Shhhhssh ! Grown-ups are speaking. 
@ Mud duckling: Hmmmph. Okay, perhaps I\'m a little molified (Note, I said \"a little\").
I think I see our disconnect now:
You wrote:
... Not bad. Only your second time using the program? Cool! Which program? ...
Addition to being familiar with the subject matter you are attempting to critique, another \"rule\" about offering to hold oneself out as an effective critic is that you are expected to actually ***complete*** the review of the artwork (book, movie, play, article, etc.) upon which you offer your opinion. You don\'t read the first chapter of a book, close it, and then write a review trashing it for being boring (or whatever). You are not entitled to look at the front side of a mini and then dismiss it as a \"one dimensional expression of art\" by the artist. Nor it is anticipated that one would have the nerve to watch a
portion of a video and then presume to criticize the work in its entirety.
If you can\'t hang in there for the entirety, you don\'t get a vote. That\'s the rules.
In asking what software I used, that tells me you did not watch the trailer through to the end. You saw the video go to black screen, heard just the music playing, and shut off the video before it finished. LOL !
Holy cow ! You essentially \"walked out of the theater\" before the credits started or finished rolling, and then you wrote a multi-paragraph comprehensive \"critique\" of the work and posted it for the world to see how much you knew and how little the artist did.
Don\'t bother to go back and watch the whole thing now. It\'s got a whole LOT of black screen that was intentionally put in (not accidental \"bad editing\" like you strangely want to keep insisting). If you couldn\'t stand the 1 second black screen shots, you\'ll hate it the several seconds of black screen towards the end.
Film producers can\'t make people sit in their seats to review their film credits (translation: show a little respect for all the work and people that went into a project), but the directors of the Pirates of the Carri bean franchises found a solution for that ailment. They reward people who will remain in attendance until the ***Completion*** of their artwork. At the end of the POTC credits, patient and respectful viewers get a 60 second piece of bonus footage with another story added. I\'m quite sure they don\'t regard that as \"bad editing\" (no, they didn\'t forget to add it before the credits). It was intentional.
Had you actually viewed the video to the complete end, including the black screen, you would have caught the shot of the elephant being presented, the credits as to the software used, and humorously, the little tongue-in-cheek message I inserted as the final line of the video for folks who would do exactly what you did --- trash something meant in good fun and never offered to my viewers to be taken overly seriously.
The final line of the trailer says:
Honi soit qui mal y pense.
Google that for the translation.
I think what I found disrespectful and inappropriate about your \"critique\" was that you did ***not*** offer it in an attempt to be helpful. Your remarks were formatted as \'put downs\' and presented deliberately in a style attempting to come across as more knowledgeable about a subject towards someone\'s work who is a beginner. Your alleged studies in film certainly explain why you felt superior in this regard. But when you offer opinions on subject matter on which you are not knowledgeable (i.e., the substantive content, rather than the technical presentation), one does not come across across as expert just an opinionated person who doesn\'t know the topic.
There is a huge, huge difference between being forthright and frank (not including \"bs\" as you say), and being dismissive and impolite. You can be informative and direct in your suggestions for improvement--without using terms such as \"BAD BAD BAD\" or \"amateurish\" or the like.
You may wish to re-evaluate why people look at you \"funny\" over your critiquing.
In your second email, you sound surprised when I mention (again) it was just my 2nd movie. Did you not read that in the post? If you are going to criticize something, don\'t you need to get your background (that you have control over) straight before you do so?
Also, you missed the analogy I used over your own grammar errors. I write for a living, so am \"comfortable\" in that art. It is easy for me to skewer you and your \"amateurish\" effort to write a art review. You write that you are not comfortable in writing so please just focus on your intent, and I should excuse your grammar errors.
Hello? Is that not the exact same thing I was saying? I am not \"comfortable/experienced\" in film editing, could you kindly focus on the intent rather than my punctuation and production skills that are all of 7 days old?
I patronize a great many artists---all of whom started as \"amateurs\". We certainly don\'t \"help\' beginning miniature painters and \"encourage\" them to remain in the hobby and improve by looking at their first efforts and saying, quote, \"BAD BAD BAD\"
... or when the artist says \"that was intentional on my part and part of my vision to reply to them, and I quote you,
No, I disagree. It looks amateurish. It make it look like you ... just didn\'t care. It adds nothing to the piece.
That is not \"helping\" or \"constructive.\"
That\'s being \"rude\" and encourages no one.
I wrote, \"My intended viewer does not need to be told who Jeremie is--they know. Or what a slayer sword is -- they know.\"
You responded,
Never believe that!
I beg your pardon. You may (or may not) know something about film editing, but you know \"squat\" (that\'s a legal term) about promotion. When a person creates an advertisement for golf products, they have a target audience. The target audience has a certain level of base knowledge of the sport. The target audience does not need to be told why a particular metal is desirable in the golf clubs, or why they might want to own a golf glove, or why I have Arnold Palmer hawking my products (and why they should listen to him). Those are what is called \"givens\" in the world of advertising and promotion.
It is certainly presumptuous of you to tell someone \"who\" their target audience is. Excuse me? I believe that is the business and decision of the film director.
The target audience is **not** people who unfamiliar with certain \"givens\" of the product.
My target audience (and I believe that is my decision to determine, not some 3rd party\'s) is people who ALREADY:
1) know what ReaperCon is and offers
2) who Jeremie Bonamant Teboul is
3) why they would want to learn from him
4) read that this was a 2nd attempt of a non-professional posted for fun and should expect quality accordingly
If you have to ask if \"Grallapoussah\" is the name of that piece [good gawd], \"if it won any awards\" [holy cow!], why it might be \"worth the time and money to go\" sit under the tutelage of \"this guy\" [Jeremie Bonamant Teboul, the 6th top ranked artist on CMON], or that the 2nd effort of non-professional film producer who posted something for fun and the video will reflect accordingly, I think it is a pretty safe bet that you are NOT within my target audience.
The fact that you are still suggesting things I could have (or should have) added, or can go back and add, simply underscores that you missed the point which is this was never meant to be commercial production. I have no intention on going back and \"re-editing\" my piece to \"fix\" it to fit someone else\'s vision of what they think it should be to do what they think I meant.
We will have to agree to disagree about what are appropriate expectations to have and what\'s considered socially acceptable to criticize when you buy the 25 cent lemonade at the side of the road, versus the $3.95 glass down at the Red Robin Restaurant.
The Queen says, Learn some manners if you insist on sharing your opinions and critiques. It\'s \"amateurish\" and \"BAD BAD BAD\" to do otherwise. .... It\'s not what you say, but how you say it.
In the meantime:
Honi soit qui mal y pense.
