Starting to edit was my favourite aspect of this project because this really pushed me out of my comfort zone, I never professionally edited any videos to make a narrative and make it look interesting apart from short Instagram videos. I started off from importing all my videos and photos from my photoshoot to a made folder on my desktop. From there I could criticise myself and eliminate videos that were not needed, were shaky or didn’t have much to offer. The strongest ones were labelled and sorted out in order from the date created. 

I then thought of what is going to be the story and therefore I arranged them into groups where I had Cuba footage on one side and London footage on the other. This way I could place them onto the timeline easily without them being jumbled up. 

Here you can see the whole set up of my editing software. I have my media on the left where I could easily access them, the frame window on the bottom with the audio file and the screen where I could preview the clips on the right. 

Before editing the videos, I made sure each clip is stabilised completely so that I could only get clean and smooth shots. 

This was my most useful tool, by using this dial I adjusted the contrast, highlights, exposure and black points of any specific clip I chose. Most films were shut during natural daylight and didn’t really need heavy correcting however the footage shot after sunset needed some shadow and contrast correction due to loosing detail and colour. 

 This was the function where I could adjust the audio to my clip. I was thinking hard about what music choice should I choose. I had an idea that I wanted rap because of the youth culture in London but then I realised that the spoken language in Cuba was Spanish and therefore I wanted to have Spanish lyrics. I came out to bring in the song by Bad Bunny called “Callaita”.  It was a song full of energy, it reminded me of the time I spent in Cuba and the words to connect such as the rapper singing about the beaches “playa” and singing about partying and being yourself, which is what Konrad portrayed in London.

My software allowed me to modify the clips by using slow motion and time lapse to create effects interesting for an eye. The slow motion was used to really appreciate the view and the clothing whereas the fast forward function was used for more rapid movements such as dancing or walking. 

Here you can see the Titles page where I Could insert text on top of my video for credits, quotes and locations.  I used this to write: Damian Sliwa, Featuring Central London, and Cayo Coco in Cuba, Buy less choose well and do it yourself, la vida es simplemente hermosa, Curtis Luchanah and Konrad Kuros. I didn’t want to overflow the text as my audience would get too distracted therefore I kept it minimal. 

Whereas here I present the numerous transitions that I placed in-between scenes so the transitioning wouldn’t be so simple and boring. It does give it a nice feel and style to my work. For example, rather than going straight into the next frame, it transitions by fading or blurring into the next scene. 

Towards the end of the film I inserted some quotes that could relate to my video. I stated “Buy less, choose well and do it yourself!”. The purpose was to tell my audience that London is about being independent and doing things by yourself and not looking at others. People in London tend to choose the wrong clothes and manage to buy a huge amount of them too without realising half of the things were not needed and the only reason why they bought it was to stay on top of the trends rather than focusing what makes them comfortable. 

In contrast with the English quote I had to insert one is Spanish. This translates to: “Life is simply beautiful”. I wrote that because the scenery I present in my opinion looks magical and it’s a shame not to say what a beautiful life I had for that one week in Cuba.  

I ended my fashion film with two moving images of my two main models, Curtis and Konrad. I titled their names in transition instead of doing a credit page as I don’t think it was necessary due to the already made length, it simply would have made it too long. The arrows facing each other are symbols that a transition is being used in that area.  

To conclude the edit took me a whole rough day to do which I am happy with because the soundtrack goes well with the video, the footage is not shaky, the colours are vibrant, and it has a great narrative of contrasting two different worlds.