Two Types of B-Roll

Up until this past week I really only thought of B-roll (the non-subject matter footage in a video) one way.  It was a filler meant to add depth-- through contrasting visuals or supportive ones-- to the main footage.  It was a moving snapshot: the fidgeting hands of a speaker, the cut-away to what they're describing.  All of these are shot one way... as snapshots.

But in working on my current project, a promotional video for a local company, I realized that my footage needed to be much more.  It needed to tell a story, too.  To do so, I needed the footage to follow basic shot format: a wide establishing shot followed by close-ups and points of view. The sequence of shots needed to have the same continuity; I couldn't jump from an establishing shot to a close-up of an entirely different moment.  It needed to cut on the action.  The narration was in support of the b-roll, not vice-versa.

Not all B-roll requires this level of structure; often times, the simple "snapshot" does exactly what it's supposed to.  But now I'm on the lookout for times when the b-roll is the narrative, rather than the support.

Editor in Chief - Hilton Worldwid Anniversary Video

Tim from Hilton Worldwide approached me with an unusual project.  Okay, it was unusual in several respects-- first, that an international company based outside of Los Angeles, the film and video capital of the world, would reach out to a small videocompany in Oakland; second was the nature of the video itself.  They wanted to create a 50^th anniversary tribute for Greg, one of their vice presidents, utilizing cell phone video greetings from employees all across the U.S.  From the outside it wasn’t so unusual... but lift the hood and you immediately see the problems.  Multiple “videographers,” using a variety of poor equipment, in a wide range of environments, producing a breathtaking spectrum of quality. What videographer could say no?

My first goal was to try and create some consistency in the video itself.  So I created a “best practice” guide for my crew of amateur camera people.  It looked like this:

It’s impossible, of course, to turn novices into experts with just a set of guidelines.  And there were dozens of “rules” I omitted (some to my downfall... such as “no vertical videos”).  To boot, some folks roundly ignored my guide, shooting from the hip, so to speak.

Step two was a framework for the responses.  Tim and I talked about the tone of the piece, who Greg was, his outstanding achievements, and work habits.  Tim wanted something filled with humor and appreciation.  Originally, there were to be eight pairs of people on camera.  I created sets of questions (no more than 4 per person), and we divided them across geographic regions.  The number of people quickly multiplied, as did the length of the piece.  Soon, I had over an hour of footage from 25+ individuals.  Audio levels ranged from barely audible to loudspeaker, and background noise from air conditioner hum to convention floor.  

The trick, then, was to construct as much “story” as possible among the different speakers.  I divided the video into topic sections, and focused my edits along common themes, letting multiple people tell the same story whenever possible.  No one was ever under the illusion that this was going to be a polished “showroom” piece.  But Hilton was thrilled with the final result; the rough edges were authentic and heartfelt rather than glossy.  The sentiment was exactly what they wanted to convey to Greg, and the “tone” said “Hilton.”

Color Grading Slog Video - Without the Headache

For me, Slog profiles are both a siren and a curse.  I'm drawn to the promise of greater dynamic range and the protection from blow-outs; I'm demoralized by the difficulty of transforming Slog 2 and Slog 3 footage into vibrant, rich video.  Admittedly, I'm not the greatest of color graders; most of us aren't.  In fact, I suspect that much of the "stylized" color grading I see is simply an effort to cover up the fact they couldn't create a natural looking image.  I'm sick of green-hued images.  But I can't throw stones because I have the same difficulty-- even after 20 minutes of futzing with levels, color wheels, and contrast, I'm dissatisfied. So what the heck is wrong with Slog footage and how can I grade better and faster?

I don't have an answer to the first question.  The problem is probably me.  To give myself a break, photos are rarely as pug-ugly as Slog 3 images, and the tools in Lightroom and Photoshop are much much better.  But I have figured out a great way to quickly grade my footage to an even more satisfactory level than before. 

Personally, I think the Sony a7Sii color is a bit wonky.  Not all the time-- but sometimes there's a muted hue, and it's on full display when you color grade from Slog. So here's a technique I've discovered:

1. Before shooting your footage, take a photo of the scene.  Make sure it's properly exposed, since your camera settings for Slog may be too far to the "right," i.e. slightly blown out for still photography.
2. Now film in your Slog profile of choice.  Whenever you move to a different scene, take another photo.
3. Import both the photo and the video into your video editor; I use Sony Vegas Pro.
4. I believe all the major editors have a color-match function.  In Sony Vegas, open the Color Match FX to apply the photo color to the video. Be sure to tick the "match brightness" box.  It should look like this:

 

If you're unfamiliar with this tool, I'd suggest Google for a more complete explanation.  But quickly, the Source Image will be your photo (the color you want); I make sure the still image is on the Preview screen and then click "Preview" to capture it.  The Target is your video; I bring up the video on the monitor and hit Preview in the Target box.  The color adjusted image will appear in the Result section. 

This will get you 80% of the way there.  Typically, I use the Levels FX to bring the image into perfect exposure.  If you don't know how to use a Waveform scope, learn, because it's amazing.  And for a little extra punch I'll boost the overall saturation using the Color Corrector, and individual colors using AAV Color Lab.

Here's a before image of the footage:

It's the typical washed out footage of Slog 3.  Now here's the color matched and tweaked image:

The great thing is that this only took an extra 15 seconds during filming, and about two minutes of grading in post. After tweaking the levels and saturation, the resulting image is better than the original photo.

While I've known about the Color Match feature for a while, I only now just thought to apply it to my Slog footage utilizing a reference image.  It's really the same technique film photographers used to employ, taking a Polaroid to check exposure. 

Channeling the Buying Impulse

We all want progress.  Often the progress I most fervently desire is forward movement in my career: more jobs, better jobs.  When I hit a lull, waiting for the next opportunity is hard.  I quickly exhaust my techniques for "goosing" new business into being, and I'm left with this need, this yearning for forward movement.  If I can't get better jobs, I want better tools, better capabilities, better photos.  Buying some new piece of equipment is a nice, easy solution.  It's fast. It doesn't over-commit my time.  It's definitive, cheap progress.

The problem isn't just the rapid decrease in my bank account.  Like cotton candy, the "buying solution" lasts about as long as a sugar high.  Within days I need another fix. Photography is first and foremost about problem solving: how to work with a given light, a given architecture, a given person.  I've already got a robust set of photography tools, so I'm much better off learning how to use them better to solve problems. 

Which is basically the answer to re-channeling my impulse to buy more gear.  Shooting is a lot more satisfying than buying.  The challenge is how to shoot without having the driving purpose of a job.  A job focuses the activity, raises the stakes, and provides a nice clean finish.  But if I know that my impulse to buy more gear is really about a desire for progress, for improvement, than it becomes just a little bit easier to tame that buying impulse.  I can make that conscious effort to put down the cotton candy and make some soup.

Sony a7Sii Joshua Tree Review

Continuing my extended review of the Sony a7Sii (you can read the general overview and the wedding reviews on my blog), I took it to Sequoia National Park and Joshua Tree to see how it would perform (and to deepen my knowledge of the camera).  Being mirrorless-- and a Sony-- its operation is significantly different than my other two cameras.  And in all fairness it has an incredibly high bar to pass in order to make it into my camera bag.  The Nikon D600 (my workhorse) was rated with the 3rd best DSLR sensor when it was released; my Pentax 645D was similarly at the top of its class, only within the even more demanding medium-sensor competition.  So how did the a7Sii fare?

To start let me say that I never intended the Sony to be a primary camera, only a solid backup.  I don't like having identical systems for 1st and 2nd cameras. Since cameras so rarely fail, I like my 2nd to offer something different in terms of tonal quality or features.  I want it to be something I'll use during a session even when my primary kit is functioning just fine.  To that end, the Sony doesn't disappoint.  But let me start with the specifics.

The Good
I wanted to play with the a7Sii with some landscape opportunities; I'd already found that the ever-so-slight shutter lag made it less than ideal for events and sports; I wanted to see how it performed with a still subject.  Normally, I'd chose the Pentax 645D for this job.  And let's be honest-- it's unfair to pit a 12MB full-sized sensor against at 40MB medium format sensor.  The Pentax surpasses in detail and texture.  Still, the Sony does quite well on its own terms.  While the image quality is not quite on par with even my Nikon, it's clearly ahead of smaller sensor cameras, and many full-framed ones too.  Also, the Pentax is freakin' huge; it's not suited for hardcore traveling.  The Sony is the smallest of the trio, and in some respects (silent shutter, low-profile, and tilting LCD) the most versatile.  So even though it doesn't have the same detail and textural depth, I'd still list image quality in the "good" section.

With landscape (and portraiture and architecture), you don't notice the ever-so-slight shutter lag.  The issue doesn't distract in the slightest.

The dynamic range is pretty impressive; it may even surpass my Nikon-- I'll have to test that further.  What makes it so good is that the camera resists blowing out.  You can see it in the blue skies-- I did very little to pull them out in these images.  The darker zones are sometimes a bit mushy, but the camera works hard to keep everything within range.

I'll repeat myself now: the Sony a7Sii is incredibly fun to shoot.  It just feels good.  And the versatility I mentioned before gives it a flexibility that's hard to match.  So even if my other cameras produce better images, there will still be times when I'll chose it above the rest.

A simple $20 adapter allows me to use some incredible Nikon glass. This is the 50mm f/1.2.

Because you can quickly zoom in (I've assigned the Zoom to the button nearest the shutter), focusing with a manual lens is quite quick and beautifully accurate.

The Not-So-Good
When it comes to landscape photography, the Sony really doesn't have any major flaws.  If you're a professional landscape photographer the low resolution (12MB) sensor is an obvious and insurmountable problem. But for the rest of us it does quite well.  And if you use a better lens, you'll get some of that detail and sharpness back.  12MP with excellent glass is sharper than 16MP with mediocre glass.

In scenes with a wide dynamic range, the viewfinder and LCD often make the brightest portions appear blown out.  But just on the screen-- not the image itself.  To compensate,  I took to always having the histogram up in shooting mode so I could tell what was really happening.  It's not blown out, the viewfinder/LCD just doesn't have the same dynamic range as the image.

Color.  Color? Color....  I'm pretty mixed on this one.  Shooting in RAW and converting with Adobe DNG converter, the colors are oddly muted.  Not just muted, oddly so.  You can pull a lot of richness back (in fact the raw files are quite flexible), but it takes more tweaking than with either of my other cameras.  I also, I find it needs a little more sharpening.  I think those qualities qualify as a negative.

But really, there's not much else in the negative.

The wife... tree hugging.

The Verdict
The Sony does a very good job of challenging my Nikon for travel photography.  The smaller size and versatility make it a difficult camera to leave at home.  Let's see what I do the next time I take a major trip (okay, let's be honest, I'll probably take both since the Sony can use the Nikon lenses).  The a7Sii is quite capable for landscape photography, just so long as you don't need a huge amount of detail.  Again, it wouldn't be the choice of a professional in that field, but rather a professional photographer looking for either a solid second camera or dabbling in a field that's not his/her/they specialty.

At times I felt there was some very safely "middle-ground" about the camera.  With the kit lens, it's easy for the images to be good yet unexceptional.  However, I think that with better lenses and a deeper understanding of the camera's qualities it will be possible to create some truly exceptional images.  These images, by the way, were tweaked for color and sharpness, but I didn't take the time to try and find their full potential.

The a7Sii is, of course, really designed for video.  Still images are secondary.  If you judge it as a video camera first and a still camera second, the Sony a7Sii is better than its aspirations:  I'll never grab my Nikon above the Sony for video, but there are times I'd grab the Sony first when shooting still images, which speaks volumes.  And if I had to give up one of my three cameras today, I'd let go of the Pentax.  The image quality is superb, but it can't compete on versatility.  In comparison, it's a boutique camera, a tool for a specific purpose.

Nuts!  I left my tripod at home.  This image was shot with the camera propped on my bag to reduce shake....  Also, in  the dark I couldn't find the shutter delay option, so two strikes against. me.  That functionality is a bit buried in the menu.

Creating Facebook Videos that Work

Tips for Making Facebook Videos the Sell


Today we posted an article on our other blog at Hurricane Images Inc.  Like it or not, Facebook is almost a ubiquitous presence in our lives.  And increasingly it’s become important for small businesses-- for branding, customer relations, and marketing.  Creating video for Facebook isn’t like creating video for other platforms, though. It’s a unique interaction, and if you’re going to be successful, your video should be custom built for the platform.  I'm posting the first five tips here.  If you like them, mosey on over to Hurricane Images Inc to read the next five.  And a little lagniappe.

1. Create for Facebook.  This means design your video for how people will watch it on Facebook, and upload it directly to Facebook.  Attention spans are short, 85% of videos are watched with the sound off. Facebook gives priority to their “own” content, versus Youtube links.  So design your content for the medium.  Marketing is only an expense when it doesn’t work; otherwise it’s a profitable investment.

2. Start hard.  The first three 2 seconds have to stop them in their tracks because viewers are scrolling downwards through their feed.

3. Make your visuals lively.  Seems like this goes without saying, but the visuals have to be striking.  This isn’t a medium that does well with elegance, slow moving frames, or talking heads.

4. Be unbelievable brief:  2-30 seconds is perfect.  Anything over 60 seconds is lost. What’s worse, if you bore them they’ll walk away with a negative impression.  So what if you have more to say? Create a second, longer video and link to it.  Or your website.  “Want to learn more, visit:  www.hurricaneimagesinc.com”

5. Call to action.  Tell them what they should do.  It doesn’t have to be “buy my product;” it can be as simple as “learn more.” Go to the “Edit Video” section of your video and under the “Call to Action” section, you will find various options (Learn More, Watch More, Shop Now, Book Now, Sign Up and Download).

Want more?  Read on.

Pinterest Tools - a review of Copublish, a free management tool

I don't enjoy social media (Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, etc.), so anything that makes interacting with those platforms easier is a real boon.  There's a lot to debate about the usefulness of these tools, too.  Having that video or image that goes "viral," attracting ridiculous amounts of attention and praise... well, who can argue against the success of that?  But if it's not a phenomenon you can consistently replicate-- or that even has a solid set of guideposts for increasing your chances-- then it's not exactly a "business activity."  That isn't to suggest social media tools aren't of value.  If you run an Etsy or online shop-- a venue that opens you up to national and international customers-- these tools have a necessary place in your marketing outreach.  Especially a tool like Pinterest which puts your product in front of people with an interest.  Connecting people with common interests is Pinterest's strength, and the network is global.

As a photographer and videographer (who is geographically limited), Pinterest is less practical; I don't benefit from admirers in Australia, or even Alabama.  But I do believe it has a small place in my toolbox.  My goal is for someone local to see my "product" and reach out.

Having a "small" place in my toolbox means I want it to take a "small" amount of time (and a small amount of cost), so I started looking for free tools to manage my posts.  Like all social media tools, regular posting is important.  I wanted a tool I could use to schedule a week's worth of posts and then ignore.  And I wanted it to be free.  There are some paid options (like https://www.viraltag.com/), but few in the free category.  In fact, I found only one: Copublish (http://copublish.in).

So does it work?

Copublish lets you schedule your pins in advance, describe and tag them, and track their analytics (though I don't think they do this any better than Pinterest).  The interface is simple and attractive, though I found it a bit buggy.  After I set up my account, I added a new board to Pinterest.  Copublish couldn't "see" the new board.  So I un-linked my Pinterest account from Copublish and tried linking it again, but it wouldn't.  I'd give it permission to post to my Pinterest account and it would keep telling me I didn't have any accounts linked to Copublish.  I emailed tech support and they responded really quickly (like five minutes later), asking a question.  But then they didn't respond after I gave them the answer.  I suspected that the problem has related to how Copublish "refreshes" its data, so I waited and day and sure enough it was working again.  Since then I've scheduled two weeks of posts to two different boards.  On the whole, I'd rate Copublish a B-.  It's working well now, but I worry about what will happen if I add a new board.  If it can handle that, I'd upgrade it to a B+.

Ultimately, of course, the most successful Pinterest campaigns are run by people who love Pinterest, post regularly by hand, and are interacting with other users.  If Pinterest is an important tool for your business, I wouldn't skimp on your time investment.  For those of us who are social media introverts, Copublish is a handy tool.