Videographer's Boot Camp: Part 1-Equipment, Chapter 1

Videographer's Boot Camp Videographer's Boot Camp: Part 1-Equipment, Chapter 1
18 minutes
Share the link to this page
Copied
  Completed

Transcript

My name is Derrick friend. I've been in the video Film and Media Production business for over 30 years. I started out in 16 millimeter documentary film and worked through the days of two video cameras and tape based linear editing. For the past dozen years I've had my own company producing HD video for a variety of clients. Along the way, I've won a few awards and learn a lifetime of knowledge and how to professionally shoot video. record audio Create professional media.

Now I'm not telling you this to toot my own horn, but rather to let you know that I've made a pretty good living in video production for a long time using certain techniques. Because while technology is always changing, the basics of visual storytelling are timeless. What are those basics, proper camera operation, proper lighting, and clean audio recording. First off, let me tell you what the series is and what it isn't. This series is not for the intermediate or advanced operator who's already in the marketplace earning a living. This series is for those of you who like me as a kid and may have bolted a camera to a sled or a bicycle, or later on made films with friends and thought wow, this would be pretty cool to do for a living.

Now you may have shot some footage with an iPhone or a GoPro. But that is not enough to do this professionally. This series is like a boot camp taking a raw recruit with Experience the beginning and at the end turning that recruit into a professional, ready to take on the world. If you follow all my videos in this series, you will have the knowledge to become a freelance camera operator, or work for television news station, or work for a production company. The first video is about what types of equipment you should buy. The next segment is on how to shoot professional video.

This is followed by segments on lighting, recording professional audio, tips and best practices. Sadly, the longer I'm in this business, the more I see and hear poorly shot video. With horrible camerawork, bad lighting and terrible audio. You can dress it all up with fast cuts, effects and loud music, but it's still amateurish and not get your next job. The keys to professional video combined equipment selection with technique. In this first video, I will be discussing what features you You need to look for your equipment.

I will not be endorsing any particular model or brand. For one, the technical aspects of this business change on a continual basis. Number two, there are multiple options available from all the major manufacturers that are suitable. And number three nobody's endorsing me. codecs in bitrate. First, let's talk about the features to look for in a suitable camera for professional video.

Before we do that, we need to discuss a little bit of tech stuff first, so bear with me. With the advent of digital video, there has been an ever evolving creation of codecs. What is a codec? codec stands for compression decompression. The amount of digital information on a single frame of HD video is huge. If one were to record video totally uncompressed, the resulting file size would be gigantic.

And for most purposes unwieldy. In order to make the file size manageable, manufacturers and engineers have come up with many different ways to compress the video to make it smaller. The way they do this is by analyzing each frame pixel by pixel. If one's frames pixels are the same as the previous frame, it just duplicates the pixels. The only part of the video that the codec changes is when the pixels change. So for example, a camera locked down on a scenic beauty shot will be a much smaller file size than a scene where there is a lot of action and camera movement related to codecs is bitrate, a more highly compressed codec will have a smaller bitrate to create a smaller file size.

A less highly compressed codec will have a larger bitrate. For example, HDTV has a bit rate of 25 megabits per second, while XD cam has a bit rate of 35 meg gigabits per second. Here's an example. I shot this scene three times. The first is uncompressed HD. Next up, it's pro res HQ.

Finally, I recorded it an HDTV. You can see on the screen that women in a video for each codec has a different megabit per second bitrate, and a different file size. Why is all this important? Why not just shoot at the most compressed codec possible to get the smallest file sizes because picture information is lost, the more you compress it, it can result in ugly artifacting artifacts or things like smearing and blockiness around the edges. It's like putting a pound of potato chips in an eight ounce bag. You may be able to do it, but you'll end up with a lot of broken chips.

Also, the more digital information you have, the more you can manipulate. For example, while it's possible to create an acceptable group Screen composite from HDTV, it is easier to make a cleaner green screen composite from a less compressed higher bitrate video signal cameras. Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk cameras. Number one, you need to be able to record 1920 by 1080 HD video, you should be able to record to either videotape or some sort of memory card. Compact Flash, sx s p two, etc. If you want to shoot for broadcasts, you will need a camera that will record a bit rate of at least 35 megabits per second.

If your intended clients are for DVD or web, you can select a camera with a lower bitrate such as HDTV, or AVC HD. I'll explain later in subsequent videos, but you want your camera to have the option of manual control over all of its functions focus Iris zoo, whitebalance framerate audio. The main technical thing you need your camera to do is create the proper exposure for whatever scene you're shooting. correct exposure has different variables which we'll get into more detail shortly. These variables include f stop, which is related to Iris and shutter speed, or how many times the shutter opens and closes in a second zebra. The first thing you want for proper exposure is zebra.

Zebra will superimpose diagonal lines in your viewfinder. To show where your video is at a level you select either 70 8090 or 100% video. I like to set my zebra at 100% and make sure nothing in my frame exceeds 100%. This way if my subject is a person, I set my Iris for zebra occurs just on the highlights of my subject. Zebra fills the subjects face. I know I'm over Post and I just there are some instances where automatic functions are desirable.

But most of the time you want to have total control over all of your cameras functions. Iris, Iris refers to how big or how small the aperture is that allows light into the camera. It sounds counterintuitive, but the higher the aperture number, the smaller the aperture. f 16 means the aperture is small, and F 1.7 means the aperture is large. the brighter the scene, the smaller the aperture to limit the amount of light coming in. We'll go over this in more detail in a later segment in the series.

But for now you need to know that you should adjust your aperture manually whenever possible. Why not just leave it on auto Iris. Well there are a couple of reasons. If you select Auto Iris and something brighter than you your subject passes in front of your subject, your camera will Iris down and then Iris up again. And that's the mark of an amateur. Also, if you're shooting a subject on a stage who is illuminated by a spotlight, your camera will probably over expose.

A professional will keep his or her Iris on manual exposed for 100% video on the highlights. Remember, you can color correct for video that is slightly underexposed. The video that is overexposed is technically beyond saving. A good time to put your iris on auto is when you're shooting outdoors on a sunny day. And there are a lot of clouds passing by the sun. To try to follow the changes in light intensity manually is impossible.

It is better to let the camera do it automatically. neutral density filters you can cameras should have built in neutral density filters. What do these do? They blocked different amounts of light entering the camera without changing color temperature, depending on which filters used. Why is this important? Remember, we talked about proper exposure being a function of f stops and shutter speed.

If you're shooting in bright sunlight, what do you can't get your iris small enough to get a proper exposure then your shutter speed will need to be increased because the higher the shutter speed, the more light is necessary. We've probably all seen video shot on smartphones out in the bright sun with movement seems all jittery. There's no natural fluidity to the movement. That's because the camera has no neutral density filter and the shutter speed is so high to properly expose for the huge amount of light coming into the camera. If you can cut a half or three quarters of the light coming into the camera, you can have a slower shutter speed that looks more natural. Well that's when neutral density filters come in.

Handy. A good rule of thumb is to shoot at an f5 point six IRS at 168 or 100 frames per second shutter speed. If you're an F 16 and still look overexposed, it's time to dial in a neutral density filter to get back down to an F 5.6. shutter speed for most of your shooting. One 60th of a second is an appropriate shutter speed and lens a natural fluid look to your video. It's good to be able to manually dial in a higher shutter speed if you're shooting sports and want less blur, or as we'll cover in a later segment. If you need to open your iris to decrease depth of field.

I know don't get freaked out yet. We'll talk about all this in a later video. But for now trust me you want to be able to change your shutter speed light balance. Make sure your camera is capable of manually adjusting white balance quick tutorial on white balance. color temperature is measured in degrees Kelvin, and it changes depending on what the source of light is. Sunlight Outdoors is about 5500 degrees and is referred to as cool because it looks bluish in the shade at 6500 degrees or higher.

Indoor light illuminated by halogen or tungsten light is about 3200 degrees Kelvin. It is referred to as warm because it's orangish. Our human brains could adjust to the differences in color temperature organically and make anything white as white and then all the other colors fall into place. cameras on the other hand, must be told what is white under different lighting conditions. Once the camera knows what is white, all the other colors will be correct. Of course most if not all cameras have automatic white balance and acts somewhat like our braids can be useful if you're shooting news and going from one source of light to the next, all the while recording, like say you're falling action from outdoors to indoors on the same shot.

However, if you have control over your environment, it is best to white balance under the lighting source is more accurate and your colors won't shift if the lighting in your scene momentarily changes. I'll use the example of shooting on a sunny day with clouds passing by the sun again. As your subject goes from sunlit to shady and back, your colors will slightly shift if your cameras on auto white balance. Focus, it is best to keep your camera set to manual focus and focus accordingly. This will serve you well for 99% of your work. The only time I've ever used autofocus is during fashion shows where the models are walking towards the camera.

It's difficult to follow focus manually while the subject continues towards you, especially if you're also tilting and zooming at the same time. So autofocus is preferable in this specific case. And just about all other instances autofocus has the potential to really mess you up. Let's say that you are following your subject while your lens is set to autofocus. If any object passes between you and your subject, the lens will auto focus on that object. And after passes will attempt to focus again on your subject.

It looks like a mess, again is totally brand new as an amateur. And with manual focus, you can create artistic shots using objects in the foreground and background. Having one in focus and the other out of focus that you manually focus to change the sharpness of the two objects. This is called a rack focus On the subject of focus, your camera should have a focus enhance function, which will make it easier to get perfect focus. Obviously, in HD video focus is extremely important. Sometimes something that looks in focus in your viewfinder will actually look soft and a large television monitor.

This is why you should always use a focus enhance function if you have one. On some cameras then red or green line will appear in your viewfinder around the subject when it's in perfect focus. Broadcast cameras have a feature called peaking, which do the same thing. peeking will make your subject have hard edges in the viewfinder when the subject is in perfect focus. Zoom. Your zoom lens should have a servo zoom rocker that allows you to zoom in and out at a variable rate.

In a later video in this series, I will show you how to create the zoom extra slow. It's all technique Sometimes you need to slap the zoom in and out. Either a quickly get a sharp focus or if you're doing it for artistic effect. If it's an A for an artistic effect, it's called slap zoom. For this, you need to be able to disengage the zoom servo. So get a camera that allows you to override the servo zoom, so you can zoom manually.

SDI HDMI out. This is either a video BNC or HDMI connection. One reason you want this is to be able to see your image on an external monitor. Another big reason is that this is an uncompressed video signal before it goes through the codec and gets compressed. You can record this uncompressed video signal to a less compressed or even an uncompressed format on an external device and what your camera records for example, if you have an HDTV camera With an SDI output, you can record the pristine uncompressed signal to a device that records the video to uncompressed or a less compressed codec. format.

Your cameras should be able to record in various formats and frame rates. I won't go into too much detail at this point. Most broadcast television is shot in 1080 ti which means 1920 by 1080 interlaced. Other popular formats include 10 8030 P, and 10 8024 p, which is progressive instead of interlaced. If you're shooting for the web 30 P is a good format. It's a good idea to have a camera in the records in different formats, and ask your client what format they want to shoot.

Sign Up

Share

Share with friends, get 20% off
Invite your friends to LearnDesk learning marketplace. For each purchase they make, you get 20% off (upto $10) on your next purchase.