archived-videos Practical Film Burn and Super-Bokeh? Oh my.

P

Pete

Practical Film Burn and Super-Bokeh...

Hey everyone!

In a spur-of-the-moment rush yesterday, I decided to do a little experimenting with my (somewhat) new T3i. I was intrigued by the effects that physically removing the lens from the camera would have on the image. From my video's description:

1) The focal point moves closer to the camera, and it gives you a very shallow depth-of-field. This means that you can get much closer shots than you could with the lens attached. The shallow depth-of-field is especially evident in the shots of the leaves.

2) You can make use of "light leaks" or "light flares" from the sun. It was a mostly cloudy day when I shot this, which in my opinion is the best lighting to do so, because the flares are there but they aren't obnoxious. No special effects or additional "film burn" was added to this video -- everything you see is 100% practical.

I recommend watching this from YouTube rather than the embedded version. The bigger/higher resolution it is, the better it looks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fc9kkRffMSw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fc9kkRffMSw

So, what do you think? I'm sure I didn't break new ground or anything here, but I personally couldn't find any other examples of a similar technique. Do you like the look of it? Do you hate it? I understand that some parts were a bit too shaky, due to my unsteady hands, so you'll have to bear with me there.

I found that the longer lens you have, the better results you get. Most of those shots were from my 135mm, and a couple were from my 50mm. I will note that these were MD-mount lenses, so I had an adapter to connect to the EF-mount on my camera. That's important because, for this video, I removed the lens but kept the adapter attached to the camera. I'm not sure if there would be any other effect if the adapter was off as well, but I'm too paranoid to completely expose the camera's sensor.

I'd like to get some opinions/comments/criticisms/suggestions/ideas/whatever on the video.

Thanks a bunch!

EDIT: I re-uploaded the video after discovering that the previous upload was a rough-cut. Everything is essentially the same, except it hopefully flows better :)
 
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Pete said:
Hey everyone!

In a spur-of-the-moment rush yesterday, I decided to do a little experimenting with my (somewhat) new T3i. I was intrigued by the effects that physically removing the lens from the camera would have on the image. From my video's description:

1) The focal point moves closer to the camera, and it gives you a very shallow depth-of-field. This means that you can get much closer shots than you could with the lens attached. The shallow depth-of-field is especially evident in the shots of the leaves.

2) You can make use of "light leaks" or "light flares" from the sun. It was a mostly cloudy day when I shot this, which in my opinion is the best lighting to do so, because the flares are there but they aren't obnoxious. No special effects or additional "film burn" was added to this video -- everything you see is 100% practical.

I recommend watching this from YouTube rather than the embedded version. The bigger/higher resolution it is, the better it looks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdeFdFkcbSE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdeFdFkcbSE

So, what do you think? I'm sure I didn't break new ground or anything here, but I personally couldn't find any other examples of a similar technique. Do you like the look of it? Do you hate it? I understand that some parts were a bit too shaky, due to my unsteady hands, so you'll have to bear with me there.

I found that the longer lens you have, the better results you get. Most of those shots were from my 135mm, and a couple were from my 50mm. I will note that these were MD-mount lenses, so I had an adapter to connect to the EF-mount on my camera. That's important because, for this video, I removed the lens but kept the adapter attached to the camera. I'm not sure if there would be any other effect if the adapter was off as well, but I'm too paranoid to completely expose the camera's sensor.

I'd like to get some opinions/comments/criticisms/suggestions/ideas/whatever on the video.

Thanks a bunch!
Click to expand...
Hey, Pete. Not bad stuff, but we can all do that. Show me a story with camera movement. That's my challenge too. ;)
 
CamVader said:
Hey, Pete. Not bad stuff, but we can all do that. Show me a story with camera movement. That's my challenge too. ;)
Click to expand...

Hey CamVader, I appreciate it. This was essentially a test video, but I agree that there should be a point to it.

I've been trying to line up another test vid with a friend for a while now. When that happens, there should be at least a bit more of a story to tell.

Thanks for the response!
 
Also known as "lens-whacking" :) I really like the look of the footage, be interesting to see a more structured piece (narrative, music promo, whatever) shot with just this technique - I bet it'd be tricky!
 
@chilipe -- Thanks for that! I never knew what it was called, so that's a nice thing to be aware of.

I'll be shooting one more like this ("pointless") tomorrow, just for fun. But after that, I'll be doing something more substantial.
 
Alrighty, I tried this technique again, only with man-made objects/environments instead of with nature (I would call it the counter-thesis, but that would imply I have a purpose in these videos beyond testing out a filming technique). I can't say that I like this footage as well as I do the "nature" video, but someone else may have a different opinion about that. One of the main problems is that much of the footage was over-exposed. I darkened a few of the clips significantly in post to get them to where they are now.

Anyway, here's the final product:
(It looks better from Youtube than it does embedded, so just click on the video link and watch it there)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4WndNDHc1s

Again, any comments/suggestions/whatever are of course welcome. By next week I'll be taking a major change of pace, as I plan on starting my first action scene. Hopefully it will be different than your expectations.

Thanks again for the responses!
 
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