archived-videos Angry Gamer

No offense intended... but, based on your video, they don't seem to be teaching much cinematography in your cinematography class.

Maybe I'm just turning into a curmudgeony old man, but I guess I didn't really see the point to that.

I suspect you had fun though, that's important. :)
 
Yeah, really all I have to say is 'What Cinematography?'. It all looks naturally lit with no external lights, it looks very drab and grey for the most part and the camera quality is also fairly bad, though it looks like thats your colleges' fault more than anything.

You need to get some sort of externals. Take the shot where he's sat in front of the computer. There's a window behind meaning the guy is dipped into near silhouette really. You need a light on him to counteract that, maybe even just a reflector would've done the job. The camera also seems to be jacking up the gain because of the lack of lighting too.
 
I don't usually suffer from motion sickness, but you mildly succeeded on that account.

For the rest, what were you trying to achieve so we can put it into perspective?
 
MissingProductions said:
Made this video for my cinematography class. Would love to get some feedback.
Click to expand...
CMOS sensors LOVE LOVE LOVE light.
Especially ones with little itty bitty sensor sizes.
What're u shootin' with there, pardner? http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b395/JRWJR/Misc pics/428px-SensorSizes.png

All of this is shot on a 1/2.6" sensor: http://www.youtube.com/user/placesofnature/videos?view=0&flow=grid
Even with a small sensor you can get a decent image.


PLAN ahead better.

If you wanna shoot indoors - fine. Just add a ton of light and color grade in post to darken.
What NLE are you working with, as well?

Otherwise, PLAN on a subject where a lot of light is appropriate - a game cave is not good for the equipment you have.

As far as walking around with a camera goes: cameras are light, your arms are bouncy, add more weight to the camera and you'll reduce your bounce and improve your cinematography.
Build a metal (not PVC) box rig:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gd83zNHGnh8

Discussing framing is secondary to these two fundamentals.


BTW, your cinematography instructor sucks.
This is all rudimentary cr@p he/she should have discussed before sending you all out to burn up hours planning/shooting/editing.
 
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Thank you guys for the constructive criticism, no offence taken whatsoever.

I am fully aware of the lighting situation, when I was editing the footage, I was angry with the very dull lights. I will be using the schools light kit from now on.

As for the bouncy camera, I have built myself a steadicam, rayw, but I'll have to look into that one, the fact that it's metal and has the bars you hold on the sides seems like it would do a better job.

And you guys are right, unfortunately my class consists of us watching movies and my professor telling us how amazing the shots are. Then giving us handouts on the different shots we can use: wide shot, ground shot, etc.

As for what I was trying to achieve, it was a basic "emotion" project he assigned where we had to emit some sort of emotion. So I chose anger. Since who hasn't been angry on a game or with their computer?

I really appreciate the feedback. Hopefully I'll improve in my next video.
 
I understand. Don't get discouraged. Keep at it, learn and keep on practicing.

I say ask questions, no matter how silly they seem to others. If you want to learn something, the best way is to ask.
 
I would say learn what you can from that class (which isn't likely to be much) and then when you do your project work, do the best work you can, and treat it as if you're working on a project for a final at an actual film school, where you'll be graded based on everything you should have learned during your time at film school.

This means you'll likely have to do a lot of other work outside of the class, and a lot of your own studying, but it should make that class an easy A (probably already is from the sounds of it), and you'll actually get something out of your time.

First place to start would probably be lighting, as clearly that's the area in which you're lacking most right now. Watch a couple movies you like. Not the big super spendy VFX porn ones, but something more along the lines of swingers, or State & Main (awesome movie!)... character driven drama or comedy. Find a scene or two that you like and recreate them shot for shot. You'll learn a lot about camera placement, lighting, etc by doing this.

Pick up some books, and practice practice practice..

We'll be happy to help you, as Sweetie said, ask lots of questions. But if you're truly interested in filmmaking, do the work to make it good... don't just half-ass it for some joke of a community college elective class. :)
 
MissingP,
Will has suggested some very smart ideas just there that you'll benefit from.
Along the lines of his suggestion of finding a scene or two to recreate, watch a few movies from this thread's lists: http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=45221
And then pick some scenes to recreate or at a minimum to analyze for how it was done.

Largely these don't have big whacky SFX or destructive action scenes which makes them great for DIY cinematography training.

This thread has a link to a very cool site you also might find useful, (after you get the fundamentals acquired and are ready to move onto genuine framing and scene composition): http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=40827

GL!
 
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