Best practices in still camera & video production. Learn how turning off your video camera's auto functions can help you tell a more compelling, convincing story.

1. Meeting the Convergence Challenge:
Improving Your Production Values in 15
Minutes or Less
Presented by
Donald Schwartz
donald.schwartz@imagelinkproductions.com
Twitter: Ishkahbibel
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2. Convergence Finally
• From Gateway TV to Now
• We are moving away from 320x240 windows on your computer
• Google TV interface on SONY TV – channel selection from internet or cable
indistinguishable
Photo credit: Sony Electronics 2

3. What Happens When You Magnify a
Small Image?
(From 320x240 to a 50 inch TV Screen)
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4. The Video Camera vs. Your Eyes & Ears
Eye Features:
• Auto White Balance – doesn't see shadows as blue nor
fluorescents as green.
• Auto Exposure – wide contrast range covering highlights and
shadows with unrecognizably quick adjustment. (FYI: your
camera uses gray scale starting with 18% gray).
• Auto Focus – face recognition built in. Multiple focus points
built in.
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5. The Video Camera vs. Your Eyes & Ears
Ear Features:
• Directional Audio – you know where the sound comes from
and your ears’ sound view is very large.
• Auto Level – hears and adapts quickly to whispers and
thunder claps without distortion.
• Wide Frequency Range – 20-20,000 Hz.
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6. Ban Flip Cameras For Anything But
Home Movies
• When an all-auto camera reacts to changes in light levels,
color temperature changes and/or audio changes, everything
it does is obvious and distracting.
• Forget Take America Back, Try Take Back Control From Your
Camera.
• Learn to Love Manual Control (Who’s more capable, you or
your camera?)
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7. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
Achieved By:
• Lighting – foreground & background separation – create contrast – makes
image appear sharper.
• Think principal subject – brighter than other pictorial elements.
• Creates dimensionality by using light and shadow. Shadow defines depth.
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• Technique: Start with 3-point lighting consisting of key (main), fill (fills in
detail & lightens shadow), back or separation light.
Images: Copyright 2006 Jeremy Birn
3dRender.com
Used by permission of author
Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See

9. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
• Technique: Have no lights?
Bounce or reflect available light
using foam core, show card, or
cine foil.
• Apply angle of incidence. Angle of
incidence equals angle of
reflectance. Also works for finding
unwanted reflections.
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Photo credit: California Sunbounce

10. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
• DOP – Depth of Field –
What’s in focus an what is not?
Not available on cameras with
small sensors – sorry.
Image: Donald Schwartz 10

11. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
Rule of Thirds – divide your frame into a 9 section grid.
Compositional Mastery: Part I
Image: Donald Schwartz 11

12. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
Lens Focal Length – Bringing Your Audience into Your Shot
Wide Normal (Perspective) Telephoto
• Why not zoom in? Because it changes perspective and draws attention to itself.
• Start wide(r) than normal and walk in to bring your audience with you.
Drawings: Jennifer Schwartz
Compositional Mastery: Part I
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13. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
Compositional Mastery: Part II
Solving the 2D Conundrum – Creating 3D
•Frame Within Frame •Vanishing Point
•Create Scale
•Use of Color – set design or color balance
Images: Donald Schwartz
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14. Forget in-camera image stabilization – increases file size.
Animation courtesy of Darmont - www.idleworm.com
Why Does The Camera Bounce When I Walk?
Camera In Motion
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15. Camera In Motion
• Use a camera stabilization system – it
separates your gait from the camera.
Example: Merlin
Why Does The Camera Bounce When I Walk?
Courtesy: The Tiffin Company
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Merlin Stabilization
System
Click to play video

16. Avoidable Mistakes
Panning
• If you think it’s too slow, make it
slower.
• Apply pressure before you need to
and lessen before you stop.
• Use a tripod.
Eye Line
• Consider viewer’s point of view. If
you are above or below it has to be
for a reason.
Avoid Dead Eye
• Cause it too much top light.
The 180 Degree Rule
• You have crossed the line.
• Quick and dirty solution for
interviews: shoot over right shoulder
and for reverse, reaction shot over
left shoulder.
Image courtesy of Steven d. Katz
Michael Weise Productions in conjunction with Focal Press 16

17. Avoidable Mistakes
Color Balance – White Balance
• Daylight (sun & sky) is bluish: 5400 to 6000 degrees Kelvin.
• Overcast: 6000 to 7500 degrees Kelvin.
• Fluorescents (cool white) tends towards green: 4100 to 4200 degrees Kelvin.
• Home Incandescent – red/yellow: 2500 to 2900 degrees Kelvin.
Tech: Only way to be sure is to manually white balance under predominate light source.
Hollow or Distorted Sound – Pick the right microphone for the job
• Shotgun – the outdoor microphone of choice – very directional audio pickup.
• Lavaliere – the interview microphone of choice – captures voice resonance with
accuracy.
• Cardioid – most common microphone for interviews – wide heart-shaped
acceptance pattern.
Tech: Determine the peak level, the loudest your audio will get and set it there.
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18. What’s Next?
Consumer to Prosumer Cameras
• Allows you to visually see audio and
light levels (via Zebra).
35mm Cameras Capturing Video
Pros:
• Enable depth of field with large
sensor.
• Use of great glass lenses.
• Exceptional ISO/light sensitivity.
Cons:
• Limited recording time due to sensor
over-heating.
• Poor sound quality.
• Requires mounting rig for shoulder or
mounting on a tripod.
Photo courtesy of www.idcphotovideo.com 18

19. Resources & Sources
Web Video: Making It Great, Getting It Noticed
By: Jennie Bourne; Dave Burstein
Publisher: Peachpit Press
Pub. Date: August 05, 2008
Print ISBN-10: 0-321-55296-2
101 Quick and Easy Secrets to Create Winning Photographs
By: Matthew Bamberg
Publisher: Course Technology PTR
Pub. Date: April 14, 2009
Print ISBN-10: 1-59863-902-1
Film Directing - Shot by Shot
Visualizing from Concept to Screen
By: Steven d. Katz
Publisher: Michael Weise Productions & Focal Press
Publication Date: June 1991
ISBN #: 0-941188-10-8
Stoppees’ Guide to Photography & Light: What Digital Photographers, Illustrators, and Creative Professionals Must Know
By: Brian & Janet Stoppee
Publisher: Focal Press
Pub. Date: October 22, 2008
eISBN-10: 0-08-092798-X
Home Recording for Beginners
By: Geoffrey Francis
Publisher: Course Technology PTR
Pub. Date: January 01, 2009
Print ISBN-10: 1-59863-881-5
Digital Lighting & Rendering, Second Edition
By: Jeremy Birn
Publisher: New Riders
Pub. Date: April 27, 2006
Print ISBN-10: 0-321-31631-2
Info on Walk Cycle: http://www.idleworm.com/how
Info on Light Reflection Tools: California Sunbounce: http://www.sunbounce.de/
Info on Camera Motion Control: Tiffin: http://www.tiffen.com/
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