Technical Design Final Cut Pro Having Final Cut Pro training helped to better understand the editing program. Which will be useful during the editing process of our documentary and other work I need to produce. Colour Correction Learning about colour correction is useful because it can help save footage if something had gone wrong, for example if the footage is too bright you can add a colour corrector to turn the brightness down. Often a exclamation point will be visible on the preview screen to warn you of a light problem with the footage, i.e, over exposure. Final Cut Pro X Over the summer I purchased the latest apple editing program, where I taught myself the basics, using online tutorials and youtube videos. It largely differs from Final Cut Pro as apple removed a lot of features. Its visually more appealing and you can render video while you continue to work, this is a useful idea as it means you can keep on tweaking the video while it renders which you couldn't do on previous versions of the program. A negative aspect of the program is that there is one time line for video and audio, which unlike the other programs makes the process of editing audio more hassle. So the program would work well along side programs like adobe audition, or other sound editing programs. I will continue to use this program for personal projects, but I don't intend on using it for the documentary. Canon 450D Training White Balance Setting the white balance on the camera lets it know what the true white is, and sets the camera up to register natural looking colours. You can manually set the white balance or choose from one of the several presets, such as cloudy or sunny. This automatically sets the colour temperature of the shots by effecting the kelvins of the light. ISO Speed The ISO speed effects the image sensors sensitivity to light, depending on the high or low exposure to light. An ISO speed of 100/200 is for sunny outdoor settings (Spanish Film) An ISO speed of 400/800 is for Overcast skies or Evenings (Uk Film) An ISO speed of 1600 is for Night or Dark Indoors (Dusk til Dawn) Shutter Speed Shutter speed affects how quickly light gets into the lens, the slower the speed the more light gets in, this affects the outcome of the picture and can lead to blurring and colour distortion. Setting the camera to TV mode enables the photographer to change the shutter speed quickly, so you can get action shots the way you want them, either blurred or frozen, depending on the shutter speed. Aperture Aperture effects the depth of field of the camera, which can give a good look, as it gives you the freedom to focus on particular subjects either in the foreground or background while un-focusing on other subjects in the same frame. It is useful for photographers as they can get the audience to look at what they want by drawing all the cameras focus towards it. Editing RAW Images Learning how to edit RAW images, using the specific editing program on adobe photoshop, was beneficial because it gave me the knowledge to edit my photoessay, but is a skill I can use in the future. Using the RAW editing program you can tweak the picture to look exactly the way you want it, you can alter it to look naturalistic, or over saturate the colours to give your image a more surreal/artistic look. You can manipulate the image but the program can also try and save the photo if it was too over exposed when you originally captured it, or add exposure if it looks too under exposed for example. Canon 550d Training Greyscale 18% is classed as balanced Lens PLC (Peripheral Illumination Correction) - Full Frame Reading - Balanced lighting Longer Lens = longer shutter speed Shorter Lens = short shutter speed Light Fall Off. A.K.A Vignetting is when the frame has darkened edges due to more light reaching the centre of the image. Mechanical Vignetting A physical light block, could be the clouds a tree, or parts of the camera causing less light to reach the lens field of view. Optical vignetting The image is affected by the angle the light is coming into the lens aperture. Pixel vignetting The photon wells that make up the image sensor don’t get enough light to them which could create the darkened edges of the frame. COF – Circle of Confusion Circle of confusion refers to the smallest point of focus of an object in relation to the human eye and the camera lens. Depending on the type of lense and the distance of the object depends on the detail the camera can pick up and helps attain the depth of field number for the shot. Extension Tubes Gaining an extension in focal length, Canon extension tubes come in 12mm or 25mm. The longer the tube is the greater image is magnified, although light loss will occur with the tube on. This can provide an effect that some video cameras cannot achieve with as much detail to the subject. Macro mode is used when a tube is added; as it decreases the focal length of the camera so it chooses a smaller area to focus on to keep the magnified image in focus. Sound Duplicate sound in postproduction to convert from Mono to Stereo. A recommended microphone to use with a DSLR is the Rode Videomic Pro. It minimises surrounding sound and focuses on the subject it is aimed at. It can provide up to 70 hours of recording from a single 9v battery, can be easily attached to boom poles which can help for portable recording devices . White Balancing – Stills of different light levels of locations can be used to alter white balance quickly between locations. 24p vs 25p European PAL is 25p, which works well in Europe but doesn’t work as well in other counties. NTSC 24p is easier to convert to 25p than 25p is to convert to 24p, conversions from 25 – 24 can affect the synchronisation of the sound and affects the speed of the footage, making it slower. So depending on where the film is intended on being shown should depend on how you choose to shoot the film. This video by Philip Bloom was shot on a Canon 60D with 100mm F2.8 Macro and 24mm F1.4, which clearly shows the effect and detail gained with hyper depth field. |
