Learn how to use lights and your camera to enhance a story. Explore the fundamentals of cinematography, including how to adjust exposure, frame a shot, and light your actors.
- [Chad] Hey folks this is Chad Perkins, a filmmaker from Seattle. This training series is part of a collection of courses to teach you how to make a short film start to finish. As part of this training, I made a short fantasy film called The Assurance and documented the entire process from writing and pre-production to working on set through post-production to a screening in an independent movie theater in Seattle. In this training you'll get to see how we budgeted, auditioned actors, set up lights and cameras, wrote and recorded the orchestral score, how we did all of our visual effects, everything.
And you know filmmaking is really about problem solving, so we'll show you the first drafts and rough cuts, the challenges we had, the mistakes we made so that you can avoid those pitfalls on your projects. This training consists of 13 separate training courses. Each course focuses on a component of filmmaking and will be released in the general order of the filmmaking workflow. The first course is on producing. How do you get a project off the ground and shepherd it to completion? The second course is on writing. We'll get an understanding of how to tell a story examining some of the best Hollywood films as well as how we created the world of The Assurance.
Course number three is about pre-production, getting the script ready to film. We'll look at the meetings I had with our crew about the schedule, budget, designing the wardrobe from scratch, developing concept art and more. The fourth course is on acting. We'll look at what acting is really about, and we'll show you our auditions and rehearsals and why we made the choices we did. The fifth course is about directing where we'll look at controlling the tone, running the set and the many decisions that directors have to make. Course number six is all about working on set. What's that workflow like? What do all these people do? We'll look at all of that as well as a tutorial from my wife Heather about how she created the special effects makeup for our film.
The seventh course is about cinematography. How could you use your camera and lighting to tell your story in the best way? Course number eight is about editing, and we'll see how we were able to re-edit our initial story to tell a completely different and much better one. In course nine we'll start to look at visual effects, creating environments, adding elements to shots and removing objects from shots. Course 10 is all about the stuff you think of when you think of visual effects, magic, particles, explosions. You know all that pretty stuff. These are all things that you could do at home for little to no money.
Course 11 is about color. This was a huge part of The Assurance and is an often underused tool to transform bland footage or even poorly shot footage into something gorgeous. Course 12 is all about audio. We'll look at recording audio on set, composing the score and recording it, sound design (fast-moving sound effects) and mixing it all together. Finally we'll wrap things up in course 13 by talking about how to market and distribute your film including how to make marketing materials like logos and trailers and how to get your film seen by an audience.
I think it's a one-of-a-kind experience. You're not just learning about how to make films, but to see what it's actually like to solve problems and struggle and fail and compromise during that process. - Cut. This has been years in the making, so thank you so much for watching this. Enjoy the training. - [Bry] That's a wrap. (group cheering and clapping)
Author
Released
9/12/2017- Understanding exposure
- Getting coverage
- Diffusing, blocking, and shaping light
- Shooting at night
- Using wide and long lenses
- Telling stories with camera movement
- Framing the shot
- Using mobile cinematography apps
- Mastering cinematic lighting
- Using common grip equipment
- Lighting people in a flattering way
- Achieving a shallow depth of field
- Creating more cinematic shots
- Working as a Director of Photography
Skill Level Intermediate
Duration
Views
Related Courses
-
Video Foundations: Cameras and Shooting
with Anthony Q. Artis2h 58m Intermediate -
Learning DSLR Filmmaking
with Chad Perkins1h 10m Intermediate -
Creating a Short Film: 09 VFX Environments
with Chad Perkins7h 12m Intermediate
-
Introduction
-
The assurance7m 43s
-
1. Cinematography Basics
-
Understanding exposure1m 31s
-
Adjusting the shutter speed2m 45s
-
Adjusting ISO1m 50s
-
Exposing for the subject3m 46s
-
Using a light meter1m 16s
-
Evaluating a histogram1m 37s
-
Choosing a frame rate1m 34s
-
Shooting slow motion footage2m 40s
-
-
2. Setting Up the Shot
-
The cinematography workflow5m 54s
-
Understanding shot sizes5m 59s
-
Using POV shots2m 10s
-
Understanding the line2m 22s
-
Creating dimension2m 44s
-
Selecting the aspect ratio3m 33s
-
Leading the eye4m 11s
-
Cheating lights and talent1m 35s
-
-
3. Framing the Shot
-
The importance of framing3m 34s
-
Utilizing thirds1m 54s
-
Centering the subject1m 32s
-
Using high and low angles2m 10s
-
-
4. Lighting in Theory
-
Hard light vs. Soft light4m 27s
-
Avoiding "sourcey" light2m 18s
-
Realism vs. Beauty3m 13s
-
5. Lighting in Practice
-
Mastering cinematic lighting3m 47s
-
Diffusing light4m 51s
-
Blocking and bouncing light4m 51s
-
Using scrims2m 3s
-
Working with natural light4m 20s
-
Shooting night scenes5m 20s
-
Making magic with fog2m 56s
-
Coloring light with gels4m 13s
-
Creating lens flares2m 19s
-
Preventing lens flares1m 40s
-
-
6. Lighting People
-
Lighting from above1m 52s
-
Lighting from below1m 49s
-
Minimizing blemishes1m 49s
-
Making light flattering1m 18s
-
Using eye lights3m 10s
-
Making a silhouette1m 38s
-
Creating the film noir look2m 34s
-
Lighting dialog scenes2m 3s
-
7. Camera Basics
-
Which camera should you use?3m 48s
-
Building the camera2m 41s
-
Supporting the camera1m 8s
-
Achieving critical focus3m 48s
-
White balancing the camera1m 50s
-
Setting up video village2m 55s
-
-
8. Telling the Story with Lenses
-
Using lenses to tell a story3m 13s
-
Working with wide lenses3m 20s
-
Working with long lenses4m 28s
-
Using premium optics1m 51s
-
Racking focus1m 45s
-
-
9. Moving the Camera
-
Moving the camera6m 24s
-
Using a slider1m 39s
-
10. Creating Cinematic Shots
-
Critiquing the shot2m 18s
-
Changing the background1m 2s
-
Rethinking the lighting1m 39s
-
Changing the tone with gels1m 53s
-
-
11. Fixing Mistakes
-
Recreating the faceoff shot1m 26s
-
12. Working as DP
-
Responsibilities of the DP2m 29s
-
Knowing the script1m 30s
-
Scouting locations2m 26s
-
Getting coverage4m 6s
-
Gear: Renting vs. Buying2m 20s
-
Working with the crew3m 47s
-
Stealing shots2m 33s
-
Shooting visual effects4m 48s
-
-
Conclusion
-
Improving your DP skills3m 10s
-
Previewing the next course1m 49s
-
Final thoughts56s
-
- Mark as unwatched
- Mark all as unwatched
Are you sure you want to mark all the videos in this course as unwatched?
This will not affect your course history, your reports, or your certificates of completion for this course.
CancelTake notes with your new membership!
Type in the entry box, then click Enter to save your note.
1:30Press on any video thumbnail to jump immediately to the timecode shown.
Notes are saved with you account but can also be exported as plain text, MS Word, PDF, Google Doc, or Evernote.
Share this video
Embed this video
Video: About this training series