PhysMuse

So, I have always liked the idea of creating a Udemy course, but have never been able to decide on something that I wanted to teach.

Until recently.

After completing the book (paid link) Music Theory for the Guitarist I thought that I could create a Udemy course to accompany the book.

I’ve been thinking for a while about how best to bring the material to life in video form, and today was all about experimenting, testing, and figuring out the workflow that will carry this project forward.

Starting with a rough script I began with a very early draft of the script for Lecture 1. It wasn’t polished, but it was enough to start talking through the ideas and see how they sounded out loud. Writing for video is very different from writing for print, and it became clear quickly that the script will need tightening. That’s part of the process: speak it, hear it, refine it.

Creating the first slides Next came the slides. I built a clean template in LibreOffice Impress and put together a few test slides: a title slide, a section slide, and some content slides. The goal wasn’t perfection. It was simply to see how the visuals feel once they’re on screen and how they support the narration.

Static slides vs. progressive reveal This was the big discovery of the day. I tried two approaches:

• static slides with all the text visible
• progressive reveal slides where each new bullet appears on a duplicated slide

The difference was immediate. The progressive reveal approach feels more alive and keeps the viewer engaged. Each new bullet gives a sense of movement and progression, which is especially helpful during longer explanations. This is the method I’ll be using throughout most of the course.

Recording the first test audio For today’s test, I recorded the audio straight into my IPhone. The room was quiet and cool, so it worked surprisingly well for a rough demo. For the real course, I’ll be recording in Cubase, which will give a much cleaner and more controlled sound. But the phone test was perfect for getting the timing right and seeing how narration and slides interact.

Putting everything together in Filmora Once the slides and audio were ready, I pulled everything into Filmora and built a rough test video. I stretched each slide to match the narration, adjusted the pacing, and experimented with how the visuals felt during longer talking sections. It also allowed me to cut out some of the uncomfortable sniffs and throat clearing. Seeing the slides and audio together made the project feel real for the first time.

What I learned today A few takeaways from this first test run:

• movement on screen matters
• progressive bullet reveals work extremely well
• scripts need to be written with slide flow in mind
• the workflow of slides → audio → Filmora is solid
• this will get faster as the process becomes familiar, at least that is the sincere hope

What’s next Now that the pipeline is tested, the next steps are to refine the script for Lecture 1, tighten the slides to match the narration, record clean audio, and build the first polished lecture. It’s early days, but the foundation is solid, and I’m excited to keep building.