Mastering Videography

An NAT Pop is bringing in a natural sound burst into your video. Watch your morning or evening news and any story the photog. had time to edit will incorporate NAT Pops.

Lens filters once allowed all sorts of special effects. Star filters made twinkly stars wherever a highlight appeared in frame. Gradient filters turned boring skies into brilliant sunsets. Even defusion filters to get that Vaseline smeared-on-the-lens dreamy look from your video camera. Of course for this effect a pair of nylons stretched tightly over your lens will do the trick too.

I hate cleaning my lens. It scares me, damn things expensive, but I\'ve seen a lot of video ruined behind a dirty lens. Try and shoot a beautiful sunset behind a dirty lens and the beautiful sunset will be the second thing your viewers will notice. So keep it clean but CAREFULLY.

Fight scenes in movies are just really long sequences. Since the last two episodes you should be shooting sequences all the time now. I\'m going to show you how you can make two people who have actually no idea how to fight, look pretty good in a fight scene. It all has to do with choosing specific angles that hide and enhance what you want the audience to see. And to prove it, I\'m going to use a nine year old and an eleven year old and I\'m going to do it in an hour.

Last time we talk about shooting sequences to make your videos more interesting. This time I\'m going to show you the effort it takes to shoot a sequence. It takes time to shoot sequences but the end result is always worth it.

A sequence is a way of editing a group of video clips together so they make sense. Does that make sense? You have to really think ahead to shoot a decent sequence. They include different angles, cutaways and a lot of changing your scale; You\'ll see.

Screen Direction is another one of those gotchas that can fool even the most seasoned reporters. Believe me, Ive seen it a lot. So here\'s another taste of the mastering Videography DVD. I hope it helps.

Action Move is a continuity technique. Its a very specific technique that should not be used all the time but its interesting if you have a reason to use it. So here is another tool for your toolbox.

Contrast ratio has a lot to do with our last tutorial on the iris. You see contrast ratio is the difference between the lightest and darkest objects in a shot. Unfortunately video doesn\'t do very well with this and the iris we talked about last time is the tool that has to deal with it. Here\'s another excerpt from the Mastering Videography DVD.

Every video camera has an iris. Hopefully your camera doesn\'t just offer and auto iris. Yeesh, I hate those things. Here\'s a little diddy about the iris and why its so important for your videos exposure.