How to shoot better video

How to shoot better video

Setup

Discuss your expectations with the team first. Plan your shoot, so you all have an idea of what you expect the output to look like. If your by yourself though, then you are are director, editor and producer all in one!

When you're shooting on new DV tape, roll 30 seconds of nothing to get past the typically imperfect tape head, or record colour bars if your camera has that functionality. You can then spend the next 30 seconds record the 'nothing' that is the room tone .. excellent back ground noise which can be dubbed into any part of your mix later.

Audio

Shut up when you shoot. Audio makes video three-dimensional and you'll need that ambient sound... so don't talk over it. I have seen many comedy videos ruined because the person with camera laughed close to the mic and spoiled the audio completely.

And check your levels - maybe someone took it off of auto and onto manual, for a setting they wanted and didn't put it back. So check!

Framing your shot

If something is going to move, it's much better to hold the camera still and let the subject move through the frame - before it comes into view for a few seconds, and after it's gone for a few seconds. This means anticipating what's about to happen - a skill in itself, but one that will lead to superior videos.

Remember the Rule of Thirds!

If you divide your screen into vertical thirds, know that the viewer's eye wants to rest on the upper third of the screen. If you're talking to someone in the field, place them in one of the thirds (either the left or right) and have them looking IN to the middle of the frame.

Personally, I like to put someone on the right, and then caption on the left. You should always manual focus for shots like this too. Tell the subject also to "look at the reporter, not the camera" .. and then (biggest tip of all) it sounds weird but don't make eye contact with the subject. Look at the view finder on your camera. Nod and smile and offer support (without making any noise yourself) that what they're saying is great, and then pause/leave a gap after they've finished talking before asking your next question.

The only time you should put someone in the middle is on a sit-down interview, when the camera if fixed to the tripod, and they look directly into the lens - and only get their head and shoulders in.

And don't chop the tops of people's heads of .. it looks ridiculous, always make sure there's a strip of daylight between the top of someone's head and tip of the frame. Unless of course, that if the effect that you want, in which case - chop a lot off so that it's obvious that that was what you were intending to do. The worst thing to see is when someone's head bobs about and moves during the shoot and one moment their head is chopped off, and the next it isn't - very annoying to watch.

Shooting

Shoot in sequences: Wide shot; details; angles. Close ups work really well on web video, so don't be shy in getting up close and personal with your subject. Mix your shots by this ratio: one quarter wide, one quarter medium; half close-up.

Get your set-up and "two-shots" after the interview. Move the camera back, but stay on an imaginary line (and remember: once you choose a side, stick to it - don't cross the line!). Now put the reporter in the shot and have the reporter talk while you run tape of the two of them together. Then get a reverse shot over the subject's shoulder of the reporter listening. Then get a close-up of the reporter listening. You'll use these options during editing.

Get creative with your angles. Crawl on the floor, stand on a box. Hold the camera up high in the air pointing down, whilst you angle the view finder down so you can still see what it's doing.

If you're shooting something boring like a building, get moving people or cars in the shot. The classic opening shot of any interview is to get a shot of a vehicle driving past the building where your interview is taking place.

Use a tripod for steady shots, and for a subject that isn't moving. If a tripod isn't available, get close and go wide, or find an object that you can lean against (like a wall, lamppost, etc..) to steady yourself. As a last resort - hold the camera against yourself, and hold you breath to get a steady shot!

Hold all your shots at least 10-15 seconds. You can always make a 10-second shot into a two-second shot.

Always begin or end a zoom or pan on a static shot. A zoom should begin with 15 seconds of wide shot, end with 15 seconds of tight shot. This gives you flexibility in editing.never zoom in AND out or pan one way THEN the other in the same shot. Unless it is the style you're going for, excessive zooming and panning doesn't look great anyway.

Tapes

Some people are moving to the all digital age and away from tapes. I'm still using Mini DV tapes though as they are a proven and reliable technology.

So label your tapes. Always label your tapes! At the time, you'll think "Oh, I'll remember what I recorded on here", but then you won't and you'll have a whole bunch of tapes to go through to work out what's on them. And when i say label the tapes - PUT THE LABEL ON THE TAPE itself, and not the box. Because any unlabelled tape can go into any labeled box, can't it? I once swapped the tapes in boxes of about twenty cases for a friend of mine to deliberately piss him off and show him how his system wasn't effective.