- Rail Through the Stomach. Did your subject just get impaled by a railing or is a tree growing from their head? Trees or telephone poles sticking out of the back of someone's head- not a good idea.
- Bright Light Background! Subjects who are just darkened blurs because there was bright light in the background.
- Boring shots of buildings with no action. You can avoid this by using interesting camera movements of angles.
- Shooting Up The Nose. Do you really want to be looking up someone's nose when you are watching a video? All of the audiences attention is taken away from the shot when they can see up someone's nostrils.
- Looking Down on Children. This is one of the most common video mistakes. When shooting video you want it from the perspective of the subject. Shooting the top of a child's head does not give you their perspective. Don't shoot down when filming children.
- Office Lights! Shooting anywhere with fluorescent lighting on the ceiling is a no no. They provide great lighting for offices and other places but they create horrible lighting for videos. The position of these lights creates dark eye sockets and show imperfections on the skin. You can move your subject closer to a window to let the some natural light in.
Monday, September 3, 2012
Common shooting mistakes
Most people make the same sets of mistakes when they first start shooting video:
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AHHHHH! I've seen these mistakes before but it's so true. I don't want to be thinking "How are you living with that tree in your head?", it's so distracting.
ReplyDeleteVery informative.
I hate office lights.
Personally these things can get very confusing for me and often I see them not as mistakes but as a different take on the shot itself. Perhaps the person filming intended for the tree to stick out of their head to symbolize growing knowledge or wisdom that does in fact distract you from where you need to stand in life. Personally I find the slightest "error" in a shot and interpret that into a fascinating meaning that enhances the over all elements of the video.
ReplyDeleteThese are all common mistakes. If you attention they can be avoided, but some can also be used to your advantage. The fluorescent lights, as we discussed in class, can be used to show a stark omniscient world and then the bright light background can be used to create a silhouette and then you can pan across and get the character out of the light to solve it. They can all be used to help as well!
ReplyDeleteVery true Presley!!
ReplyDeleteI used to have a serious issue with office lights, for some reason I never really factored in lighting when i first started out, even though it is one of the most important parts of film-making.
ReplyDeleteOnce taking the lighting class at school I learned very similar techniques addressed above on how lighting changes the look of a person or image. Im now almost obsessive when it comes to lighting, and fluorescent and any sort of office light drive me crazy! With a more observant eye, as most film makers have little mistakes such as poles and distracting background can make all the difference between a beautiful shot and an okay shot.
ReplyDeletei get really peeved with big budget films when they have a shitty background. if you have all that money why not make sure the background is pretty? Same thing for lighting. it bugs me.
ReplyDelete