Lately, for a few reasons I won't go into, I've had occasion, as an editor, to look at a lot of video footage shot by others. Some of it is just atrocious. It is just stunning how badly people handle a camera sometimes.
All it takes is just a few minutes watching TV or a movie to get the basics, and it really is the basics that people seem to be missing (Maybe that's the problem, many activists don't watch TV, so they've forgotten what good camera technique looks like). The boiled down rule of thumb: Hold the shot for awhile. That's all you need to know. Everything else comes from that: Don't pan and tilt around constantly. Don't zoom in and out all the time. Just fricking find a shot and stay on it. Even if it might not be the best, perfect composition, just stick with it for at least 5 seconds, 10 seconds, hell, 30 seconds, and THEN move and find your next shot. If you're worried about missing some action, then pull out and stick with a long shot and stay on it. Just stop waving the damn camera around for god's sake. Just stop. Please!!!
(All this advice and more is readily available online, for example at the excellent Video Activist Network site.)
Posted by steev at Septiembre 2, 2007 01:03 PM