1. Learn the importance of understanding differences between what video makers can see with their eyes and what their camera can capture. 2. Learn low cost methods to improve your story-telling by improving the quality of your image and sound capture regardless of what camera you use.

1. Use What You Have and (Still) Produce Great
Video to Increase Sales on the Web & Beyond
Queens Museum of Art
Saturday, April 21 2012
2 PM – 4 PM
Queens, New York
Presented by
Donald Schwartz
Technology Writer/Photographer
donald.schwartz@imagelinkproductions.com
Twitter: Ishkahbibel
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2. The Road Ahead
Eye vs. Camera Smack Down
Focusing Attention – Seeing the Light
Making Your Camera’s Sensor Happy
How to Become a Composition Master
The Sound & the Fury
Image: Jennifer Schwartz
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3. The Video Camera vs. Your Eye
Eye Features:
• Auto White Balance – doesn't see shadows as blue nor
fluorescents as green.
• Auto Exposure – wide contrast range covering highlights and
shadows with unrecognizably quick adjustment. (FYI: your
camera uses gray scale starting with 18% gray).
• Auto Focus – face recognition built in. Multiple focus points
built in.
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4. Ban All Auto Camera Functions – Who’s More
Capable, You or Your Camera?
• When an all-auto camera reacts to changes in light levels,
color temperature changes and/or audio changes, everything
it does is obvious and distracting.
• Learn to Love Manual Control (Who’s more capable, you or
your camera?)
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5. Start Small, Turn Off One Auto Function
At a Time
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6. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
Achieved By:
• Lighting – foreground & background separation – create contrast – makes
image appear sharper.
• Think principal subject – brighter than other pictorial elements.
• Create dimensionality by using light and shadow. Shadow defines depth.
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7. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
• Technique: Start with 3-point lighting consisting of key (main), fill (fills in
detail & lightens shadow), back or separation light.
Images: Copyright 2006 Jeremy Birn
3dRender.com
Used by permission of author
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8. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
• Technique: Have no lights? • Apply angle of incidence. Angle of
Bounce or reflect available light incidence equals angle of
using foam core, show card, or reflectance. Also works for finding
cine foil. unwanted reflections.
Photo credit: California Sunbounce
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9. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Lighting Characteristics
• Color
• Hard vs. Soft
• Sun is a hard light, a direct light - well defined shadows
• Bounced lights are soft - less shadows and good wrap
• The bigger the light source, the softer the light
• Distance & Light
• If you move light close to your subject light will fall off very rapidly, but
back will fall off more slowly. When you pull back you can actually light
more space.
• Inverse Square Law - means of calculating fall off
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10. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Shadows
• Can Define Subjects (add 3rd dimension)
• Create Pattern
• They Can Also Distract
• Video or Photography Distractions:
– Two cross shadow under chin
– Moving shadow against wall
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11. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Shadows
Define Subject Create Pattern Distraction
Images: Donald Schwartz
Models L- R: Salley & Lady Camelllia
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12. Video Camera Sees Light Differently
From Our Eyes
Color Balance – White Balance
• Light color is measured in degrees Kelvin which corresponds to
different colors.
• The Basics:
– Daylight is blue
– Tungsten is red/yellow
– Fluorescents are green
I Win
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13. What Happens When Your Camera’s Color
Balance Doesn’t Match the Color at Your
Shooting Location?
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14. You Can Use Presets
Image Courtesy: Canon
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15. The Only Way To Be Sure Is To Do A Custom
(Manual) Color Balance Under The Pre-
dominant Light Source
How to:
Go to Custom Setting, fill frame with something white and press.
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16. What Does Proper Exposure Mean?
Why is it Important to You?
Answer:
The amount of light required for the camera’s sensor
to capture the widest range of bright highlights and
dark areas without over or under exposing the image.
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17. Exposure Considerations
Why Understand Gray Scale or Zone?
• Your video camera is color blind.
• Exposure is set in relation to Middle Gray
(Zone V) – 18% reflectance.
• Zones are a method of quantifying shades.
• Determining how a color corresponds to a
shade of gray produces more consistent
results.
Photo credit: Donald Schwartz
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18. Camera Auto Exposure Set From Middle Gray
Black Tank Real World View
Courtesy Tim Cooper Photography (Perfect Exposure for Digital Photography) 18

19. Camera Auto Exposure Set From Middle Gray
Black Tank Auto Exposure – Middle Gray View
Courtesy Tim Cooper Photography (Perfect Exposure for Digital Photography) 19

20. Camera Auto Exposure Set From Middle Gray
White Wall Real World View
Courtesy Tim Cooper Photography (Perfect Exposure for Digital Photography) 20

21. Camera Auto Exposure Set From Middle Gray
White Wall Auto Exposure – Middle Gray
Courtesy Tim Cooper Photography (Perfect Exposure for Digital Photography) 21

22. Exposure For Black And White
Light Absorption and Reflection
Images: Donald Schwartz 22

23. Setting Exposure Using Your Camera’s Controls
• Zebra Stripes - skin tones and peak white
(images: 70 IRE & 100 IRE)
• Waveform Monitor - range from black to
peak white (image)
• Gray Card - mid-tones
Gray Card – Cowboy Studio
Waveform Monitor
IRE Pictures courtesy of The DV Show
WFM courtesy: CyberCollege® and
InternetCampus®
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24. Expose Your Video Camera Like A Still Camera
Image Courtesy of Canon 24

25. A Work Around for Cameras with Auto Only
Exposure
Shooting a Subject in Front of a Window
Work Arounds:
• Move subject away from window
• Cover window
• Add front light
Photo credit: Donald Schwartz 25

26. Focus Attention – Get Audiences to Pay
Attention to What You Want Them to See
• DOP – Depth of Field –
What’s in focus and what is not?
• The distance between the nearest
and farthest objects that appear
in acceptably sharp focus - a
function of lens aperture, ISO,
shutter speed.
• Not available on cameras with
small sensors – sorry.
Image: Donald Schwartz 26

27. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part I
Rule of Thirds – divide your frame into a 9 section grid.
Image: Donald Schwartz 27

28. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part I
Changing Lens Focal Length Alters Perspective
Wide Normal (Perspective) Telephoto (Compression)
• When you change perspective you change the relationship between the
background and the foreground
• Why not zoom in? Because it changes perspective and draws attention to itself.
• Start wide(r) than normal and walk in to bring your audience with you.
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Drawings: Jennifer Schwartz

29. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part I
Long Lens Compression
Appears
Actual Distance
85 mm - lens
125 sec - shutter
speed
125 ISO
Images: Donald Schwartz 29

30. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part I
Wide Angle Lens – Expands Distance
24 mm – lens
125 ISO
Images: Donald Schwartz
Model:
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31. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part I
Eye Line & Camera Angle
Up Down
Angle Angle
Images: Donald Schwartz 31

32. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part II
Solving the 2D Conundrum – Creating 3D
Using frames within frames, vanishing point and visual triangles.
Think: what frames do you see every day? Clue: what do you look out of – a window?
What in this image leads your eye to the horizon?
Images: Donald Schwartz
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33. Focus Audience Attention
Compositional Mastery: Part II
Solving the 2D Conundrum – Creating 3D
Vanishing Point
Triangulation
•Frame Within Frame •Vanishing Point
•Triangulation
•Create Scale
•Use of Color – set design or color balance
Images: Donald Schwartz 33

34. Audio Mastery
The Big Idea
Microphones Have Different Acceptance Patterns – Each One Hears
In A Specific Direction
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35. Audio Mastery
Basic Microphone Terms
Omni Directional: pickup sound from every direction equally.
Better at resisting wind noise or mechanical handling
Less susceptible to popping “p,” “b” or “t”
Directional Microphones: Sounds best from the front. Tends to reject sound
that comes from other directions
• Directional Types: cardioid, subcardioid, hypercardioid, bi-directional
• Suppress unwanted noise
• Reduce effect of reverberation
• Increase gain before feedback – cranks up the good sound before
distortion
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36. Audio Mastery
Visualizing Microphone Pickup Patterns
Patterns, called polar patterns, should be taken as the floor plan of a microphone’s
response; where the microphone hears the best.
Microphone Patterns
AT8004L Audio-Technica Omnidirectional Audio-Technica AT831 R - Audio Technica-AT875 Short Condenser Microphone
Dynamic Microphone Cardioid Condenser Microphone 36

37. Audio Mastery
Sound Recording – Best Practices
• Recording level should be as close to zero on your meter as possible without
increasing background noises.
• Get microphone or camera as close to subject as possible.
• Metering: Level should be as close to zero as possible with increased background
noise.
• When setting level have subject speak normally. The subject should not move
backwards or forwards during the test.
• Don’t use AGC (audio gain control).
• Record at least a minute of ambient sound (called room tone) with no one talking.
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38. Camera In Motion
Why Does The Camera Bounce When I Walk?
Animation courtesy of Darmont - www.idleworm.com
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39. Camera In Motion
A Moving Camera
• Use a camera stabilization system – it
separates your gait from the camera.
Example: Merlin
Merlin Stabilization
System
Additional Benefits: A moving camera creates motion
where there is none. Enables multiple angles and diverse
shot compositions (wide angle to close up) without editing.
Allows crossing the line (the 180 degree rule).
Courtesy: The Tiffin Company
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40. Video Promotion for the Artist 101
Ideas for Narration:
• Who you are
• Things you can say about your work
• The tools you use
• How long did you take to create
• Who or what was your inspiration
• Create a back story. Make one up if necessary
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41. Video Promotion for the Artist 101
The Pictures
The Cutaways:
• Show studio or where you work
• Show work-in-progress
• If used found objects, show where found
• Show your muse with visual suggestions as to “why” he or she
assumed that role
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42. Video Promotion for the Artist 101
Your Art
• When showing your art, animate it.
• With an installation, walk in and around as if you were a viewer.
• With paintings and photographs, move camera across the painting or
photo – think Ken Burns.
• Use lighting to create dimensionality for sculpture or installations..
• Create a mood using music, sound effects. For example: bells, foot steps,
thunder.
• Create a back story and cut back and forth between you talking directly to
the camera and your work.
• What can you say about your work? If you can show it with footage and
stills, do it.
• You can talk about process, materials, specialized tools, why you applied
the paint the way you did.
• You can talk about influences, inspiration, your muse.
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43. Avoidable Mistakes
Panning The 180 Degree Rule
• If you think it’s too slow, make it • You have crossed the line.
slower. • Quick and dirty solution for
• Apply pressure before you need to interviews: shoot over right shoulder
and lessen before you stop. and for reverse, reaction shot over
• Use a tripod. left shoulder.
Avoid Dead Eye
• Cause: too much top light.
Image courtesy of Steven d. Katz
Michael Weise Productions in conjunction with Focal Press 43

44. Lighting Supplementals
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45. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Light Creators
• The Sun
• LED – Litepanels Hilio
• Fluorescent – Riffa 55 Kit
– Want high CRI
– Efficient, short throw Litepanels Hilio™ Riffa 55 Kit
• Tungsten – More heat, less light –
Lowel D Light & Tota
• HMI - generate light equivalent to
sun light color temp
Lowel D Light & Tota
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46. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Light Controls and Shaping
• Limits (softens) light output
• One light two different intensities
• Removes light from where you don't want it to be
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47. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Lighting Control Tools
Altman Barn Doors
Westcott Fast Flags & Nets Internal & External Scrims
Altman Fresnel
Doors, IK Scrims: Courtesy of
Altman, Fast Flags: Courtesy of
Note: Nets & Scrims: two light intensities from one Westcott
instrument
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48. Everything You Wanted To Know About Light
Light Rigging Tools – Your Personal Assistant
Avenger C Stand Kit & Set Technicians Handbook
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49. One Light Setup
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50. Audio Supplementals
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51. Audio Mastery
Understand the Language
Dynamic Microphones
Condenser Microphones
Omni-directional, Directional
Microphone Acceptance & Rejection Patterns
Phantom Power
Impedance – Low & High
Balanced & Unbalanced Microphones
Sensitivity – measured in db (decibels)
Mic Level & Line Level
Frequency - measured in Hz (Hertz)s
Gain
Signal to Noise
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52. Audio Mastery
The Essentials
Mic Level - audio that comes directly from a microphone.
• Diagnosis: can barely hear it.
Line Level – amplified audio that comes from a mixer, audio system.
• Diagnosis: distorted audio or pinned needle.
Phantom Power –
• Provides power to use the microphone at the camera input or from a mixer.
• Unlike Dynamic, Condenser microphones require a power source. If you don't power
from an external source must boost in line. Will require some kind of battery.
Balanced Unbalanced Audio Connectors –
• Balanced audio connectors are less prone to RFI(Radio Frequency), hum and buzz.
• Unbalanced audio connectors can be ¼ inch or 3.5 mm and are more prone to RFI, hum
and buzz.
XLR ¼ inch 3.5 mm
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53. Audio Mastery
Work Arounds
Egg Crates or Shipping Foam
Matthews Sound Blankets - Moving
Blankets
Courtesy of Matthews
Auralex Styrofoam Wedgies
Comprehensive EXF Mini - Courtesy of Comprehensive
Hosa XVM XLR Female to 3.5mm mini male -
Courtesy of Hosa
Beachtek DXA-2J next to Beachtek DXA-5D Courtesy of Beachtek
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54. Improving How You Look To Your Audience
Talk to The Camera: Three Views of the Teleprompter
Courtesy of Second Screen Academy
Auralex Styrofoam Wedgies
Interior Teleprompter Teleprompter with cowling Teleprompter displaying text
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55. Tools to Turn Your iPhone into a Controllable
Video Capture Device
Filmic PRO – Courtesy of Filmic PRO Adaptor for audio – Courtesy of Sescom
vReveal – Courtesy of vReveal
Plus portable digital
recorder and Plural
Eyes by Singular
Software
Wide Angle Lens – Courtesy of Photojojo Miniature Shotgun Microphone –
Courtesy of Vericorder Technology
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56. Camcorder Alternative
Consumer to Prosumer Cameras
• Allows you to visually see audio and
light levels (via Zebra).
35mm Cameras Capturing Video
Pros:
• Enable depth of field with large sensor.
• Use of great glass lenses.
• Exceptional ISO/light sensitivity.
Cons:
• Limited recording time due to sensor
over-heating. Improving.
• Poor sound quality.
• Requires mounting rig for shoulder or
mounting on a tripod.
• Rolling shutter effect (going away).
Photo courtesy of www.idcphotovideo.com 56

57. Picking Up Steam
Panasonic AG-AF 100
4/3 – type MOS Sensor AVCCAM Camcorder
Pros:
• More cost efficient than using hybrid 35mm camera add-ons
• Use of existing 35mm camera lenses = good glass
• Real Depth of Field
• No constraints on video recording time
• No requirement to sync audio
• Use of normal rigging for tripods
Image courtesy of Panasonic Inc.
• Focus Assist Function – sharpen detail in view finder
• Zebra & Color Bar Displays – Zebra for assessing highlights
and/or peak white. Color bars for editing match camera output.
• XLR balanced audio inputs vs. 1/8 inch minis
• Audio monitoring
Cons:
• No 35mm sensor so have crop factor
• Only Panasonic lenses allow for power zoom, aperture and focus
– all other adapted lenses are manual.
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58. Picking Up Steam
Sony NEX FS100UK
Pros:
• More cost efficient than using hybrid 35mm DSLR camera add-
ons
• Exmor Super35 CMOS Sensor
• Real Depth of Field
• Embedded Timecode
Cons: Sony NEX FS100UK
• All manual control lensing
• Control Access & Design
• Some difficulty associated with using prime lenses other than
NEX lens
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59. Resources & Sources
Web Video: Making It Great, Getting It Noticed
By: Jennie Bourne; Dave Burstein
Publisher: Peachpit Press
Pub. Date: August 05, 2008
Print ISBN-10: 0-321-55296-2
101 Quick and Easy Secrets to Create Winning Photographs
By: Matthew Bamberg
Publisher: Course Technology PTR
Pub. Date: April 14, 2009
Print ISBN-10: 1-59863-902-1
Film Directing - Shot by Shot
Visualizing from Concept to Screen
By: Steven d. Katz
Publisher: Michael Weise Productions & Focal Press
Publication Date: June 1991
ISBN #: 0-941188-10-8
Stoppees’ Guide to Photography & Light: What Digital Photographers, Illustrators, and Creative Professionals Must Know
By: Brian & Janet Stoppee
Publisher: Focal Press
Pub. Date: October 22, 2008
eISBN-10: 0-08-092798-X
Home Recording for Beginners
By: Geoffrey Francis
Publisher: Course Technology PTR
Pub. Date: January 01, 2009
Print ISBN-10: 1-59863-881-5
Digital Lighting & Rendering, Second Edition
By: Jeremy Birn
Publisher: New Riders
Pub. Date: April 27, 2006
Print ISBN-10: 0-321-31631-2
Info on Walk Cycle: http://www.idleworm.com/how
Info on Light Reflection Tools: California Sunbounce: http://www.sunbounce.de/
Info on Camera Motion Control: Tiffin: http://www.tiffen.com/
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60. Resources & Sources
 Perfect Exposure for Digital Photography
The Zone System of Metering & Shooting (DVD)
By: Tim Cooper
ISBN 9780981602905
 The Lighting Technician's Handbook
By: Harry C. Box
Publisher: Focal Press
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61. Donald Schwartz
Imagelink Productions
11 Sterling Place
Brooklyn, NY 11217
donald.schwartz@imagelinkproductions.com
Twitter: Ishkahbibel
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