How To Get Better At Cinematography
As we continue our journey as cinematographers, there are always new things to learn. There is so much information out there about shooting videos, but very few resources that focus on how to light properly or how to use color effectively.
That’s where this article comes in! We will be breaking down some of the fundamentals of lighting and color for amateur filmmakers. These days anyone can pick up a camera and create incredible looking shots, but it takes more than just having a good eye to pull off great photography.
It takes knowing what tools work best and being able to apply them correctly to achieve your vision. The better you get at it, the closer you will come to creating professional-level photos and movies. So let's dive in!
Lighting
Surface lights are one of the most important parts of any successful photograph or movie. A surface light looks natural and does not look overly studio or plasticized. It must also produce enough light to clearly expose the subject.
In cine film production, ambient (natural) light is often times not strong enough to fully illuminate the subjects. Therefore, they turn on additional light sources such as desk lamps, flash guns, or battery powered LED bulbs.
These extra light sources help even out the intensity of the shadows and bring forth warmer shades of colors. This effect is called balanced illumination.
There are many ways to control the strength, shape, and placement of these light sources.
Learn photography basics
A long time ago, people learned how to take good pictures by learning how to use a camera! Before that, you needed someone who could take nice photographs to teach you. Nowadays, with technology moving faster than ever before, there are many ways to learn about taking great photos without having to pay an expert or professional for lessons.
There are several types of photographers out there, from casual photogs to professionals. No matter what level you want to reach, though, it is important to understand the fundamentals of photographic editing. You should know something like Photoshop, Lightroom, or similar software beyond adding decorations to images.
This article will go into more detail about some of the most fundamental things every cinematographer must know how to do.
Practice taking photos of things
A great way to get better as a cinematographer is by practicing, practice, practice! Taking still photographs is an excellent way to do this. You can take many different types of pictures depending on your goals.
Taking candid or informal pictures is a nice way to start because it does not require you to be in front of a pre-existing background or structure. By incorporating into your photography some simple photographic techniques, like using natural light, working with slow shutter speeds for soft focus, and recording time lapse sequences, you will naturally begin to add depth and dimension to your pictures.
Take some time every day to look around you and find interesting patterns, shapes, colors, and textures that you could use in your next picture. The more you expose yourself to visual information, the easier it will become to create beautiful, crisp images that tell a story.
Invest in a good lens
A decent camera is great, but having quality glass is what really sets apart professional cinematographers from amateur ones. Sure, you can take any old piece of plastic and tell people it’s a DSLR, but deep down, they know it isn’t.
DSLRs have large sensors that allow for higher resolution images, which makes your photos look better than if you were using something with smaller pixels. Higher quality lenses are almost always sharper too, making your image look more detailed and rich.
There are many types of cinema grade lenses out there, so don’t feel like you need to spend a lot money to get some nice filters. Check out our article here about where to begin when investing in gear!
But remember, no matter how expensive your kit is, nothing compares to shooting with one good shot.
Learn to use lighting
A key part of cinematography is being able to work with light. Lighting can be natural, man-made, or both!
Natural light is when sunlight is used as the source of illumination. This is usually done during filming in the morning or evening when it is possible to capture enough exposure for the needed shot.
Using available light naturally is the most common way that cinematographers begin working because you don’t have to pay too much money to get adequate light. However, when there is no light available, they turn to artificial lights.
These are created by using bulbs to produce heat which then produces light. There are many types of bulbs used for this including sodium vapor, fluorescent, hydrogen gas, and metal halide.
The best way to learn how to use light effectively is by practicing, practicing, practicing! So, make sure to look out for opportunities to do so.
There are several resources available to anyone who would like to start exploring the art of photography. By adding more depth to your photographs, you will want to try experimenting with different ways to use light.
You could also take some classes about photographic techniques if you feel ready.
Practice editing your photos
After you take your first few pictures, it is important to start thinking about what you want to change or improve upon. This could be changing your camera setting, switching up the exposure, moving something around, etc.
Once you have done this, save all of these new photographs in a collection. You can then go through and organize them by type (videographer styles) or by size (large format photography).
From there, you can begin to edit and enhance some of these images. There are many free and paid software applications that allow you to do this. Some of the most common ones are Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom, and YouTube for making color adjustments and photo edits.
By practicing editing and enhancing your own photographs, you will learn more advanced techniques that other cinematographers use.
Learn to use Adobe Photoshop or other editing programs
Having a background in photography is very helpful when cinematogrpahying because you can manipulate photos in these editing software apps to enhance your skills. You can learn how to use photoshop, lightroom, gimp, photobucket, etc to improve your cinematography!
Many cinematography websites have great tutorials that show you how to do various things like color correct, edit frames, add effects, and so on. All of these are totally free to access!
There are also many online courses that focus on cinema-style filming, lighting, camera work, and more.
Become familiar with different film types
After learning how to use your camera effectively for stills, it is time to move onto filming more fluid sequences or as they call them, shot styles. These are typically confined to either cinema style (or movie mode) or event documentary style.
Cinema style is when the narrative of the story being told in the film can be seen clearly over what happens in the scene. This was very popularized in movies like The Lord of the Rings, where every scenes has an extended amount of narration that helps tell the viewer what’s happening and who everyone is.
Event documentaries also have long periods of narration but their main focus is capturing interesting events that occur during the filmmaking process. A good example of this would be the movie Paris Burning, where the audience gets to learn about the Nazi death camps through interviews and footage.
There you have it! That is all you need to know about cinematic shooting modes.
Become familiar with different camera types
A very important part of cinematography is knowing what type of camera you use. There are several main categories, such as dolly cameras, static cameras, and moving or traveling shots.
Dolly shooting is when the camera stays still while the subject moves around it. This is typically done for coverage or aesthetic reasons. For example, if the scene contains many objects then the dolly allows the camera to stay away and focus on one object for an extended period of time.
A static camera is one that remains fixed during filming. Static cameras are usually used for efficiency since the settings are known and not having to reset them each time something happens (like someone walking into the frame).
Moving or traveling shots occur when the camera is in motion. These can be done either slowly or quickly and are most commonly seen in action scenes or documentaries.
There are some tricks that professional cinematographers know how to do that anyone could learn.