, so step two, let's talk about speed ramping.
And we're gonna jump into Final Cut,
that's the editing software that I use.
However, you can do this technique
with most editing softwares out there.
So I'm gonna show you how you do it in Final Cut,
but just know that there is this ability
in other editing softwares as well.
So the first thing you wanna do is look for the moment
that you wanna play out in real time.
And this is that moment
where I'm just walking towards camera.
That's a smooth section.
So I'm gonna cut that
and I'm gonna make sure that
that is what plays out in real time.
Now, the next point I wanna look for
is when the drone is fully away from me,
and it's still smooth.
You can see how I kind of do a bump here
on the later end of the shot.
So I want to stop here
and I'm gonna go back, probably about that much.
Alright, so I'm gonna trim the heads and the tail
of that section.
So now I have the basic boomerang.
So I have the first section here,
which is gonna play out in real time.
I have the last section here,
which is also gonna play out in real time.
And then I have this middle section,
and this is the section that I wanna speed up.
Now because this effect is so quick,
I really don't need to speed ramp the ins and outs,
I really just need to speed up this one section.
So I'm gonna click Apple + R,
and that pulls up my retiming tools.
And I could either go through and do fast,
I can do a custom speed where I add a rate or a duration,
but on Final Cut,
I like to just grab this section right here,
where the little bar is and pull it back.
And so that automatically speeds it up
based on how far I pull this to the left.
So now let's just watch this real quick.
So that's pretty good.
It's a simple, just zoom straight out.
But we're not gonna end right there
because from here, there's a whole set of things
that you can do to really make this shot stand out.
So that's just the simple retiming.
It's just take the section in the middle, speed it up.
I have mine set at 3840%.
That just gives you an idea of how fast you can make
that middle section to give it that boom,
out to the wide shot.
So from here, the next step that I do
is I add a motion blur effect
because when the camera zooms out,
I wanna give this feeling of quick, fast motion.
And to do that, you can just add a motion blur effect,
and I'll link to one down below in the description.
It's the one that I'm using here in the shot
and how it works is I just drop it on top
and it creates a motion blur based on the footage
that is underneath it.
So I have this effect just called motion blur,
and it goes from one all the way up to six,
and then it has motion blur max and motion blur min.
On this shot,
what I found is that motion blur four seems to look good.
And basically all of these are different strengths.
And depending on how your computer is,
this might actually make your computer really chug
and slow it down.
I'm excited to get an M1 and really see
how these kinds of effects apply
because right now I'm working off
of a maxed out MacBook Pro and I still have issues
when I work with some of these plugins.
So I've added the motion blur just right on top.
You can see this first section underneath,
motion blur on top.
And this is what it looks like with just that on there.
So a little bit of motion blur,
it just gives that feeling of vroom, zooming out.
Now the next step is to add sound effects
because sound effects is really gonna help sell
this zoom out.
If you put like a whoosh sound effect,
it just intensifies the shot even more.
So I have three here that I've brought into this project,
a low wind whoosh, a shaker whoosh
and a rumble shutter flash.
So these are kind of a combination of a whoosh sound effect
with some others type of sound.
So like a shaker or a rattle.
These effects that I'm using kinda combine them
and it gives it a different quality
and then just whoosh.
So I like the sound of the shaker whoosh,
and I'm gonna add that underneath.
So because of the way the sound effect is,
it has a slow build up and then it tapers off.
So right at this moment where it hits,
that's where I wanna start this zoom out.
So I'm gonna just set this right around there.
(whooshing sound)
So that's a good way to just go from your subject out
to the vista and everything else around you.
So now when you wanna create this into a boomerang,
you wanna reverse the effect.
So now we're gonna add the same sped-up section
on the back end of this clip,
reverse it and go back to the initial shot.
So the first thing we wanna do is grab this part
that we've sped up
and we're gonna duplicate it on the backend.
Now I'm gonna use Apple + R again,
and that's gonna bring up my retiming,
and I'm gonna go to custom and I'm going to go to reverse.
So now essentially we're all the way out here
and instead of zooming out, it's gonna zoom in.
And what I'll do is I'll take this section
and I'm gonna duplicate that and put in the front.
So (whooshing sound)
Now you might notice there's a little jump here.
So all I did was extend this clip one frame,
and that was enough to make this seamless.
Okay, so we have our front half.
This is me walking, we zoom out with the motion blur
and we see the entire shot,
and then it zooms back to the initial shot of me walking.
And from here, now, what we need to do
is add the same motion blur effect over this section,
make sure it's timed exactly.
And then let's add a different sound effect
for zooming back in.
So I'm gonna pull up the three sound effects I brought in.
Let's use the low wind whoosh this time.
And then from here,
you basically take this and duplicate it on your timeline
and you can make an infinite boomerang.
It goes in and out, in and out,
boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
Now the next step to sell this even more
is add a little bit of music underneath it.
So what I have here is just a track
that I pulled off of Epidemic Sound.
That's what I use to get my music.
And I just have this plane underneath
this whole boomerang section.
(light melodic music)
So depending on how you're gonna use this effect
in your videos, you can put a little bit of music under it
and it's just gonna add that through line
through the video
where you have this continuous music track playing,
but then the boomerangs happen in and out, in and out.
Now from here, what I would do is add a color grade.
So I would just add an adjustment layer above all of this,
and then do a color grade on that adjustment layer.
Now you don't have to do the color grading last,
you could do this first.
So when you first pull the clip down
and before you start editing this boomerang,
you can apply your color grade then.
But my workflow, a lot of times, in Final Cut
is using an adjustment layer on top
and then adding my color grade to that.
Now I have a completed boomerang
with a little bit of music underneath it,
and it's pretty solid.
I can use this to upload to Instagram,
I could use it for my Stories.
But this effect works great on drone shots
when you wanna start on your subject and then zoom out.
Here's the effect on the helix
and you could see, I did the exact same steps,
but because I use the automation and the helix mode,
it creates a very different looking boomerang
than the original, just zoom out and zoom in.
So you use your quickshots
to create these cool looking effects,
whether you wanna make a boomerang
or you just want a quick transition in one of your videos.
Alright guys, if you haven't checked out some
of my other tutorials on the DJI Mini 2,
I highly suggest you start up here at the beginners guide.
This is gonna go through everything you need to know
about your Mini 2.
Alright guys, I'll see you over there.