Focus In & Stay Sharp

Ever had this happen? You’re shooting an event from the back of an auditorium. You start with a wide establishing shot of the stage as the curtain rises… and then – at just the right time – you zoom in for the big closeup, only to find that *DOH!* your focus is soft. Here’s the deal: It’s virtually impossible to set a sharp manual focus on a distant subject with your lens zoomed out to a wide angle setting. You just can’t see where your focal point is. The trick is to zoom in as far as you can and set focus at the extreme telephoto end of your lens. This will mean anticipating the position of the subject you’ll want to zoom in on before the show starts. The cool thing is, once you’ve zoomed in and set your focus on the most distant thing you’ll shoot, the shot will stay sharp as you zoom back to wide angle.  

Mixing Music and Dialogue

Almost every edit has two primary audio components: voice and music. Both play important roles in your productions. The voices communicate content. They impart information and tell the story. Music sets the mood and drives the pace of the edit. When music and voice are mixed properly, the latter adds and underscores emotion without competing with the content. But when your music mix is too hot and the instrumentals overpower the dialogue, your viewers will have to strain to understand what is being said and they might miss the message. 

You may have invested in high quality audio monitors for your edit bay. These make your soundtracks sound fantastic at your desk, but we all need to remember that most people watching our productions will not be listening on high quality speakers. Some may be listening through the small speakers built into their TVs, others through their laptops, some in headphones and others on their phones, Kindles or iPads. If you know exactly where your edit will be played (in an auditorium, on an iPad or on TV sets in a variety of homes) you can optimize your mixes for that specific setting. If your production will play in a wide variety of settings, you need to make a mix that works well for everyone. I highly recommend auditioning your mix on a variety of different playback devices to make sure it sounds clear on the poorest device people might use. When in doubt, ride your music levels a slight bit lower than you think you should, and bump them up only in the gaps between dialogue. A mix that sounds good to the least of these will work well for everyone.

Split That Clip

Most edits use "straight" cuts, keeping video clips linked to their accompanying audio so the image and sound begin and end together. Most of the time this is fine, but occasionally you may want to mix things up by unlinking (or splitting) the audio and video so that they begin and/or end at different times. This creates what's known as a "sound bridge" or an "L-cut." Sound bridges create one of two effects: either 1) the video from the incoming clip leads the audio, or 2) the audio from the incoming clip leads its video.

Video Leads Audio
Imagine a scene where a couple is having a heated argument. As the sound of their harsh words continues, we cut to a sequence of shots of the man driving away in the rain, dazed and lost in his thoughts. As he drives, the sound of the argument continues until it is abruptly interrupted by the honking horn of another driver that brings the man back to reality, and re-syncs the soundtrack.

Audio Leads Video
In another scene a boy sits, bored, in a classroom, daydreaming while his teacher lectures about the lessons of past wars. While we see the teacher lecturing, the sound of his voice is replaced by the sounds of a battlefield, then we cut to the same boy, a few years later, in combat.

As you watch TV programs or movies this week, look and listen for this technique. Once you are aware of it, you will begin to notice it in the shows you watch.

As with all special video devices, this technique should be used sparingly and with restraint. If it is overused, it will become a distraction to your viewers, BUT you will find that, when it is employed at the right time, the L-cut/sound bridge can be a powerful tool for visual storytelling.

Tally Light Stage Fright

People that aren't used to being on-camera may get nervous and freeze-up when they see the red tally light on your camera begin to blink. I've found that some people are more relaxed & perform better if you turn it off or tape it up. Your camera might have a switch or menu function that lets you turn off the tally. If your camera doesn't offer that option, you can simply cover it up with a small piece of black gaffers tape. Remember, one of your goals should always be to help the people you shoot look their best on camera. When you're working with amateur actors or uninitiated interviewees, do what you can to eliminate tally light stage fright.

Five Tips for Lighting Faces for TV

The GIGO principle certainly applies to lighting. The fact is, if you start with grainy, poorly-lit footage, your end result will be compromised. It doesn't matter how good your camera and editing software may be, if you are a lazy lighter, your productions will suffer. Knowing this, the best thing you can do to increase the production quality of your videos is NOT to buy a better camera or a new color-corrector. The first thing you should do is learn to light. Here are 5 tips to get you started.

#1 - SHOOT A THREE-POINTER
Three-point lighting is the time-tested standard for lighting talent for TV and film. A three-point setup consists of a key, a fill and a back light. The key light is typically positioned to the front of the subject, slightly to one side. It provides the primary source of illumination in this setup and its quality and characteristics help to establish the mood of the scene. The fill light is less powerful than the key light. It is positioned on the side opposite the key and serves to soften (or fill-in) the shadows created by the key light. The back light (or hair light) is positioned above and behind the subject so that it casts light on the subject's head and shoulders. This adds depth and separates him from the background. Learning and using three-point lighting isn't difficult. It will make a huge difference in the look of your footage and in the overall professionalism of your productions. If you're not using it, it's time to start.

#2 - SET THE MOOD WITH SHADOWS
When a bright key light is positioned close to the camera, the result is "flat" lighting. Flat lighting is emotionally neutral. If you're doing news, this may be fine. But if you want to add emotion, merely flooding your subject with bright, flat, light isn't enough. Lighting can be used to move and manipulate shadows to create the illusion of depth on a two-dimensional screen. To add depth, position the key light so that it strikes your subject at an angle. The size, angle and intensity of the shadows cast by the key help set the mood of the scene. As you move the key farther to the side, the mood becomes more and more dramatic. Once the key is positioned appropriately, use the fill light to soften its shadows to your liking.

#3 - SOFTEN UP
The hardness or softness of a light can be determined by examining the shadows that it casts on your subject. A hard light casts a dark shadow with a sharp edge transfer. Soft light casts lighter shadows with a wide gradient shadow-edge transfer. Soft light is more flattering to the face than hard light and is preferred in most setups. Hard light can make a subject look intense and even wicked. Small, focused lamps cast hard light and shadows. Larger and more diffused lamps cast softer light and shadows. You can soften the effect of a light by adjusting its distance from the subject or by adding diffusion to spread the light.

#4 - HANDLE HARD-TO-LIGHT PEOPLE
Some people are inherently more difficult to light than others. The top three problems you'll run into are: people wearing glasses, bald heads and dark skin. While the solutions are slightly different, the problem is essentially the same: bright reflections and specular highlights that create unattractive, glowing, hot-spots. When lighting a person with glasses, lights placed anywhere near the camera create specular highlights on the lenses of the subject's specs. Bald heads are less of a problem, but you'll still get small hard light spots across the cranium. When you expose subjects with dark complexions properly, you often end up with hot spots on the tip of the nose, forehead, cheeks and chin. For glasses, the solution is to go up and out. Raise your lights higher and position them as far to the sides as possible until the reflections are gone. People with bald heads or dark skin need to be lit with very large, very soft lights positioned very close. The goal is to make the specular highlight larger than the subject's face, bathing them in soft light.

#5 - LIGHT THE WHOLE SHOT, NOT JUST THE SUBJECT
The job doesn't end when your subject is lit. You're not done until you've lit the whole shot. Save a light or two for your background. Pinch your barndoors down to create a shaft of light across the background or add a gel for a splash of color. Taking a little extra time to dress your set with light will greatly improve the look and feel of your shots.

~cp