Behind-The-Scenes: Random Anime

Oh boy. This thing felt like it took forever to make. After I got horribly sick halfway through I was worrying it might never get done. So I apologize for not technically uploading a video in the month of January. But here's my thoughts on the random anime video!

I've had an idea for a while to review more shows in a straightforward manner. People really liked my Daily Life of the Immortal King video, and I want to make more content like that. But just picking a new or popular show felt a bit boring. So I wanted to add some sort of gimmick or twist to the format to spice it up. And using a randomizer was the perfect solution.

The video, to me at least, is very much based on RedLetterMedia's Best of the Worst series. Which, if you didn't know, is a video series where they spin a giant physical wheel with VHS tapes on it and have to watch whatever they land on, then pick the best one. My style is obviously very different to theirs though, so instead of the panel talkshow format they use I wanted to shape this video into something like what I normally do.

The format I had in mind for the video actually turned out pretty ideal. I recorded myself spinning the wheel and watching all the shows to get genuine reactions, then went and wrote green screen review/recap segments for each. I think the blend of the scripted history and recap with the reaction cutaways made for something easy to watch. The only thing holding it back a bit was the lack of reactions I had to the second and third show since I was still a bit sick. So I had to fill those in with some more history and recap to balance out the video.

Editing it was then a pretty simple affair, though incredibly tedious. Chopping up the shows for the recaps, and chopping up my reactions took forever. Don't know if there's anything I can really do about that though. The reaction shots are all the red, orange, and yellow footage in the timeline, if you're curious.

As you might have noticed, I also changed the framing of the green screen couch a bit! I went back and forth on it, but ultimately I like being in the side of frame, because it gives me more room to show images and text in the background. And being a little closer to camera just felt pretty natural. I know people have complained about the couch taking up too much of the frame, but I like it. I might just need to decorate it with some props or something.

Overall, I really liked making this video. And I think even if it ultimately doesn't do well I'm gonna make a sequel at some point. It's just too fun to give up on. I might make the next one a bit shorter. But other than that I don't even know what I'd change.

If you have any questions about the video, or thoughts on the final result, let me know!