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Freelance video, new to DSLR
Hi,
I have my first freelance video shoot using a DSLR camera and had a couple of questions for people with DSLR experience. I recently got a Canon 5D Mark III but come from a camcorder background, and this weekend I have to do a run-and-gun freelance video shoot with my 5D. And I had two questions below, related to being so new to this camera and DSLR in general. The shoot is a children’s party about which I’m supposed to make a short video.
-Shooting for slow motion: Using a DSLR what’s the best way to do this? With a camcorder I would just set my frame rate to 60 fps. But I wasn’t sure with the 5D Mark III. I’m planning to shoot at a movie rec. size of 1920/24/IPB, and the only 60 option I saw was at a 720 size. So I’d be grateful for any guidance on picking the right setting for slow motion on my Canon 5D Mark III.
-Video and photo workflow: The client asked me to snap a few stills too, and my photography background is minimal. In a run-and-gun video situation what’s the best way to occasionally snap a few stills, without interrupting the video workflow too much? Or is stopping everything to take stills a bad idea? I know this camera is a DSLR and this may be easy, but I assumed I’d have to flip the switch from video to photo mode etc.Much appreciated,
Neil -
7 Replies
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To shoot slow mo you will have to do 720. We have done it a lot and speaking as an editor you’ll be fine with 720 even though it isn’t 1080.
I don’t see a problem with switching from stills to video. It doesn’t take a lot to rotate the dial. On my T2i I can take a photo while recording video. It of course ruins your video which is why I would just stop recording and rotate the dial.
Hope this helps and best of luck.
Stephen Smith
Check out my Vimeo page
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Much appreciated Stephen, very helpful on both. On the slow mo thing, if you shoot 1080 resolution for most of the shoot, and 720 for a few slow mo shots, is it a pain to integrate the two later? I’m assuming no, because I’ve heard it’s never a problem to go from higher to lower resolution (in other words make the whole sequence 720), as opposed to vice versa. But I just wanted to confirm that.
Thanks!
Neil -
When I do it I just bring the 720 into a 1080 project file so everything is 1080. In this spot the Ribs is 720 and the raincoat guys walking out of the house is 720, everything else is 1080. https://vimeo.com/77805157
Keep in mind I used Twixtor & optical flow to make the people leaving the house go even slower. But making the whole timeline 1080 is easy to. So both options work great and look great on my broadcast monitor.Stephen Smith
Check out my Vimeo page
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Being new to the camera and shooting kids (very active) getting into the menu switching formats might be the last thing you want to deal with on the fly like that. Shoot all 720, make it easy. JMO
Chris
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On the Canon 5 series when you are in live view mode (shooting video) the camera still shoots stills. Just press the shutter release and the camera will grab a full Rez still. This DOES momentarily interrupt the video stream temporarily “freezing” the action – so don’t do it during a scene you need, but there’s no need to change any “mode” to grab a still while shooting video.
Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.
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Why not just extract stills from the video in post?
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Because a screen cap is limited to the video resolution of 1920×1080.
A full frame still from a 5d’s 22.5 Mpx sensor is 4080 x 2720 with significantly greater bit depth if encoded in Camera RAW.
Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.
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