80% of a typical motion picture is made up of close-ups of people having conversations. And by far the most commonly used lighting setup for such a close-up shot is the far-sided key. Master this one simple lighting setup and suddenly 80% of your shots will look “Hollywood.”
Cinematography Still Frames Film Grab Movie Stills Database 129 of the Most Beautiful Shots in Movie History PS – the winner is the Shinning (1980). Movie Screen Shot My personal favorite for random inspiration (plus a fun play-along game): Screenplays Drew’s Script-o-Rama Internet Movie Script Database
When is a light not THE light? When it’s a light you see on screen of course.
The Aperture setting (the opening of the iris that lets more or less light in) of a lens is measured in a unit called f-stops. A wide-open aperture that lets the most light in is represented by a small f-stop number, typically something like f2.8 (or maybe f1.4 for a very “fast” lens that can […]
There are three methods of setting focus depending on which of the 3 types of lenses you are using. For a video style camera with a zoom lens you use…
When you set the focus on a lens you are picking the mathematical distance to the subject that will be perfectly in focus. Depth of Field is the area in front of and behind that mathematical point that also looks in focus. Depth of Field can be shallow (only the exact subject is in focus) […]
In order to develop a personal reference for both picture and sound, watch movies on a standard monitor and with standard speakers and headphones. (Make sure to choose a light-weight and portable LCD monitor which will let you plug in a set of headphones perhaps.) Then use that monitor as you shoot so you can […]