Cinematography Introduction (First Post)

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Hello, my name is Ethan. Approximately two years ago I received a small, non-HD Insignia camcorder for my birthday. This irrelevant, insignificant object slightly peaked my interest into the cinematic world. As I began to fool around with the camera and watch short films on Youtube, I would quickly grow to enjoy this hobby.

Almost one year after that day I received the second installment to my new videotaping collection; a big green screen. I had no idea what I was to do with this piece of equipment and, just as the use of camcorder, my interest of this hobby started to slowly die off. My ignorance in this category caused my disinterest.

Time passed and dust collected on my green screen until one day, I came across a video displaying a true understanding of camera techniques, special effects, and editing. It looked so professional that my interest was rejuvenated before I could grab my green screen and now broken camera.

Today I begin documenting my 6-7 week road to improving in cinematography for my 6-7 week long Genius Project!  My intentions at the end of the project are simple: create a short film utilizing filming techniques I will read and learn about. It will be jammed pack with higher-quality shots and edits than I have ever done. To make sure I meet where I would like to be at the end of the project, I will soon set myself time frames to work on certain aspects of cinematography. If I stick to a schedule, it will make the project much more enjoyable so I can do the work over a long period of time and create a fantastic end result. At the end of my project I will show my final product (short film) and compare it to a similar shot without technique, to measure my growth in cinematography.

The steps I will take to improve:
1. Understand How to Use Equipment
2. Learn Appropriate Camera Angle Use/Camera Movement
3. Understanding of Editing and Effects
4. Shot Composition
5. Finalize Videos with Transitions and Tweaks

To help me reach my goal of improving evidently on each of the steps listed above, I will use many sources I read about online or in a book. One major source I read today that I will be using is, http://courses.iddl.vt.edu/DEDCM001/sa/index.html (pictures below taken from here), is in association with Virginia Tech University and explains the purpose of specific camera angles, camera movements, and framing. For example, image A you see below is taken at a “high angle”. This is used to show lack of power, which is unlike image B showing a “low angle” shot used to display power or someone as sinister. This will be a great website to refer to when recording. I also browsed tutorials on http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials. They have a huge library of Adobe After Effects, one of the main editing software’s I will be using, which will be very helpful to refer to after recording.

A

B

It seems that this project will be challenging because I obviously will not be able to master cinematography in a matter of weeks. Besides the fact, I am greatly looking forward to starting and I think this will be very fun all together.

Well, that's all the information I gathered this week. I have gathered most of supplies I need and I am ready to start practicing with my new information. Oh before I go, I would like to share my first project checkpoint. On this upcoming weekend I plan to broaden my knowledge of my equipment and when to use it, but during the following week and weekend I would like to start storyboarding and film my original movie, before I incorporate any of the new things I will learn. Once I have this complete I can work on improving it and make a similar movie for my final product displaying how I can greatly change it and make it better. Until next week...