Week 6 & 7 - A Pirate's Workout
The last 2 weeks I created an elaborate 20 minute pirate-themed workout video on the roof of my house. It took heaps longer than I thought - so I’m counting this a 2 week project and taking a few days break before week 8.
Tools I used:
ChatGPT - to generate the first couple of pirate-themed exercises. After that it was more fun to invent them myself (with help from Christian)
A Jolly Roger flag, hung with lots of tape (against 30-40mph winds)
A rooftop
An ambiguous leftover leather Halloween costume
iPhone 13 mini + tripod - for filming and recording the violin
Online interval timer - to keep me on track while filming
Final Cut Pro - editing the footage
Davinci Resolve - color grading
Figma - editing graphics to import into Apple Motion
Apple Motion - for custom timer overlay, titles, and video effects
Violin (played by Zander) - to the tune of ‘Spotted Pony’
Ableton Live (via James) - to turn the simple violin recording into the epic opening soundtrack
Stable Diffusion via Playgroundai.com - to make the floating-head pirate
A vocal mic + audio interface - to record my voiceover
D-ID - for the audio lip sync
Process
As seems to be the trend, this week’s project ballooned in scope as I got excited and wanted to add more and more ideas. Initially, I had planned for a ‘chill week’ and a very low investment project. I asked ChatGPT to give me 3 workouts - a HIIT, a Yoga, and a dance - in the theme of pirate.
Here were my first prompts:
I want to create 3 pirate themed workout videos, each 20 minutes long. There will be Yoga/Pilates, HIIT, and a dance class. Generate me the workout plans, including timing and exercise namesthese moves are boring. make them original moves that I wouldn't see in any other workout videos getting better. make them 50% weirder and harderAnd the output:
Yoga/Pilates:
◦ Warm-up (5 minutes):
▪ The Sea Serpent: Pretend you're a sea serpent, wriggling your arms and legs and making serpentine movements
▪ The Treasure Map Hunt: Crawl on your hands and knees, searching for a treasure map on the ground
◦ Training (10 minutes):
▪ The Swordfish: Hold a plank position, while waving your legs like a swordfish swimming
▪ The Squid Stretch: Get into a downward dog position, and pretend you're a squid reaching out with its tentacles
▪ The Ship's Wheel: Stand with your feet hip-width apart, holding your hands out like a ship's wheel. Rotate your hands in opposite directions, feeling the stretch in your back and arms
◦ Stretching (5 minutes):
▪ The Lobster Claw: Lie on your back, lift your legs and arms into the air, and pretend you're a lobster with your claws open
▪ The Net Cast: Sit with your legs spread wide, and pretend you're casting a net, reaching towards your toes with your hands
It looks like a menu at a fine dining restaurant, but the exercises themselves weren’t terribly inspiring. I had a few day lull after this, wondering if this week was going to be a flop.
My enthusiasm was revived after a freeform movement play session with my housemate Christian; we spent an hour finding weird ways to move around the house and experimented with a bunch of new pirate moves. The flag arrived the same day.
The time had come to film it. I’d narrowed down my exercise list to a tight 20 mins, added them to an interval timer, my costume was ready, my facial hair painted on. The day was perfect, sunny, and clear. Against my better judgement, I decided to wait until later in the day for a more flattering light. The light was good, but the wind picked up to an Antarctic Gale. As you’ll see in the video, I decided to plough ahead anyway. It was cold .. and my phone, bag, flag, and gear was all in danger of flying off the roof (I lost a pair of scissors into the abyss).
After the ordeal of filming, I eagerly replayed the footage to discover that my clip-on lapel mic fell off in this process. I had no audio…
I was impatient to get into the post-processing, so instead of re-filming it, I decided to overdub the audio. This gave me the idea of a floating head - and another chance to incorporate some new AI tools.
First I needed to create an avatar of myself as a pirate. Easily done with Stable Diffusion (I used playgroundai):
Next, I uploaded the images and recorded audio to D-ID - and I had the pirate avatars lip syncing with 80% realism.
You’ll see in the image above some overlays on the screen. These I made using Figma and Apple Motion. I found SVGs of a map and a wheel, cut out a lot of the details I didn’t need, then moved them over into Motion to animate. Super streamlined! I did the same with the opening title image and a cannonball. I also found a free Treasure Map font for the text.
I also wanted a unique soundtrack to add to the video. It just so happened that one of my housemates loves playing old Irish fiddle, and another is a pro at Ableton.
After several more hours of voice recording and audio + video editing, I finally had the video finished. There were still some timing issues with the music and a few cuts in the opening credits, but I had to call it done at some point or I’d be jumpin’ overboard meself. Yarrr!
Learnings
Video editing takes a long time. I’m still learning the tools, and it’s easy to fall into the trap of perfectionism
There are infinite media creation and manipulation tools that work well together. Importing concepts between software is awesome!
Losing the live recorded audio felt like a huge bummer at the time, but it sparked a fresh layer of creativity, exploration, and play
Ad-libbing / commenting over the top of a video of myself is weird but hilarious
Having amazing talented housemates to rope in to the process is a big bonus
Next Steps
Debut the film to the house as a live workout
Play around further with voice generator tools - like Eleven Labs
Get some new pants
Part 2 - Space cowboy workout?