Since my last video on Mt. Takadate, which didn't do so well at all, I've been thinking of ways that I can improve. You should think of ways to improve even if the video does do well, but to be honest, this video was a bit of an experiment. I wanted to focus on the visuals of the mountain to give the viewer a feeling of what it would be like to climb it, but the quality of the images wasn't there, and I did it in a way that doesn't focus on the reason why Takadate was on the 100 Famous Mountains of Yamagata in the first place. In the case of a low mountain like Takadate, this is probably the angle I should have taken.

Since then, I've filmed my next two mountains to share, The Hidden Side of Haguro, and another one that will be released in due course, and I think I need to do a much better job at getting good footage in the first place. My excuses both times were that I was with people more interested in climbing the mountain than filming the experience, which contrasts to Mt. Kinbo that I climbed with a friend interested in photography and videography, and Mt. Arakura that I climbed individually. This means I spent less time on what I now think are the more important things to capture while out on the mountain, such as a good introduction, and a good finish as well.

I'm sure it's been said, but you can only do so well with bad footage. At a guess, I'd say it would be much easier to edit when the footage is there. So the next challenge for me is making sure that I get the best footage I can each time. I had it in the back of my mind that I could just 'edit out the bad', but this has proven to be entirely wrong.

These mountains are interesting places. I could hardly sleep the other night because I got so excited writing about my experience. Now I need to do a better job of portraying that excitement and getting people interested in climbing the mountains, which is one of my main aims of this project. But as I've learned, there's no such thing as editing out the bad. The only thing you can do is get the good.