The Songwriter Online’s Matthew Moran will be presenting a FREE seminar titled:
Music 2 Money: Business Strategies & Technologies for the Professionally-minded Musician.

Here is the event page on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=160350834019036

Additional details:
Where: GC Studios, 6400 Owensmouth Ave, Woodland Hills, CA  91367
When: 2:00PM to 3:00PM
What: Matt will cover a basic business plan, merchandising, gigging strategy, and tools to help you both organize your business and create a stronger online presence.

Please help spread the word. Share on Facebook and pass along to your friends.

I typically want my band’s videos to have a more professional appearance. Rather than have the video just start, I wanted to add an image with the band and logo at the start of the video. I, however, am not really a graphic designer. Rather than use a complicated graphics program, I found that using Powerpoint provides a very rapid method for doing exactly what I wanted.

If you find this helpful, please pass it along and leave us a comment. Have a question? Leave that here too.

Here is an example from one of my band’s videos:

Once again, we turn to Google for an amazing tool. I’ve done several surveys for both general business and music business interested folks. I’ve used Google forms to create the surveys and when doing so, have asked if people want to learn how to create and use a form similar to what they are filling out. And surprise, it remains one of the most popular topics.

Here is a video showing how to setup your first Google Form. Of course, you will need a gmail or google apps account. But that takes no time and is one of the most valuable tools you will use.

Watch the video and then, if you wish, go to test the form out.

If you have questions or comments, leave them here on the website or send an email to one of the email addresses listed in the video.

I was talking with a friend of mine the other day; actually, the conversations has sort of grown as we’ve spent some time together. He is a songwriter and performer – looking to build a base of fans/passionate listeners. Recently, he performed at some local clubs that require a minimum draw. He met the minimum once but two times did not, requiring that he pay the venue.

He had another such gig coming up and he asked me if he should perform there. My answer was an emphatic no!!! Let’s discuss pay to play – and why I don’t do that.

Let’s split performers into two distinct groups. Those who have a large base of fans and those who don’t.

I fall into the second category. So does my friend. I am building pockets of support – across the US – which is rewarding. But largely, I am “building” – that’s the key word here. So is my friend.

Pay to Play – described

Pay to play takes a few different forms.

Guaranteed draw/minimum draw

This means the venue books you with the understanding that you will have at least 15, 20, 25, 50, X people at the show. They will pay you for each person above that number. For each person below that number, you pay the venue the ticket price.

So, if you need 15 people at the show and you get 5, you owe the venue $10 x 10 or $100.

Ticket to Sell

In this version, the venue gives your (or you buy) X number of tickets. You have to sell a certain amount to cover your cost or you can give them all out. Either way, if you don’t sell enough tickets to cover the cost,  you are out that money.

Buy-in

This version of pay-to-play involves an upfront fee to get on the bill or to get a time-slot. The venue will, at this point, pay you 100% of all fans who pay the cover-charge at the door.

Check your ego at the door

Here is the problem with pay to play. Typically, the band or artist wants so badly to play X venue – because other bands play there – that they agree to the terms. Then, they go about inviting friends and family to the venue.

By the 2nd or 3rd time doing this, your friends and family are pretty much tapped out. They are done seeing you and you are now underwriting the venue for the opportunity to play to the band that played before you – as they pack up and leave – and playing a couple songs for the band playing after you, and their friends and family – as they arrive.

What is your Goal?

You have to ask this question a lot. Are you simply looking for any place to play – and you just want to play for friends and family. If so, what does the pay for play venue get you?

A stage? A PA? Multi-colored lights? Hmmmm…

Grab 4 friends, a light and some colored paper, and play in your back-yard if that is the case. You get more than 40 minutes, you can rent a small PA for less than you’ll pay the venue, and you achieve the same thing.

Sure, you don’t get the glory of being on a stage and looking down at your three friends texting the friends who didn’t show…

On the other hand, if your goal is to build a base of fans/passionate listeners, there is another way.

Think Promotion and Opportunity

Here is a question..

Would you rather play play for your brother,  your mom, and your angry girlfriend/boyfriend or play for 5, 10, 20, etc. brand new listeners?

Nothing against your brother, mom, or your angry partner but I am guessing, when it comes right down to it, new listeners are the premium. They are what you want. They are what you hoped to get at the pay-to-play venue.

But, unless you are doing some great promotion, your new listeners are not there.

This is in part due to how we think about promotion and in part due to the venue. The pay to play venue has no true incentive for promoting your show. They’ve got your/their money. Their job is to fill the bill with acts that will invite enough friends to buy drinks at the bar. That’s full-time work!

Your job is to promote the show – and unfortunately, promoting through friends and family is just not that effective as a long-term strategy.

So, if you are going to promote a performance to NEW LISTENERS – why use a pay to play venue.

Instead, as a strategy, find a place that is inviting to new listeners and use an off-night strategy to book and promote your own show. For instance, an hour of music at a local cafe starting earlier than the 11:15 slot you had at the dive-bar.

Get flyers out, get some of your music to the venue. Get some of your music to surrounding businesses/vendors. (See my post on FREE CD’s). Let current passionate listeners – and yes, even friends and family know about the show.

And try to have a night back at the same venue already lined up 1 month later; or another local show – so you can promote it at the current show.

And make sure you have these other basics in place:

• A website (not a myspace, Facebook, or Reverbnation page – although you do need those) but a honest to goodness – ALLABOUTYOU.COM page. Own the network.
   
• An active mailing list. Use a professional service rather than your hotmail account. Act like you are a professional and people will start to believe it.
   
• Product/Anything to give out. Some postcards. A CD of 4 songs you recorded at your PC. A poster. A few t-shirts. A lyric sheet with a black and white picture. Let people take you home with them.

What I can tell you is that as your base grows, even the pay to play venues will want you there – and they won’t mention minimum draws.

Britt provided voice-over and James the mix and sound. Take a look below and let others know as well.

Promo Video: Watch on YouTube here

It includes links to my mailing list, myspace, facebook, YouTube, and twitter.

However, at live gigs I wanted to make it easier to gather addresses as well.  I have a mailing list and direct people there but recently while reading “I Don’t Need A Record Deal” by Daylle Deanna Schwartz, I put another tool in place.

One of the artist in her book created handouts with a perforated edge that included a small section they could write their email address on.  It gives them something to keep and something to leave with the performer with contact info.

I have cards already – and hand those out – but recently created a second card that a listener can fill out and then drop into my guitar case or some other container when I play.  Here is what it looks like:

I played recently and placed these cards on the tables.  Then, during my set, I pointed them out and asked for people to fill them out and drop them in my guitar case.  The response was excellent.

It makes is simpler than having people have to get up and go to a table and add their name to a list or pass a single list around the venue.

Making it as simple as possible is the key!

Here is the timeline for a video of my song South To Mexico from my September 27th performance at Cave Creek Coffee Company.

click image for larger version

In the timeline, you see all the elements we have discussed:

The intro plate, the video with effects, the MTV style overlay on it’s own timeline – at both the start and the end – and the Title at the end, on the same timeline as the video.

Creating The Video:
From the File Menu, select, Save Movie File.  You will be presented with the following window.

I select the My Computer option because I want the highest quality for my original movie file.  Other options, particularly email and web will produce a smaller movie.  When we upload to YouTube, the movie will be rendered by YouTube for distribution on their network.

Having the original file in a higher quality also means we can use it later for a DVD or other distribution option.

Next, name your file and select where Movie Maker should save it.

I named my file, 20080927_C4_SouthToMexico – to help me easily know, by looking at it, the date_venue_song.  Naming files in general using this method helps you sort them in a list.

Press Next and you will be asked about the file quality.  I am selecting the default – Best quality for payback on my computer.

Select Next and the movie will be created.

Uploading to YouTube:
We are going to upload the video to YouTube – although, the process is basically the same for all video upload services.  If you do not have a YouTube account, you will have to create that.  It is simple and I will not cover that here.

Logon to your YouTube account.  In the main page,  your account page, there is an Upload button.  Select Upload.

You will be presented with the following screen

click image for larger version

I put the song title and that it is an original song by Matthew Moran.

In the description, I put the lyrics and copyright information.  At the top of the lyrics I also have the text, “Recorded at Cave Creek Coffee Company, Cave Creek, Arizona”.

The video category is Music and in the tags I placed, “americana, acoustic, love song”.  I don’t really know where my music is categorized but this seems to be what other songwriters tell me I am. 

Date and Map Options:
To get to the date and map options, which further let us identify when the video was shot and where, we will select the choose options link on the Date and Map Options section.

This gives you the following fields.

I input the date and the city, state then press Search which brings up the map, as shown.

There are other options on YouTube for comments, sharing, etc. – I typically keep all the defaults.  Then press, Upload a Video.

You are presented with the following screen.

Browse for your video, select the file, and then press Upload Video.

Then wait…..  The screen will show the progress.  DO NOT LEAVE THE SCREEN.  LET THE UPLOAD FINISH FIRST.

When it finishes uploading, YouTube must then process the video – which basically means converting it to a flash movie and embedding their logo on it.

When it finishes uploading but before YouTube processes it, you will be presented with the code you can use to embed the video.  This will be important but you can always get to it later.  Here is what that looks like:

If you embed and publish the video before it is done processing – converting to flash – anyone visiting your website or blog will get a message that the video is not ready or available.

My advice, don’t publish the link or embed it until it finishes processing.  Processing can take anywhere from 4-5 minutes to 30+ minutes – I would imagine based on how many videos are being uploaded to YouTube.

If you select the My Videos link above or select My Videos under Account in the YouTube navigation, you will see your uploaded videos and the most recent will show as processing.  See image below:

From this screen, you can edit the video options (the description, title, date and map, broadcast, comments, etc.

When it is done processing, you can also select which plate shows in the YouTube preview of your video.  They don’t offer many options – just 3 -and it is a random sampling from somewhere in your video.

Once it is done processing, you can get the link and the embed code by simply clicking on the video and playing it.

To the right of the video, you will see the following:

The URL is the direct link.  The Embed is the code to embed it in your website or blog.

Embedding Your YouTube Video
I use LiveWriter to write this and other blogs.  It makes embedding videos from YouTube and other services simple.

In LiveWriter, I select, Insert Video. The following screen appears:

Copy the Embed code from the YouTube window and paste it into Video URL or Embed box at the top of the above window.  Press Insert and the video will be embedded into your LiveWriter blog post – just like it is below…

I also copy the direct link (URL) and make the title above my video open my YouTube page.

If you do not use Livewriter and edit your HTML on  your website directly.  Simply copy the Embed code into a section of HTML on your website.  You can place it between <p></p> paragraph tags or between <div></div> tags to allow you greater control over how it aligns on the page.   Or simply give your web designer the Embed code and let them do it.

Also, if you are creating pages or blog post directly in a web-based editor like WordPress, Blogger, Typepad, or others – there is usually an option for embedding video or for editing HTML (source) directly.

If you run into a problem or have a question, just ask in the comments.

I hope you found this tutorial and the entire series helpful.  Let me know.

A Word About Branding:
Brand is a combination of images, phrases, products, ideas – that make up you, your company/organization, and how you are perceived in the marketplace.  It is the recognition of a Logo or a jingle.

In order to help further your brand or at least the consistent look of your videos, having a plate or image at the start and/or end of your video is helpful.  Ultimately, your brand is the quality of what you produce and how you are perceived or understood in the market but let’s do what we can to further our brand with some consistent intention.

Video Title Plate
I could hire a graphic designer or spend a lot of time learning Photoshop or some other graphic program to create a professional looking title plate for my videos….  But I don’t have the budget or the time.  However, I can generate a nice title plate using Powerpoint and a few images from my collection – images of me performing.

I bring them into Powerpoint, set a background color for the slide, and place the images on top of a second colored square – just as a way to border the images – or tie them together.

I save the Powerpoint file – as a powerpoint file first.  This allows me to keep the slide in case I decided to make changes to it later.   Then I save it as a jpeg image by selecting, “File->Save As” – select file type and select JPEG image.  Give it a name you can identify and set the directory you want to save it in.

I have a folder called Collateral\Music – and I save both the Powerpoint and jpeg image in there.

You will be prompted to save the current slide or all the slides.  Select current slide.  Here is what my current title slide looks like:

Your next step is to import the image into Movie Maker so you can use it at the start of your movies.  This is as simple as selecting “File->Import Into Collections” and select the image.

I’ve imported the image into the collection we created before – with the 5 movie segments.

click on image for larger version

As you can see, when I highlight the image (or any media) in a collection, it shows up in the preview window at the right.

The Timeline
All movie editing starts with the timeline.

click on image for larger version

The timeline is where you place your media and make fine-tuned adjustments.  For instance, you can:

• Cause video or images to fade in and out;
• Adjust audio levels to fade in or out or increase the volume;
• Adjust the length of time an image shows on the screen;
• Add and move Title/Overlays – words on top of or in front of your movie;
• Add affects to the video – like brightness, slow motion, or other features;

I add two title/overlays to my videos, in addition to the intro plate pictured above.

The first is a title I used to put at the start and end of my videos.  Now, however, I have it only at the end.  It is a whole screen title with the name of the song and where it was filmed.  You can see the plate for South To Mexico below:

To create this, you select, Tools -> Titles and Credits -> Title After The Selected Clip.

You will be presented with a box to enter text but we want a different type of animation, so don’t type anything.  Below the text box presented, select, Change The Title Animation.

Scroll down and select Titles, Two Lines->Moving Titles, Layered.

Select “Edit Title Text” and you will be given a two-box title screen.

Enter your text, as shown.  Song title in the top box, specifics in the lower box.

I also edit the “text font and color” – making the background black and the text white.  I adjust the font size there as well.

When you select Done, the title plate is added to the end of the movie or selected clip.  You can drag and drop it in the timeline if you wish to move it.

Differences in Titles and Overlays
Titles, in general, are those text plates that come before or after your movie media.  You will notice that these exist on the same timeline as your movie and your title image.

Overlays, in contrast, have their own timeline and appear “on top of” or in front of the media (images or movies) in the main or top timeline.

The above title appears before or after the media on the main timeline.  However, we also want that VH1/old MTV style title that appears as the video starts and ends.  As in the image below:

To add this, we also go to “Tools->Titles and Credits”

This time we select “Add title on the selected clip”

We select the “Subtitle At Bottom” Title Animation

In this case, based on my dark video, I chose a white font color.

Type whatever text brands your video how you would like – website, copyright, song title, etc.

Press done and it is added to the timeline.

I copy this overlay and paste it a second time, dragging it towards the end of my song as well.  By default, the overlay last 5 seconds or so.  You can zoom closer and drag it by either end to lengthen it’s duration.

I try to place it just as the music starts and again, just as the music ends.

For my videos from my September 27th date – which was quite dark, I also added two brightening affects to the video.

Just click on the video clip in the timeline, right mouse-click and select Video Effects.

You will also note that the video has a Fade In, From Black and a Fade Out, To Black effect.  You can add those here but I added them by again, right mouse-clicking the video in the timeline and selecting “Fade In” and “Fade Out” – which are standard actions.  I also fade in and fade out on the audio.

Transitions
To get that nice fading transition between your intro plate, the video, and the final plate, you can add the video transition, “fade”.

However, all you really need to do is from the timeline, click and drag the video slightly to the left, over the title image.  This creates a fade automatically.  Do the same with the final overlapping title at the end and drag it slightly over the end of your video.

You may need to zoom in on the video to drag it the proper amount.

Below is a zoomed in section of my timeline.  You can see the video is slightly over the VideoTitlePlate and that the overlay starts somewhat into the music (by looking at the audio attached to the video).  You can also see the little blue stars on the video clip – showing you that there is at least 1 video effect on the movie.

click on image for larger version

At any time, you can click the ruler above the timeline and press the “play” button on the preview window to see what your affects and transitions look like.

You are almost ready to create, upload, and then embed your movie.

If you have any questions so far, please post them here in the comments.

Based on our prior tutorial, I am assuming you have your video read into Microsoft Movie Maker and are ready to start creating individual movies.

I am well aware of the danger of “assuming” but I have to start somewhere.  If you are struggling with getting your video captured and onto your PC, leave a comment and let me know.  I’ll see if I can provide more detailed instruction.

By creating individual movies, I mean a single movie for each song performed.  In the video I am working with for this tutorial, there are 5 songs.

1. Do It Again
2. Is It Too Late (still need to upload this video)
3. Everyday Lies
4. I’ll Make You Feel
5. Morning Girl

If, by chance, you have a video camera that produces a movie file, you can import that file into Movie Maker.  This will also create a Collection with the same name as your movie file.

What is a Collection?
It is a folder or container in Movie Maker for media that you have created or imported.  It can hold images, movies, and audio.

You can (and should) create a collection for any images you will use repeatedly in your videos.  I have a collection where I have video intro plates – branded for marketing purposes.

You can create movies using media (images and movies) from any of your collections – you don’t need to “import” the same image into every “collection” created when you capture or import video.

Note: When you import your movie, select File->Import into Collection

Make sure you uncheck the “Create clips for video files”

Clips are video segments.  Movie Maker will create breaks based on what it believes are transition points in your video.  However, we are going to manually create our own clips or segments based on the beginning and ending of a particular song or segment of our performance.

If we allow Movie Maker to create clips for us, it will arbitrarily generate segments based on changes in lighting or audio breaks.  The image below shows the Movie Maker collections window after importing a video with the “create clips for video files” checked.  It created 68 clips or video segments for the 20 minutes of video.

click image for a larger view

As I have said above, I have 5 total songs in this section of video – so 68 clips is far too many.

Fortunately, the original file is in-tact.  Clips are virtual breaks or space holders in Movie Maker.  Any captured or imported video remains in its completed form on your harddrive.

Also, you do not have to re-import your movie to bring it in as a single clip.  You can highlight all the segments and select “Combine” from the “Clip” menu or right mouse-click and select “Combine”.  This will combine the clips back into a single clip.

click image for a larger view

Creating Clips
Movie Maker, like most video editing software, has a timeline (bottom pane), the media pane (upper left), and the preview pane (upper right).   We are not yet working with the timeline.

By highlighting our section of video, we can preview the video in the preview pane.  We will be finding the beginning and ending of each song in my performance and creating a clip – or splitting the video at that point.

I don’t need to be 100% precise.  In fact, I will leave some room at the start and ending of each song so I can fade in and out later.  To find the break points, I can watch the entire movie or drag the movie placement control in the preview pane.

Once we find a good place to break our clip, we can select “Clip->Split” from the menu or press the “Split” icon on the preview window.

The Split icon looks like:

Pressing it will cause your video in the Collection window to split into two segments.

click image for a larger view

By default the two segments will keep the same name, with the second segment adding a numeric value.  However, to make our clips easier to keep track of, we will rename each segment for the song it contains.  As mentioned above, the first song is “Do It Again”.

I highlight the first segment, press F2, and type “Do It Again”.

Now I can do the same for the rest of the songs.  Simply go through my clip, find the ending of each song, give myself a few seconds to fade out, and split the segment and rename.  When complete, I am left with a collection screen with 5 individual segments or clips like below.

click image for a larger view

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If you’ve gotten this far, you are well on your way to creating your performance videos.  I’ve got to run to do some consulting and make some coffee.

Coming next: Your branded video intro plate & your first movie