1. PREPARATION (Before You Go to the Field)

VIDEO HANDBOOK

The following brief handbook is designed to guide you in your video shooting as you continue to grow and learn with this new medium. As with all handbooks these are simply guidelines, sometimes you may want to not follow these recommendations based on the effect and feel you’re going for in the movie you’re shooting.

And as with everything else, the only way to figure this stuff out is to just get out there and try. Good luck!

1. PREPARATION (before you go to the field)

You should prepare for a video assignment by asking yourself the following questions: 1) Who do I need to interview? 2) Where should I interview my subjects? 3) What time of day will the light be best for shooting? 4) What environmental shots (B-roll) do I need? 5) What environmental sounds will I need? 6) Do I have all the equipment I need and is it charged? 7) What do I want the end product to look and feel like? 8) What shots do I need for the end product? 9) How will those shots look in sequence?

If shooting alone storyboard the video in your head and write down a list of the shots and subjects you need.

If shooting with a crew storyboard the video together and talk together about shots and subjects.

Don’t forget to use whatever equipment is available to you. For example, your mobile phone may be able to shoot some video and sound and you may need to use it or hand it to a child or someone else to get their perspective of things.

2. THE SHOOT (in the field)

A. Composition/Camera Technique

Always use a tripod or something else (i.e. stack of books, rocks, the roof of a car, etc.) to stabilize the camera, if there’s nothing to place the camera on then brace yourself against a wall or tree to try and keep your hands steady. If there’s nothing to keep steady, shooting at a wide angle provides a steadier shot (this is if you’re shooting with a video camera or DSLR that shoots video, not with a Flipcam or Kodak Zi8). Compose your video shot like you would a photo and make sure things like telephone poles or trees don’t look like they’re sticking out of people’s heads or that plants make the subject look they have crazy hair. Don’t be afraid to move furniture or subjects to get the best possible shot.

The rule of thirds in photography still applies to video.

Don't constantly pan from side to side or zoom in and out with the camera. Hold your shots and look for the one moment that's really captivating. If you're constantly panning and zooming, the one shot you'll really want to use will lose its impact with all the movement by the camera. Instead start with a static, wide angle shot, and hold it for 15 seconds. Then make your move to zoom in or pan, and hold the next static shot for an additional 15 seconds. This will give you three useable shots - the wide-angle, the close-up and the zoom in between - to choose from in the edit room. And when you move, make sure to do this in between shots or between long pauses in the interview.

To get a close-up it's better to keep your camera set to a more wide-angle view and move the camera closer to the subject of your shot, than to have the camera farther away and zoom in for the close-up.

B. The Interview

When shooting an interview don’t have the subject look directly into the camera, have them look at you or the interviewer, basically looking across the frame. Further, when the person being interviewed is looking to the side, add space in the direction in which the person is looking. For example, if the interviewer is to the right of the camera, then you would place the person being interviewed to the left so that they are looking across the frame toward the right. This will place the person being interviewed on the left of the frame, looking right at the unseen interviewer into the space remaining on the right of the frame. The opposite can be done as well.

Be aware of furniture, fans, lights, machinery, wind, etc. that make noise or nervous habits of the person being interviewed that create noise that may interfere with the sound. If the subject is sitting in a chair that squeaks, change the chair; if the subject has a nervous habit of jingling their keys or playing with money in their pocket, stop recording, point it out to them and politely tell them to stop or remove the items because it’s interfering with the sound in the shoot.

Don't do a pre-interview off camera where you tell them the questions you'll be asking beforehand. It makes them sound stilted and canned in their responses when the real interview begins. Just give them a general idea of what you'll be discussing. And before you start the interview, let the camera roll for a few seconds before you ask the first question. If you’re worried about the person being interviewed not being comfortable, always remember that getting a story (written or visual) requires you to build a relationship with the subject. So for a video shoot, while you’re setting up just start talking to the subject to make them feel relaxed and to have them understand who you are and what you’re doing.

Video tends to make things look two-dimensional and flat, so when shooting someone, try to include other objects in the background or foreground that give the viewer a sense of depth.

When shooting an interview make sure to at least have the head and shoulders of the subject in the shot. Don't have a shot where there's excessive empty space above a person's head. That's just dead space. There should be just a little room above a person's head in a shot. It's better to have that room below the person's face (space you then could use when you're editing the video to add a title with the person's name or for subtitles). But don't have the shot too low where you crop the top of the person's head. And if you're shooting a person standing, don't chop them off at the knees; get their entire body in the shot.

C. Environment Shots/B-roll

When shooting environmental shots or B-roll, make sure to capture at least 15-20 seconds of each shot (this will help in the editing process). Also, you can never have enough B-roll. Remember that you not only use B-roll for transitions between scenes, but also as footage during interviews to use the interview sound over, so you need a lot of environmental/B-roll shots. A good rule of thumb is to shot twice as much B-roll as interview footage.

Also, as with photography, pictures and video are more interesting when there are people in the shot. When shooting B-roll try to get people in the shot. For example, rather than shooting just a school building, try shooting the building when kids are playing in front of it or when kids and teachers are walking in and out of it.

Think of different scenes, as in a movie, when shooting B-roll or action shots. Each of those scenes is made up of sequences. In each sequence, you need to follow the action, and shoot wide, medium and close-up shots. Say you want to capture a person arriving at work in the morning on her bicycle; that's one sequence. It could be made up of the following shots: 1) the person pulling up to the building, 2) getting off the bicycle, 3) chaining the bicycle to the bicycle stand, 4) taking off gloves, 5) taking off her helmet, 6) tucking gloves into the helmet, and 7) walking into the building. Every little detail is important. You can't shoot enough details. In fact, a good ratio to shoot for (literally) is 50% close-ups and extreme close-ups, 25% medium shots, and 25% wide shots. So the bicycle sequence may break down like this: 1) A wide shot of her arriving. 2) A medium shot of her getting off the bicycle. 3) A close-up of her pushing the front wheel of the bike into the bike stand. 4) A close-up of her chaining the bike to the stand. 5) An extreme close-up of her taking off her gloves. 6) An extreme close-up of her eyes as she looks at her hands while she's taking off her gloves. 7) A close-up of her taking off her helmet and tucking the gloves into it. 8) A close-up of her straightening her hair and looking at the building. 9) A medium and wide shot of her walking into the building with the helmet tucked under her arm.

Anticipate action by trying to predict where the subject/action will go, and then be ready to shoot it when it moves into the frame of your shot. Think ahead and get positioned for the action that's to come. Let action happen within the frame; don't constantly move the camera in a futile attempt to catch everything. And don't be afraid to allow your subject to move out of frame, rather than trying to follow them with your camera. This is especially important if you're taking a shot of a person who is walking and then later another shot of the person sitting down. If you follow the person while they walk with your first shot and always keep them in frame, and then cut to a second shot of the person sitting down, it can create a mental disconnect for the viewer as to how the person got to the second position. If instead you show them walking out of the frame in the first shot, then it's logical to the viewer that the person would be seen in the next shot sitting somewhere else.

Think about varying your shots and angles. Shooting a video all from eye-level will be quite boring. Especially try shots where you hold your camera close to the ground and shoot up toward your subject. For example: 1) If you're shooting a scene like people walking on a sidewalk, hold the camera low to show their feet moving, rather than straight-on shots of their faces. 2) Or if you're shooting someone working at a computer terminal, take one shot from over their shoulder, then another that is a close-up of their hands and fingers using the keyboard and mouse, then a shot from over the person's other shoulder, then a low angle shot looking up at them and then a facial shot. 3) Or hold your camera above your head to get a different perspective on a scene. 4) Do a close up shot, because that often provides a more intimate view of a person. This is especially important with video on the web, because the video viewers use small windows and wide-angle shots won't display much detail. 5) Don't just rely on zooms to get these different perspectives - move the camera closer or farther away. If you take shots from these different perspectives, when you edit your video you'll be able to put together a sequence of 4- or 5-second shots of your subject, rather than one 20-second shot from a single perspective.

Make sure you get all the shots you need even if you don't think you'll use them. They may come in handy in the edit room. So start with an establishing shot (such as video of the person who is the subject of your story) and then remember to get the other kinds of shots you may use to supplement that in your final film.

D. Sound

Be aware of the wind direction and block the wind: 1) if there is a building that can block the wind then film behind it; 2) if you’re in an open space and there’s nothing to block the wind, then determine the direction and have the subject turn their back to the wind, or if there is a group of people in the field use them to block the wind.

Lavalier (lav) mic placement: 1) Ask the person to run the cord of the lav mic up the inside of their shirt (so the wire won't show in your video). 2) Then clip the mic to the outside of their shirt, about 5-6 inches below their mouth. Try to center the mic as much as possible. If you have it too far to one side, it won't pick up the audio well if the person then tilts his/her head to the other side while talking. 3) Use this same procedure if the person is wearing a t-shirt, running the cord up under the shirt and clipping the mic near the top of the shirt. 4) If the person has a necktie, run the wire down the back of the necktie and through the little label on the bottom back of the necktie. 5) Be aware of collars, jewelry, buttons or anything else that could hit the mic and create noise. If something or someone hits the mic while speaking, ask the subject to stop and repeat what they said. 6) If it's windy, the lav mic will pick up the sound of the wind. In this case try to clip the mic closer to the person's mouth, or switch to a hand-held microphone with a windscreen on it that muffles the noise of the wind.

If you're using a handheld microphone, you usually should hold it about 5-6 inches below the interview subject's mouth. Don't hold the mic right in front of the person's mouth, but slightly off to the side and tilted toward the mouth. This will help avoid picking up "popping" noises from a person's lips as he/she speaks. Tell the interview subject to try to ignore the mic and concentrate on the camera. And make sure to have the microphone out of the frame.

If using overhead mics on booms (poles) make sure they mics don’t drop into the frame. Sound in video is all about signal (intended sound, i.e. subject’s voice) to noise (unintended sound, i.e. wind, trucks passing) ratio, so be aware of mic placement and background noise. Make sure the audio is right; bad audio means that the video will most probably be useless.

Check your audio levels using headphones before the interview starts. If you don’t have headphones or your device doesn’t have a port to use headphones then record the subject talking for a bit, play it back and adjust accordingly.

You can use location sound and anything happening publicly in your video, so get kids to sing or a church congregation to sing, or workers to work, etc. Environmental sound works wonders in a video.

Once you start shooting remember to not make a sound – don’t sing, don’t hum, don’t cough, don’t sniffle, don’t sigh, don’t say “yes” or “no” or “OK”, etc., and don’t interrupt. At most nod your head or smile to make the person feel comfortable or to acknowledge that you are hearing and understanding them. However, be aware that people can react to your gestures and expressions, so be careful with that as well and keep your reactions to a minimum. You want the person to naturally tell you their story. If you need them to repeat something, have them finish their thought, wait a bit, then ask then to repeat or clarify.

If you happen to be the only one in the field and you’re shooting and are also the interviewer you’ll be off to the side of the camera anyway, but there are two things to consider: 1) if you need your questions to be part of the video make sure to mic yourself separately on a different device and then splice the two audio sources together when you’re editing so that the audio is all level 2) whether you need the interviewer’s questions or not, instruct both the subject and interviewer to not talk over each other and also to wait a couple of seconds before starting to speak (this will help in the editing process).

If you’re shooting video on multiple devices at the same time (or even simply recording audio on a separate device) make a loud clapping noise before you start the interview so you have an audio spike which will help you in syncing up the audio and video across the multiple devices (this is one of the reasons why they use clapboards in moviemaking).

E. Lighting

If shooting in dark places remember to use whatever light source you can (computer monitor, flashlight, mobile phone, lamp, candle, etc.) and shine it against any white surface to reflect the light on the subject (purchasing a reflector would be a wise investment). You may find yourself in a position where you need to place light sources or even your camera in strange places or at weird angles so it always helps to have some rope and tape with you to create those shots (purchasing a light source and a light stand would be helpful).

Avoid shots of areas that have high contrast such as dark versus light settings, or bright sunlight and shadows. For example, don't place an interview subject against a bright window or white wall or with sunlight behind the person. This back light is problematic for the automatic exposure feature of the camera. If the camera focuses on the light in the background, then the face of the subject will be darkened and indistinguishable. If the camera focuses on the person's face, then the background will be washed out in light. It's usually best to shoot with the sun to your back. If the sun is directly overhead, hold your hand over the top edge of the camera lens. This will in effect extend the sun screen and avoid having the camera misread the amount of sunlight. When the viewer cannot see the subject’s mouth moving it often is uncomfortable so in the end, if you have no choice, it’s more important to see the subject’s face than the background; however, if you’re trying to mask the identity of the subject for protection/safety issues, then exposing for the background is a good way to cover up the subject’s face.

Use a graduated filter for your camera (if you have one) so you can properly expose the subject and the sky rather than washing out the sky or making the ground/subject too dark.

3. EDIT (after the field)

Remember that editing takes a long time –a good judge of time (if you storyboarded and know what you want to do and are comfortable with the software) is 1-2 hours of editing time for every 1 minute of complete video.

If a particular traditional song works perfectly for the video, try and track down the copyright. Never use copyrighted material without permission. If you can’t get the copyright then you can’t use the song, but you can use copyright-free material.

Make sure that the audio in the video is all at the same level (volume) so that there aren’t parts of the video that are too loud or too soft.

Don’t forget you can separate the audio from video and it can be used in other parts of the video. Also, audio is a good way to deal with transitioning from shot to shot without the viewer noticing that the shots are changing.

Don’t spend a lot of screen time on the interview itself. Show the person being interviewed for a few seconds, then switch to using footage that relates to what the person is talking about (i.e.: footage of them doing something related, B-roll footage related to what’s being talked about, etc.). You can come back from time to time to interview footage, but you don’t want long periods of time where the only footage in the complete video is someone talking. A good rule of thumb is to cut away from an interview after 2-3 sentences of speech.

When making subtitles make sure: 1) they are legible (big enough and bold enough); 2) there is enough time to read the subtitles (think that non-native speakers read slower than native speakers); 3) they don’t have too much text on the screen; 4) the text does not cover the entire video or an important image.

Test your subtitles and any other text on screen by reading it slowly and out loud to determine that the amount and visibility of text is comfortable for the viewer.

4. PRODUCTION (working with a crew)

When hiring a video production crew: 1) see what equipment they have 2) look at what they’re doing 3) see that they’re checking for all the right things 4) see that they are prepping the right way 5) look through the cameraman’s view finder to check shot composition 6) insist on both a tripod and external microphone for all interviews, no matter how good they say they are or their equipment is; it isn’t better than a proper external mic and a proper tripod.

A good way to get a production crew on your side is to ask them if they have any questions about what you’re filming and why, or if they noticed something that should have been filmed or should have been asked that you didn’t think of that they might have seen.

5. FREE SOFTWARE FOR VIDEO/AUDIO

Handbrake converts video from and into any format http://handbrake.fr/

Free sounds/music/speeches: http://turbulence.org/soundtransit/search/ http://www.pdsounds.org/ http://www.freesound.org/ http://www.freeinfosociety.com/ http://ccmixter.org/

Audacity is a free sound editor http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Levelator is a free audio editing program that adjusts levels of audio sources http://www.conversationsnetwork.org/levelator

Further tips can be found on wvcentral, which has many clips on video production: https://www.wvcentral.org/Communications/Pages/OnVideo(1).aspx https://www.wvcentral.org/Communications/Pages/Onvideo(2).aspx