LO4: Applying cinematic lighting and Manipulating Camera Settings

This is an image of me setting up my camera to shoot on.  The equipment which I used when creating my documentary was a 4k camera, tripod and microphone. These were the pieces of equipment which I believed I needed in order to make my footage look professional and meet the industry standards.

Here I am setting up the tripod which I used in order to film my interview. A tripod was useful for this as it meant that I could be stood behind the camera asking questions without having to try and hold the camera steady. I set the tripod up both before the day I was filming and also when I was as well. I set it up so that I knew that it worked, meaning that each leg extended and the camera sat on the tripod, being secure so that it didn't fall off and break.




I did not take any images of me setting up the three-point lighting system as I was under time constraints when it came to me record my interview with the owner of thrifty store, however you cans see from clips within my documentary that I managed to get the lighting right, keeping the overhead lights on as well as the store was quite dark and I knew that  my footage would need to be bright due to it being an interview. I did a good job of making sure that the footage was not too overexposed from the use of extra lighting however. This screenshot is from the offline edit of my documentary, showing what the interview scene looked like without any effects and just from using lighting techniques.

When filming, I tried different camera settings in practice shots before hand as I knew that it would be important to maintain the same setting for the entirety of my documentary so that there was continuity between the clips. Also I wanted the footage from the interview to be easy and not staged so ideally when shooting I did not want to have to record this more than once as I believed that this would cause the answers to seem too practiced. I did play about with camera settings when it came to filming clips in and around the shop. I could not use my three point lighting set up when filming these shots as I was not using the tripod and was moving around whilst filming. This meant that it would not be appropriate to use these. I relied on the natural light as well as the overhead lights when filming these shots and I made sure to take multiple clips with different camera settings such as making the aperture higher to let more light into the shot. The use of manual camera settings was something which I believed really benefitted the outcome of my clips as it meant that I could have control over how each clip looked. After doing research into the right apertures and ISO to use, I decided that it was important for me to use a smaller ISO. Originally I decided that I wanted a smaller aperture when shooting the interview so that Bally Johal was in focus and the background was out of focus however when I did this, I realised that the shot was too dark, even with my lighting set up. The only way that I could have corrected this was by turning up the ISO and I recognised that it was most important to make sure that the shots were clear. If I was to turn up the ISO it would have added grain and texture to my shots so I decided that it was most important to compromise and have a clear shot rather than creating a shot where then background was out of focus. I did do a lot of experimenting before I found the right camera settings as there was some source of light so I did not want to make the shots overexposed. I think that the natural lighting worked really well within these shots due to the camera settings which I filmed with.