Last week, the team over at RocketJump Film School released this awesome video about sound production in film. Sound production is probably the most overlooked aspect of filmmaking, mainly because you don't notice great sound design; it seamlessly helps you submit to the willing suspension of disbelief. Check out RJFS's experiment to see how much sound actually does affect the audience.
LUTs are one of the essential tools in the video world. What in the world is a LUT anyway? If you're just getting started with video post-production, these two videos will give you a good kick in the right direction.
Beyond any doubt, the effects and compositing techniques used in the first three films of Star Wars trilogy were the game changer in VFX world. Although there has been a rapid improvement in the VFX technology for the last 40 years, we can say that Star Wars was one of the pioneers. So, how was that possible to achieve realistic results in a movie produced in 1980? Mark Vargo explains the mathematics, optics, engineering, and software behind the blue screen photography and compositing in detail.
In this video from Ryan Connolly over at Film Riot, he takes viewers quickly through an action sequence he has edited, and shows a few simple ways that he was able to increase the perceived speed and create a more realistic edit. Even if you're not editing fight scenes, there are a few tricks in here that are absolutely applicable to other genres.
I shot and edited a narrative film in the last month. It was a first for me. I had this scene in my mind of a person burying a suitcase or bag in the woods, like it’s something he or she wanted to hide or get away from. I had a second idea about a guy walking down a long passage way and knocking on a door with no one opening for him. I decided these two contrasting visual ideas will be my story.
Ok, the last time I truly attempted skateboarding, I was 14 years old, and I dislocated my right shoulder (still have a beautiful, giant scar). Regardless of my lack of knowledge of the sport, or anyone's for that matter, I think we can all agree that this video of Skater Rodney Mullen shot by photographer extraordinaire Steven Sebring is just cool as hell.
Over the past few weeks I have been touting the Sony a6300's video performance. This past week I decided to take the camera to the Mid Ohio Sports Car Course to film a track day. Oddly I ended up not using the auto focus, as the fences were proving to be a challenge with adapted EF mount Sigma lenses. On native lenses like the 70-200mm f/4 or the 70-300 f/4-5.6, this likely wouldn't have been an issue. Aside from that, the camera continued to impress me and exceeded my expectations.
If you ask many filmmakers, or any video production companies, coming up with video ideas and concepts is not always the easiest thing to do. Especially when you're trying to make a series. However, through abstract story telling, Penzoil has successfully made a video series that so far, has kept viewers coming back for more with each iteration of the series. The first, a powerful trip through a city, the second a high speed trist around a race track before breaking back onto the streets, and with this last one, a high velocity excursion through the desert.
Imagine editing your film and getting to the phase where the production sound needs to be added or perfected. This can be a fun part of editing and getting things together, but it can also be a very time consuming part of the process. If you didn’t have a recording of the live sound, you need to run through the various samples you have available in your library, or get them online, and see which sound works best. If you have the budget, you can add a Foley artist to your team to physically produce the sounds for your video. These sounds must then be edited in for the various sounds you need, be it the footsteps down the alley or the gunshots fired by the assassin that form part of your story. What if this can all be done automatically?
SnapDragon is the name of a processor made by Qualcomm. The company just released a short film titled "Lifeline" and a behind-the-scenes video where the Academy Award-winning director, Armando Bo, runs through the plot and how they used a mobile phone to create the timeline and tell the story.
Video is something I have begun to play with over the last few weeks in the form of a vlog on YouTube, but as you might know it's difficult to gain that organic reach you're used to on social platforms. That doesn't mean its impossible, but by using various other channels to advertise and push them to that new content is key in today's world. That is where vertical video comes in on Instagram! Yes, it might be annoying as hell to see yet another vertical video, but hold tight as I walk you through why this is a brilliant place to use it and also how you can do it yourself.
Why can't YouTube handle snow or confetti? Some videos look great on YouTube, but others look terrible. It could be a cheap camera, but it could also be that the creator doesn’t understand the science behind video compression.
Well known video bloggers, such as Casey Neistat and the likes, have raised the vlogging standards in recent years. How they manage to post captivating content so regularly is astounding. Many try to emulate their successes, and as a result, YouTube is crammed full of filmmakers trying to be the next viral vlogging sensation. These vlogs vary in content, style, and quality, and while there is a niche space for almost anything these days, some people are “nailing it,” and others aren’t.
Whether you realize it or not, most videos produced for cinema or even high-end marketing campaigns have some sort of cropping on it, be it by design or with a specific purpose in mind. It's a common occurrence, and for the most part, when you wanted to use this kind of cropping you either had to make your own templates or scour the web in order to find what you were looking for. Well thanks to the folks over at PremiumBeat.com, they have compiled an extensive list of what they claim to be every popular video resolution in the world. All the way from 720 HD to 8K and creating crop ratios from 1:1 to 4:1 Polyvision.
One of the greatest ways to show the passage of time is with a time-lapse. A time-lapse is essentially a series of still images taken of a single subject over any given period of time (minutes, to hours, to even days), and then played back quickly to form a video. The usage of stills is really important. A common misconception is that a time-lapse is just sped-up video. While you could do this, there are issues with battery life, overheating, and storage space. With stills, you have the advantage of raw recording, better battery life, and far more storage space.
Let me get to the point: Adobe Spark could be the company’s biggest release yet. For veteran Adobe users, it might not seem as exciting as a new Creative Cloud update; but the combination of its ease of use, ingenious functionality, and truly professional results give it the potential to aid far more people than Photoshop ever will — no, really. This is helped immensely by the fact that Spark’s launch is amongst the most impressive I’ve ever seen, as Adobe Spark launches today with the maturity of a decade-old product. And it’s completely free.
If you have not heard of Casey Neitstat yet, go check him out and come back when your done, it might take awhile but it will be well worth it. The guy is a serious talent in the film and social media world, with his own unique style and technique to movie making. This short film by Tom Bryan is an outstanding example of what each of us should be doing with our creative work. Bryan has plans to create a short film each month for the next 12 and has started it off with a bang.
I have a love/hate relationship with post work. It's where all the magic of the final product comes together, but it can be oh so mundane and tedious. One editor is making it both more fun and more efficient by trading in his mouse and keyboard for something a bit more interesting: a video game controller.
The editor: a job that if done well goes unnoticed. To be a good editor, one must feel the rhythm of a scene, be able to convey seamless emotion, and convince you, the viewer, of the truth unfolding on the screen. In this super-cut by Every Frame a Painting, the job of the editor is broken down by example. The greatest scenes in cinema would be lifeless without the masterful and instinctual slicing and splicing made by the editor.
If you began shooting video within the last five to eight years, it's quite likely that you rode the "5D Mark II wave." Maybe you didn't own a 5D, and still don't, but that camera revolutionized the world of video production forever. Not only did that camera enable many "budget" filmmakers to make top notch content, it inspired almost every manufacturer to begin shoving video into every camera they could. No longer was it necessary to buy a dedicated video camera to create motion pictures. While I will certainly credit Canon with originally bringing professional video capability to the masses, I have to hand it to Sony for rocketing "DLSR video" to another level entirely.
Have you ever wondered what it's like to be a video editor? Well, look no further. The team at Lixi Studio created this informative, and flipping hysterical how to video, so that you can learn what it takes to edit film.
In this Film Riot video, actor and director Ryan Connolly gives us the rundown on how to create a blind eye effect, similar to what we see happen to Arya Stark in HBO's, "Game of Thrones." Film Riot pulls this off in Adobe After Effects (although this tutorial can be applied to your compositor of choice) and without the use of painful contact lenses.
I recently came across this video by Christoph Galep and was very impressed by the editing thereof. The transitions between shots and the slowing down and speeding up of the time-lapse provided a good energy to the video, something a simple cut edit isn’t able to do.
Almost every video you see online holds an element of sound production made up of music and sound effects. For us to produce a quality body of work, we need to know where to look. I’ve recently started focusing more on producing, shooting, and editing and wanted to share this list I created where you can find awesome music for your projects.
For a few years, the names in the game of digital video technologies have remained pretty constant, especially in the professional or prosumer category. It’s not often you have a company jump onto the scene swinging, promising to release what could be one of the most versatile systems to hit the market in a while; this is exactly what Craft Camera has done. Purchasing isn’t available yet but they are taking reservations now and shipping out the first units off the line as early as December.
Lots of skilled videos editors have started to see the value in being hired for contract work. It’s a great supplement to other income, you can be picky about projects, and most of us enjoy the work. But what about negotiating rates, estimating time, and dealing with files after the job? Here are some tips for the business-side of being a freelance video editor.
Following the introduction of its Immerge virtual reality system, Lytro, the "light field" camera company whose consumer models we now see discounted nearly everywhere, recently left the consumer space to concentrate on and introduce its new product, Lytro Cinema. Offering a complete solution with an included server to handle the 755 megapixels of data at up to 300 frames per second (not typos), the Lytro Cinema is a new kind of too-good-to-be-true beast. But the most incredible thing about the camera? It's no lie.
I'll be the first to say it, smoke bombs are usually too Tumblr for my taste. Generally you see them with a moody girl looking off into the distance in some backyard forest. I never got the point of those images. But I found myself mesmerized by "Chromaticity"; the smoke bombs were alive, more like wayward spirits hovering above the big blue. I was so entranced it took me half of the video to realize they were attached to drones, and the drones were nowhere to be seen.
For years, videographers shooting in dark situations frequently ran into the issue of a ton of noise in darks and shadows that would oftentimes make some footage difficult or impossible to use. Many have heralded the release of the a7S II with applause due to its power for video in low-light situations and even to record bursts of high frame rates in HD, so we took one into the deep recesses of an abandoned power plant in New Orleans to see how it did.
Who else is sick of hearing the same five Premium Beat songs in what seems like every advertisement on TV right now? Well, fear not, a new site is in town to help you with your short film or commercial projects, and there is plenty of variety. For $199 a year, Art-list gives you access to universal licenses and unlimited downloads for all of your music needs. Yes, you read that right, unlimited downloads.
Time-lapse Photographer Rufus Blackwell put together an interesting video for DJI, featuring their Osmo stabilizer/camera system, but using it in a way that might not be the most obvious: for hyperlapses. Check out the video, then read on to see what improvements DJI has made in their latest firmware update to the Osmo.
Any resource that explores the art of film and video editing I find utterly fascinating, and this video is a fantastic example of just that. Director/Editor Joey Scoma of Rocketjump Film School created this video that explores many of the different ways that editors can go from one shot to the next.
If you’ve been working with video in the last few years and are looking to take your post-production to the next level, color grading absolutely needs to be something you consider incorporating into your workflow. DaVinci Resolve is not only a powerful software for doing this, but it's base version is actually free for anyone.
A few years ago, simple timelapse videos were all the rage. To spice things up, videographers started to add small camera movements to their timelapses using motorized sliders. Those small camera movements have become far more complex today as some of these camera movements are miles in length. These are called "hyperlapse" videos.
Adobe Stock has been around for a short while now, featuring useful, deep integration into Creative Cloud products, as well as a more traditional online portal through which to purchase content. Through a blog post on its website, Adobe recently announced these platforms will now benefit from native 4K video content in addition to the photos and standard high-definition videos previously offered.
Big movies mean big budgets, which usually mean big visual effects. The Moving Picture Company (better known as MPC) recently released another one of those mesmerizing VFX breakdown videos for their most recent feature film, “The Martian.” The breakdown reveals some aspects of the film and of Matt Damon's performance that were both challenging and impressive, like the fact that the helmets worn in the film didn't feature physical windscreens. Those were added later with matching reflections to the scenery.
Watch as Josh Connolly tests out the slow motion explosion he bought off Amazon Prime (ya, you heard me) and then learn how to create your very own. OK, they won't actually teach you how to blow things up, but they will entertain you while walking you through the process they used to create a slow-motion explosion effect. So, even though you may go to Film Riot to learn filmmaking techniques and how to create kick-ass visual effects, you'll go back for the sketches.
We all know it's a little bit more competitive for females to "make it" in the photography and film industries. Yes, it is. The gender gap is real, and I'm not being a feminazi. There are studies about this — science. Even women who are the main characters in films don't get paid as much as their male counterparts (Jennifer Lawrence in the Hunger Games, anyone?). It's even worse for women who are behind the screen, the creators of these big projects. The team over at Vimeo isn't having it anymore, so they are doing something about it.
For the next 10 days, the entire Fstoppers staff is down in Curacao filming our next full length tutorial with swimwear photographer Joey Wright. Recently Facebook just added a new live streaming feature called Livestream which means we can live stream while we film this tutorial. Follow us on Facebook to watch all of our shenanigans and signup for Joey's mailing list for more info about this tutorial.
A little over four years since its release, Apple's Final Cut Pro X hasn't quite comeback to its prominence in the professional video editing industry it once held. To the point that even its creator, Apple, is abandoning the software in its workflow.
As announced at Adobe MAX 2015, Adobe released new updates to its professional Creative Cloud suite of applications. Photoshop CC, Illustrator CC, InDesign CC, Premiere Pro CC, After Effects CC, Audition CC, Dreamweaver CC, Photoshop CC, Fuse CC (Preview), Adobe Stock, and more have been updated. You can download the new versions from the Adobe Creative Cloud app.
The Syrp Genie caught everyone's attention with its contemporary design and advanced automation features that made it a time-lapse photographer's best tool in the field. Today, photographer Mark Gee shares tips on how to set up and use the Genie while offering a few great suggestions that apply to all methods of landscape photography, from what apps he uses on his phone to help him plan every shot to how to edit for final output. Need to shoot a time-lapse soon? Whether you're experienced or just starting, there's undoubtedly something in here for you.
If you have ever shot time-lapse, you know the struggles of dealing with hundreds, if not thousands of large files. While Lightroom and other post production programs can definitely make editing your time-lapse easier, LRTimelapse is a program that can further ease the editing process and improve your workflow. LRTimelapse allows keyframing and grading of time-lapse sequences in an all RAW file-based workflow, as well as creating day to night time-lapse transitions easily and helping to get rid of annoying flicker effects in your sequence, all in the comfort of Lightroom.
For many of our readers here, their bread and butter is photography. In the past we've talked about why you should be creating BTS videos of your shoots. Or you could be a one man/woman band that has found themselves on a video shoot by themselves with no dedicated sound person. Our friends over at Story & Heart have put out a great new tutorial from their Academy of Storytellers about how to capture and use great natural sounds.
I have mad respect for Swedish independent film outfit Crazy Pictures for their big-budget cinematography skills that are being utilized on a moderately small budget with rigs and labor that are within reach of almost any videographer. They've put together an incredibly informative behind-the-scenes video that covers in detail the massive amount of work that goes into such a short segment of film.
A few weeks ago Microsoft announced the Surface Pro 4, an updated version of the very successful Surface Pro 3. The day after the event they gave me one to test and I'm really enjoying it.
Many people that want to get into filmmaking believe you need to attend film school to have a successful career. Many also believe that by purchasing a Red Epic Camera you will instantly become a filmmaker. Neither are true. After watching Casey Neistat's Guide to Filmmaking video, you learn that gear doesn't matter. Neistat does own expensive gear, such as the Canon 70D and the Canon 5D Mark III, however, he became a successful filmmaker and youtuber with dirt cheap equipment.
Black Diamond Equipment is known for making top-of-the-line outdoors equipment for skiers, snowboarders, and climbers. Recently, they launched their video series BDTV Season 1, which is going to be compromised of short videos about people who they believe embody their core values. These videos are a great examples of storytelling using short video format and deserve further examination. That way you can apply the same learnings to your own video work.
“Star Wars” fans around the world are patiently awaiting the arrival of “Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens” on December 18. That being said, the hype train has been running full steam ahead since the initial trailer for “The Force Awakens” was released almost 10 months ago. Since the release of “A New Hope” in 1977, “Star Wars” has created a fanatical fan base, with an expansive universe and many stories to be told. Fan films have been a part of that universe for many decades now, and they have gotten so big that “Star Wars” has an entire section of their site with awards dedicated to them.
Freelance videomaker and visual artist Julianna Thomas did something unique recently: she shot an entire series of black and white subjects, but in color. As a response to one of her greatest pet peeves, Thomas created "Black & White In Color" as a "personal response to treating black and white as an editing afterthought."