How To Film 101 ?? Analog To Digital
In Film school at Columbia College in Chicago we learned how to shoot with an analog camera called the Bolex with film that later on went through development.
Analog Film ??? Beginner How It's Made Guide:
Film Stock: we know it's expensive these days to develop, yet are you aware of how the chemistry and physics work from recording to development? The strips of plastic in film stock are coated on one side with a gelatin emulsion containing layers of microscopic silver halide crystals which are sensitive to light and later developed with chemicals in a lab to obtain the final presentation for broadcast. You've probably heard of dark rooms!
Camera Lenses: There's really no rules to shooting a frame yet this chart is a good foundation of how different lenses work and why you would choose to buy one versus the other. Lenses are called Primes (only one length) or Telephoto (have a zoom function). Make sure the lens is compatible with your camera!
Camera Settings: It's important to understand how an analog camera works in order to best refine your skills with a digital camera. Why? Because there's a bit of history involved that explains a lot about tradition and heritage in technique! Lurk here:
ISO: Guess what! Back in the day with analog cameras you could only afford to choose one ISO setting for one film strip. Why? Because analog film strips were fixed to one particular ISO. So cinematographers back in the day would buy multiple film strips with different ISO's for different daylight to night time settings.
ISO setbacks have been obliterated with digital innovation. Now we can switch ISO settings mid-shot if we like! Yet the tradition has remained the same, usually it's best to choose one permanent ISO setting for your entire scene. Plus choose the same ISO for every camera if you're shooting a film scene with multiple cameras. I almost prefer to shoot with 100 ISO whenever I can balancing lights because it's the most sharp.
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F-Stop: This is equivalent to "aperture," which has an etymology to the meaning "opening" because that's exactly what the film lens is doing if you study it! The lens opens and closes in a ratio just like our pupils dilate during the day or night.
Also notice how the smaller the F-Stop (1.4 for example) the more shallow the depth of field, meaning the subject in forefront will stand out more than the background. If you choose a high F-Stop (15+) for example your entire image is more likely to be in a balanced focus, meaning there's no real distraction from foreground to background. This can be a life-saver if you can't see your screen very well to see how details are in focus. The higher the F-Stop, the less light in! You'll get the hang of it.
Shutter Speed: Note here, how fast is your subject moving? If it's an inanimate object in a still frame, your shutter speed doesn't need to be too high. If you're shooting a sports game or a music concert where everyone's moving fast, you definitely need a higher shutter speed or all you will get is blurry images uh oh!
Digital Film Cameras ?? Recommendations:
Sony AS7II: The camera that I own. The body cost $2.5K at retail market back in 2018. With lenses it's about $3K+. It performs well in low-light plus light-weight.
Black Magic URSA or Pocket: This company is super trendy! They also make a free to premium video editing software called DaVinci which I use exclusively. I've yet to film with one of these yet I hope to gain experience with it very soon!
ARRI Alexa: Professional filmmakers who work on movie sets use this one!
RED Dragon: Wow every cool music video seems to be filmed on this. The brand has a lot of notoriety. This is kind of my dream digital camera! Cheers Ya'll!
Hope this helped you if you're a beginner to creating and filming movies. See you on the next episode of DoItYourself newsletter!