General Settings - New to vid - Help appreciated.

W

W.bat

Member
Hi there,

My situation is that I have been a full time pro shooter (stills) for over twenty years. I have changed my subject matter and business structure to where I now run a new photographic gallery. I aim to back up my stills with movie content in both web and screen (hopefully large) form. I have been shooting a 5d mk 2 for a limited amount of footage and have recently put up my first "movie" which spins endlessly in the gallery. It's ok, visually not bad, plenty of errors and really lacking an experienced pro touch. No problem.

I aim to move forward with both stills and the movie stuff. For various reasons I have swapped to Nikon with the new D800e which assuming I am happy, will be accompanied by a straight d800. I have had the camera for six weeks but have not had it available for use as it was with the guy who is building my water housing. That is now done and by chance I have the opportunity to head off into the south pacific to shoot both stills and movie for the gallery. So I have a week to put together a simple working formula.

I shoot in the surf, arty wave stuff. I have good lenses ranging from 12 to 105mm. Because of the clarity of the water I aim to shoot lots of underwater wave action, through the wave dawn and dusk stuff etc. All water based with minimal land.

My questions are.

1. With in the setting ie colour, contrast, sharpening and I am only guessing what the settings available are, what should i do to come back with the best quality I can assume to get at this stage. I would like to get maximum opportunity to change, adjust, slow down later. Kind of like a well exposed, correct raw file in stills.

2. I would love to be planning my next stage now so any suggestions on doing so in reference to setting up in camera to out put and best practice for the initial stage of out put?

3. Probably included in question one but specifically what is best for the the basis of the video ie the 1080/24p etc?

Your help is appreciated. I am really excited about the prospect of becoming competent in the video field and really can't wait to start exploring some of the associated art.

Thanks in advance

Tony
 
People will argue for ever on the image settings

My advice, dial down sharpness and saturation a little , leave the rest alone

frame rates.. 24 is 'film' 25 is uk television, 30 is USa television, faster is used for slow motion

1080 is the image size in pixel height, that is better than a lower number like 720 or 480

Manual focus (only) is your biggest challenge, id stick with the wide lenses

you will need to be using neutral density filters most likely to keep your shutter at 50% of the frame rate

so stock up on them!

S
 
Your questions have been covered and answered and argued and settled upon and unsettled and re-settled upon for a few years round here, and there are simply thousands of posts - start searching, open a doc and copy and paste things you want to remember. You'll have 30 pages in a flash.

(OK, the comment above regarding "stick to the wide lenses"?? I'd forget that. Use the lens that gives you the framing, DOF and perspective you want for the shot. Wide lenses need to be focused too. Get a loupe and a monitor to focus. DSLRs, IMHO, are almost useless without a good loupe or a monitor).
 
Hey Samuel, I just want to check before I go tweaking...but if I install your flaat profiles...I can easily load them, or reload the camera defaults correct?

I'm doing testing right now for something I'm shooting (using my D800 and a Ninja 2) and I'm just trying to see what gives me the look I want...but I dont want to permanently tweak my camera.

Thanks!
 
indeed: just select a different picture style, and having Flaat installed won't make a change on your image; delete it from the card and the camera, and it's as if you never installed Flaat
 
Michael Carter said:
(OK, the comment above regarding "stick to the wide lenses"?? I'd forget that.
Click to expand...

The OP is suggesting using his camera in a water housing while swimming (afaik).. I would stick to wide lenses for starters, I would also suggest a monitor could be problematic :)
 
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Yes I get all that.

Manual focus (only) is your biggest challenge, id stick with the wide lenses

Yes will shoot wide but also slightly longer as opportunity presents. Not scared of the longer lenses. Focus is a key with stills to, it's just that the focus can follow automatically between shots.

24 is 'film' 25 is uk television, 30 is USa television, faster is used for slow motion

Ok so as a standard should I stick to 24 frames.

you will need to be using neutral density filters most likely to keep your shutter at 50% of the frame rate

Any suggestions on brand or are they all good.

Your questions have been covered and answered and argued and settled upon and unsettled and re-settled upon for a few years round here, and there are simply thousands of posts - start searching, open a doc and copy and paste things you want to remember. You'll have 30 pages in a flash.

Yes shall do.
 
Thanks for all input. Going to collect the camera/housing today and will start on setting tonight. Probably back for more chat then.

For those that know, are the b + w filters a good neutral, clean, neutral density filter brand?
 
Business time.

dial down sharpness and saturation a little


Should I do this by adjusting an existing setting or create a new one?
 
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