Cinematography

Posted by : Sabaina and Aiman

Today, we learned about cinematography, which includes various techniques that are used in the making of a film. All the terms and conditions that were studied during class were then experimented practically, during which we released that it's not easy to capture even the simplest of shots which we study in theory. Although we are amateurs with handling a camera in a professional way but in order polish our skills in this particular area we carried out this activity so that we could get comfortable with it during our shooting of the short film\documentary. The results are stated:

There are a few credentials one must follow in order to develop a scene:

• Objective, one must be clear about the reasons behind a particular scene so that everything is done accordingly preventing it from going off the topic.
• Set up a scene, this includes the mise-en-scene i.e. the lights, background etc.
• Establishing the characters, placing the characters at their correct places in a way that they effectively give away the idea behind the roles they are playing, to the audience.
• Elaborating the activity, this would put focus on the subject's activity the director is trying to highlight to the viewers.

CAMERA MOVEMENTS

stationary moves: (when the camera is on tripod and not physically moving)

Tilt Up and Tilt down: when a camera lens moves upwards/downwards while being fixed at a particular place capturing the character or an object for a scene. The difficulty in this particular task was when we had to keep the camera at a consistent level, due to the unavailability of a tripod, in order to get a clear shot.

http://vimeo.com/64968254

Pan: It is a horizontal camera movement, when the camera moves from left to right or from right to left to capture a particular object or to give a sweeping view across the screen. The problem with this task was almost the same as that experienced in capturing the tilt moves, the camera had to still in in order to prevent it from being rugged.

http://vimeo.com/64968221

Zoom in: when camera lens magnify/minimize to capture the object or to lay emphasis/distance an object or a character. This shot was comparatively easy to do as compared to others as we only had to keep a camera at one position but our hands were still very shaky when we took this shot as the camera was not on tripod. Whereas, we had to magnify the lens to capture the object for Zoom in and then for Zoom out the camera was placed at the same point of the same object with the lens of the camera being minimized in order to capture the surrounding substitution of the object.

Zoom In

http://vimeo.com/64993957


Zoom Out
 http://vimeo.com/65193690                         

(zoom in )(zoom out)

Travelling moves: This is when a camera moves physically. Which includes the following:

Dolly Up and Down: This is when a camera is set on a small crane used indoors in order to capture various angles from above or below the object or a character.

Tracking: A camera is set opposite to a character on a track. The movement of the camera is sideways to the character.

Crane: In this term a camera is fixed on a crane which is used to capture a scene from below or above, this is carried out outdoors to capture a wide area.

For all these three travelling moves, we requires objects such as a small crane or track in order to capture these three shots. As we did not have the resources it was difficult for us to capture these moves.

Following Move: In this term a camera follows the character while walking or running etc. In order to get the correct results we had to try this task two to three times. The problem was that the velocity of the character was not matching the velocity of the camera. We had to move the camera at a slow pace in order to avoid it from being distorted so, it took us a few minutes to adjust the speed of the camera and the character with each other.

                                                http://vimeo.com/64968090

CAMERA ANGLES:

High angle: this is when a camera capture a character from  above it facing downwards. It's usually used to give an impression of the character being weak or frightened. This shot was relatively complicated as one of us had to stand on a chair in order to get take a picture from above the head of the character. we personally think that this angle was most difficult to shoot .

http://vimeo.com/64968108

Low angles: this is when a camera captures a character from below facing upwards. This particular angle gives an impression of awe or power surrounding the character. This was the most difficult shot there was. During taking it we faced some confusions. When one of us sat of the ground and tilted the camera a bit the picture we got seemed like a normal shot. It did not give any majestic feel it to. So, in order to get it right we had to adjust the camera again and again to get the correct result.

http://vimeo.com/64968206

Eye level: a camera is set at the height of the character. This required us to keep the camera in line with the character as to give a feel to the viewers as if the character itself is observing. The following picture was taken from the movie SALT so that we could better understand in practical terms along with in theory.

CAMERA SHOTS

Long shot: This shot captures the full person. As this experiment was taken place in afternoon the light available to us was very harsh outdoors that prevented us from getting a picture with the correct lights. So, this shot was taken indoors in a classroom. Due to chairs and desks we faced distractions while making an area for us to stand and take a picture from a suitable angle .

Medium-long shot: This covers a character till it's knees.We did not face any problem during a picture of this particular  shot.  

Mid shot: This shot covers area of the character from waist till above. We had to make sure that the zoom we took in order to bring the lens towards the waist was adjusted correctly. Other than that, the shot was taken easily.

Close up: This shot cover the face of the character. While taking a zoom on the face of the character, the face of the character took too much space in the entire screen so we had to distance a bit so that some space was left in the surroundings of picture e.g. the head room.

Extreme close up: This shot covers a particular area of the character in order to lay emphasis on that particular area. This shot was easy to take as compared to others as it only required to take a zoom of the eyes of the character. It did not require any movement.

180 DEGREE RULE: 

Over the Shoulder: This shot is taken in way that the front of one person and some back portion of another character is shown while they are interacting. This shot was taken by placing a camera behind the second character that gave a clear view of the first character while having a chat with the other. We did not face any difficulty while capturing this shot as it did not require any adjustments of speed or angles from which we were taking the shot.

180 degree movement: This shot is taken at the angle of 180 while placing the two character at a horizontally. This shot was a bit complicated as this term was new to us. We had to set the characters horizontally at the right place and with that during the shooting we had to keep the camera smoothly in order to get a consistent picture. There was a fixed chair in our way which was becoming a disturbance during shooting the shoot of the video. The video had to be re-taken a couple of times after which we were able to get the authentic footage. Other than that, we thought that this movement could be captured by placing the camera above the shoulder of the other person however, we were told that we could tilt the camera at different angles as well. Unfortunately, the footage we captured was not in accordance with the rules of 180 degree, so, we decided to place a picture taken from one of the tutorial videos posted on YouTube so that we could get an example of how it is done correctly.

Rule of thirds: When character or object is slightly off center so that it catches viewer's attention. it was really easy to practically apply this task as we have learned photography last year and we have experimented with this rule a lot as its the most important rule in photography.

 

Lead room: when we making a video or take a picture. The character should have a lead room. which means space before him/her which he/she is leading to. So it gives a comfortable impression to the views.

                                             Wide shot: This shot covers the wide area.

http://vimeo.com/64968156

We experimented with this cinematography technique as well: 

Shallow focus : This is one of our favorite technique and we were very excited to experiment with this shot. Basically  it is when the object near the camera is in focus and the background is out of focus. When we took this shot we felt our camera was very shaky during this shot as we very experimenting with this shot for the first time

http://vimeo.com/64968231