Video Composition Exercise
This exercise will help you strengthen your video composition skills and stretch your creative juices. Working individually, you will capture b-roll of a single event. All of the shots need to obey the Rule of Thirds. You also need to make your 2D look like 3D. That is, achieve the illusion of depth in your shots. Vary the camera's height.
In addition, you need to shoot at least two interviews. Each shot must be composed with proper balance, including nose room and head room. You also need to work on getting proper audio. The interview audio must not be recorded using the camera's shotgun. You need to use either the hand microphone or the wireless microphone.
Procedures
This assignment has two parts:
- Shoot b-roll of a single event, a scene on campus showing students walking to class, student clubs engaged in an activity, a pair of students having a conversation, someone reading a book under a tree, etc. Must not be a staged event!
- Shoot at least two interviews with proper audio. You can't ask classmates to appear on camera. Find people on the street and get a VOX POP with a question perhaps asking people what they thought of a movie that came out, or how school is going for them so far this semester.
The idea for this exercise is that you need to create visually engaging video, exploiting your 3D environment and finding depth cues. Here are some tips to finding depth using depth of field:
- Depth of Field - open the aperture to get more light to enter the lens
- Use foreground elements to force the distance between foreground and background.
- Perspective - change the angle to draw the viewers' eye towards your subject. Don't just stand your subjects in front of a wall.
See the video below to learn more details about finding depth to your shots, and see how well you can apply them or even to combine certain strategies. Remember, go deep!