Footage Help (Ideas)

More of a compositional / lighting thing... and the grading. It somehow took out a lot of texture... did you push it far?

Oh... and level up that camera, you've got tilting horizontals :)
 
Yeah, I pushed the coloring a little much I believe but I was getting frustrated with how it was turning out. I watched it on my LCD flat 42" TV and it looked.. well.. like I took a cheap home made camcorder and threw it up there. Now I'm at a loss.
 
fromdecember said:
I just did a quick test with my gh3, did some color correction, etc. and the footage still reminds me of a "home made cam" look instead more film-ish look. Is this a lens issue, coloring issue, or...?

The test is: https://vimeo.com/66189278
Click to expand...

Wait... You mean to tell me you bought a GH3 and it did not give you cinematic quality out of the box?


Hahaha, I laugh only to disarm my previous passive-aggressive comment. Cinematic quality is in lighting, composition, and art-direction, among others. I think an appropriate answer is that your cinematography needs improving, not your camera. I think you know this deep inside too, as you posted this in the cinematography forum. It's a you issue, to put it not so lightly.

Keep shooting and your eye will learn.
 
Yeah, I knew not to expect "out of the box" results to what I want. I expect that with any camera really. I'm a graphic designer getting into video because I love movies, story telling through graphics and video, etc. Basically a "starter" at videography.
 
The great news here, as Ryan explained, is that it's not your gear - It's you. And with practice and the proper theoretical know-how you'll be able to achieve the cinematic quality you're after. Just keep in mind that people spend years in school, internships etc learning the trade of DP, colorist etc and spend a lot of time perfecting their skills through working, and there's a reason for this.
 
There are people on this forum doing it for many many years and they still are asking themselves the same questions - how to make something more cinematic. That should show you that there are no easy answers. The answers that will help you today will irrelevant to you tomorrow.

My biggest advice is to look who you put in front of the camera. There is a reason why you don't see folks like this man as major starts. He looks so boring that before he even manages to finish his walk i'm already looking away from the video screen looking for something interesting.
 
fromdecember said:
I just did a quick test with my gh3, did some color correction, etc. and the footage still reminds me of a "home made cam" look instead more film-ish look. Is this a lens issue, coloring issue, or...?

The test is: https://vimeo.com/66189278
Click to expand...


The best place to start in constructively breaking down your shots is to start with what you were wanting to achieve and then people can give some advice on how to get there.

What were you hoping it to look like? Be specific as 'filmic' or 'cinematic' can mean many things to many people.

Also what settings were you using? Aperture? ShutterSpeed? Gear isn't the issue here but how you adjust can have drastic effects on the look.

I'm going to take a stab at guessing what you want but this is only based on what many other people confuse with 'cinematic' and that is shallow depth of field. I am not a fan of the current extreme shallow DOF but when used purposefully to propel the story or guide the viewers eye its a fantastic tool to obscure or reveal parts of the frame to the audience. In the cemetary scene I could have used a little more isolation of the character from the surroundings to make him feel a little isolated or for us to concentrate on his emotion rather than the rest of the frame. Especially when you can't control your background. Less distraction for the viewer when they should be focusing on the guy pacing. That brings it to framing and composition. I felt on your cemetery guy that you never went in for a closeup. I as a viewer would want to either get closer to see his facial expressions or farther away to show a greater context. shots like hands or feet pacing can convey emotion like stress or nerves etc. It all depends on what message you were trying to convey.

I am like you in that I am not a DOP/cinematographer myself (I'm a producer/director/editor day job) but cinematography interests me and I too have been shooting more content for myself over the last 2-3 years. Its a lot of lessons that are learned through failure and asking the right questions. If it was easy everyone would do it :)
 
Patryk_Rebisz said:
My biggest advice is to look who you put in front of the camera. There is a reason why you don't see folks like this man as major starts. He looks so boring that before he even manages to finish his walk i'm already looking away from the video screen looking for something interesting.
Click to expand...

I'm afraid I agree with Patryk. That guy is just not interesting. His face has no interesting angles, just a boring guy in glasses; boring body type; boring acting. I cannot imagine watching him for any length of time. At least the woman has a tiny bit of interest - she's a type, but watchable. It really does start with content, everything else is secondary.
 
Beyond that, the focal length (yes, I know a 28mm is all he had) is all wrong. Compositionaly the background is showing too much. The focus, in my opinion, is too deep and at times it seem focus is sharper on the background than in the foreground. Lots going on here, none of which conventionally good.

Now, conventionally good,is not good sometimes, but without context, I'll have to vote against this. The right cinematography is aiding the story... so perhaps in *some* film this would work, but without the context, this does not work.
 
Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
Beyond that, the focal length (yes, I know a 28mm is all he had) is all wrong. Compositionaly the background is showing too much. The focus, in my opinion, is too deep and at times it seem focus is sharper on the background than in the foreground. Lots going on here, none of which conventionally good.

Now, conventionally good,is not good sometimes, but without context, I'll have to vote against this. The right cinematography is aiding the story... so perhaps in *some* film this would work, but without the context, this does not work.
Click to expand...

Yes.
 
Thanks for all the advice. I'm cool with people being "mean" as long as it's constructive criticism so nothing said has "hurt my feelings". Anyhoo, I didn't really give the actor or actress much to work with like a director would have done. It was mostly me testing out the GH3 in the bright sunlight. I'm still reading about lighting. The only lighting I really work with is 3-point for a green screen for announcements I do every week. My first work with videography is working with a Canon XL2.. then I got a t2i for photography and began messing with video more and more. Then I just got the GH3 about a month ago to look at the m43 lenses and what not.

My settings were: Shutter at 1/48, ISO at 200, Custom White Balance, and I really don't recall the exact aperture.
 
fromdecember said:
My settings were: Shutter at 1/48, ISO at 200, Custom White Balance, and I really don't recall the exact aperture.
Click to expand...

If you were shooting in bright sunlight with your shutter at 1/48, then your aperture was going to be stopped down quite heavily.

Invest in ND filters (not a variable, just regular 'ole ND filters).
 
fromdecember said:
Thanks for all the advice. I'm cool with people being "mean" as long as it's constructive criticism so nothing said has "hurt my feelings". Anyhoo, I didn't really give the actor or actress much to work with like a director would have done. It was mostly me testing out the GH3 in the bright sunlight. I'm still reading about lighting. The only lighting I really work with is 3-point for a green screen for announcements I do every week. My first work with videography is working with a Canon XL2.. then I got a t2i for photography and began messing with video more and more. Then I just got the GH3 about a month ago to look at the m43 lenses and what not.

My settings were: Shutter at 1/48, ISO at 200, Custom White Balance, and I really don't recall the exact aperture.
Click to expand...

I think a 'big' part of my problem with your shots, especially the graveyard, is that the central figure... ostensibly the subject... is out of focus. No amount of 'grading' will cover that defect. There is of course a throw the subject out of focus to transition to a new subject 'trick' but having the subject mostly out of focus, just a 'little' bit' is usually taken as a technical error.

Another issue is the type of light you have... while I see a hint of cloud formations in the in distance, I suspect the subject and the graveyard are all pretty 'flat'. As such there isn't any 'lighting depth' to the image. The subject appears 'grey', and the 'grass' dull 'greenish/yellowish/greyish'...

In the final shot of the girl in the forest... ugh... leaves in the way... If you do want to have 'leaves framing' the subject, you need to make sure the face of the subject has a clear shot. There seems to be a twig hanging down right through her face... In terms of cinematic language... the use of such a shot is to perhaps show 'someone is lurking', and we have the voyeristic Lurker's POV, or perhaps show 'isolation/aloneness'. In either case the leaves just aren't enough to carry that sort of coding. In terms of exposure, the black blouse pretty much has no detail. That's a problem with 'black' unless lighting brings out the detail, it often ends up reading as just a 'cut out'.

As a note, in more 'action shots', such as tracking a person running through the forest 'crud' can get in the way of the shot... but it is momentary... when the subject pauses, for some 'dramatic reason', the camera needs to have a clear shot, or if in the 'predator mode', the camera moves, hunting for the 'best view', crud may show up momentarily occluding the subject, but it's not a 'long static' shot of them looking over their shoulder...
 
OldCorpse said:
I'm afraid I agree with Patryk. That guy is just not interesting. His face has no interesting angles, just a boring guy in glasses; boring body type; boring acting. I cannot imagine watching him for any length of time. At least the woman has a tiny bit of interest - she's a type, but watchable. It really does start with content, everything else is secondary.
Click to expand...

How prejudiced... but understandable... while it would take a great amount of work to make an 'ordinary' guy look more interesting than essentially a similarly 'boring' shot of a pleasant looking young women... for those who find young women to be attractive... both shots have a certain sort of 'boringness' to them.

Sure they are 'test shots', but I think the point of the exercise is to learn how to make the mundane 'interesting'...

In the graveyard shots, one could imagine people would not like the photographer jumping up on monuments or tombstones to get an impromptu top-down shot, but there's always low-up, dutched angles, subject offset from center, etc. While these sorts of things are 'standard'... it still amazes me how many people just seem to use 'eye-level', horizon aligned(sort of... and often slightly cocked from the real horizon...), center subject, shots.
 
I know diddly squat about image quality and have no idea how to grade my stuff. My movies will likely continue to
look like cheap video for a while. So be like me and worry about that stuff later, and focus on composiing better-- eg its cool you used foreground framing with the trees, but the pan down feels awkward and doesn't go anywhere (Im using NO camera movement for now, till I learn other things).


If I were you Id watch a really well shot-on-video movie (Anthony Dod Mantle is my main go-to guy to study right now) and copy some of the
frames??? Also get a copy of 5 C's of Cinematography and pay special attention to the first and last chapters, which are
worth the price of the whole book. Eg why have the guy walk towards the camera when you can have him walk 45 degrees I
think it maybe makes more depth and interest, etc...the book goes into this kinda stuff, stuff you can do with any camera.


Also a big vibe/genre/casting thing- make sure if you use these folks in a story, you try to build their characters around
their actual looks and personality and not, lets say, cast the dude as a rebel devil-may-care badass cop and the girl as the impossibly unearthly hot girl everyone is fighting over (your friend is very attractive, but real-world attractive, not phony-movie-romantic-lead attractive unless its in a realistically vibed world u paint with your flick-- also im sure your friend could kick my ass in real life, but Hollywood movies are a lil cartoonishly cast, like comic books, in a way- think about it, 1/2 of all Hollywood actresses look like models)?? I hate to use crass terms like the following, but make "realistic indie movies" don't try to make Hollywood movies you kinda need unearthly pretty people (amongst other things) for that. Maybe that last part sounds dumb, I hope I didn't offend. Taste cant be taught (I pray I have it, Im not too sure), but Im sure that's the best direction for most of us. Again, apologies if this paragraph comes off just dumb and offensive, feel free to tell me to f- off on this one.

Below is a shot from slumdog millionaire its a shot anyone can get with any camera (image quality aside)-- its about using shapes in an interesting way, it sucks cause most cinematography books really don't teach it fully, tho they give you lil hints like the rule of thirds. 5 C'S does has some super useful info itll get you started on that road.-- work hard for your shots, literally get on your knees, get up on a chair, zoom in super close, etc.. Try to make the shapes in your frame do something interesting - also use common sense a touching love scene doesn't need a dutch angle, etc.. the foreground trees is a nice start keep going might take a while to learn takes practice and constantly looking at well composed images its a lifetime pursuit right
 

Attachments

  • slumdog.jpg
    slumdog.jpg
    20.1 KB · Views: 0
Last edited:
ps the pic you did below is not a terrible composition-- its actually quite decent. thats why im not using camera movement right now, and focusing on learning to get well composed not moving shots.
 

Attachments

  • picture.jpg
    picture.jpg
    90.3 KB · Views: 0
  • picture.jpg
    picture.jpg
    139.7 KB · Views: 0
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top