DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK phần 2 pdf

CHAPTER 3PREVISUALIZATION 43 Reverse. A view 180 degrees from the previous shot. Usually used in combination with a Point of View shot or an Over the Shoulder shot. Point of view (POV). A shot where the camera shows the point of view of one of the characters. Often a dolly move. Extreme close up (ECU). A very tight close-up, such as a shot of someone’s eyes or a bug on his or her nose. Close-up (CU). A tight shot where the subject fills the whole frame. If the subject is a person, a shot of his or her head. Medium close-up (MCU). A slightly wider shot than a close-up. Usu- ally like a sculptured “bust”; i.e., head, neck, shoulder, upper torso. Medium shot (MS). On a person, usually a waist up view. Wide shot (WS). A shot that shows a whole area, usually full-figure in the case of people. Tracking (or dolly). A moving shot that uses a camera dolly (a wheeled cart that travels along special tracks) to push the camera through the scene. Often an opening shot or a POV. Depending on how they’re designed, dolly shots can travel from side to side or forward and back. DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 44 Crane. A moving shot that uses a camera crane to move the camera through the air, allowing movement on an X-Y-Z axis. Pan. A side-to-side movement of the camera, where the camera ro- tates around its base. The resulting motion is what you would see if you stood in one place and turned your head from side to side. Often used to follow a figure across frame. Tilt. Similar to a pan, but the camera tilts up and down. Analogous to tilting your head up or down. Usually used to reveal something, like a character who has just ripped his or her pants. Pedestal. Raising or lowering the camera, usually by adjusting the tri- pod on which the camera is mounted. Creates a “rising periscope” point of view. Very rarely used in features. Zoom. A lens movement from a tight to a wide shot (zoom out), or a wide to a tight shot (zoom in). Dolly counter zoom. A shot where a dolly and a zoom are performed at the same time. In the resulting shot, the framing of the image stays the same, but the depth of field changes dramatically. Objects in the background foreshorten and appear to float backward. The most famous example is in “Jaws,” when Roy Scheider sees the shark in the water on the crowded beach. His POV of the shark is a dramatic dolly counter zoom. Slow reveal. Usually a pan, tilt, or dolly that reveals something that at first wasn’t apparent. A woman laughs at a table, pan over to reveal that her husband has just spilled his wine. CHAPTER 3PREVISUALIZATION COMPUTER-GENERATED STORYBOARDS Programs like Storyboard Artist and Storyboard Quick provide simple drawing tools and libraries of characters, props, sets, and camera motion symbols that allow you to create storyboards quickly and easily. Though they may not look as good as hand-drawn storyboards drawn by a professional storyboard artist, these programs provide many advantages over handmade storyboards. With their object-oriented nature, storyboarding programs make it simple to pick up objects and move them around, providing for easier revisions. If you’ve already scouted and found some of your locations, you can shoot photos and import them into your storyboard program, letting you create sto- ryboards containing images of your actual locations. Some programs even let you add sound and define sequences to create slide-shows complete with dia- log from your actual cast (Figure 3.6). Of course, there’s no reason you can’t use your favorite image editor or paint program to create your storyboards. Whether you draw directly into the com- puter, or work on paper and then scan your drawings, preparing final story- boards in a program like Photoshop will let you easily create mixes of location photos, and simple sketches or clip art. 45 The Storyboard Quick interface. FIGURE 3.6 MetaCreations’ Poser is a very good tool for storyboarding, visualization, and planning. With Poser, you can quickly and easily create 3D figures, props, and sets that can be posed and manipulated to create complex choreographies and scenes. Because you can move your camera and characters in true 3D space, you can view your scene from different angles to block character and camera position as well as choreography. If your set designers have been de- signing or modeling in a 3D package, you can import their set models into Poser to better visualize your scene (Figure 3.7). DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 46 Poser 4 lets you pose and block scenes to create still or animated storyboards. FIGURE 3.7 Less Is More Remember, storyboards are a visualization tool, not an end product. If you show crew members detailed, photorealistic storyboards, they’ll be in- clined to think that those images are what your final scene will look like. Better to give designers, costumers, set builders, and actors rough, sketchy storyboards. Let them use their expertise to design and create the details that they’re responsible for. CHAPTER 3PREVISUALIZATION ANIMATICS Moving, animated storyboards, or “animatics,” are a great—sometimes essen- tial—way to plan complex action and motion. Animatics can provide good visual references for everyone, from designers to effects crews to actors. For ex- ample, you can use a program like Poser to create animatics that can be shown to actors and crew and that can even be used as placeholder video while you’re editing. If your feature will require complex effects shots such as 3D animation or compositing, talk with your effects crew about building your animatics in a way that can be reused later. For example, if your 3D team is building complex choreographies for animatics, maybe they can reuse the same files as the start- ing point for their final renderings. CREATING VIDEO STORYBOARDS If a paper storyboard is not enough for you to work out your visualizations, consider using any kind of video camera to create video storyboards. Gather your cast in a rehearsal space, grab some props and set pieces if you can find them (and if not, pantomime will do just fine), and begin to block and stage some scenes. This will give your cast a chance to rehearse, and help your director and cinematographer work out details of lighting and shooting. If you have access to equipment for digitizing this footage, go ahead and perform some rough edits. These rough takes can be much more than work copies: If you save your edit project files, you can later swap out this rough footage for your real footage and not have to re-edit. CREATING ROUGH EFFECTS SHOTS If your feature will contain complex effects shots—battling spaceships, giant flying insects, waving computer-generated cornfields—you’ll want to start 47 If you are shooting photographs, scanning pictures, or creating 3D renderings, look for ways to simplify your pictures. Many 3D programs, in- cluding Poser, offer special “toon” rendering modes that will render your images as cartoony outlines with flat color fills. These are ideal for story- boarding. For scanned photographs, try using Adobe Photoshop’s Graphic Pen or Photocopy filters to reduce your images to black-and- white, “sketchier” renderings. preparing such shots early in production. There’s no reason you can’t have your effects department quickly rough-out low-res, low-detail animations that can serve as animated storyboards. With these rough animations, you can more easily plan and direct shots. Having low-res proxy footage also means that you can go ahead and start editing before your final effects are rendered. Filmmakers have always had to engage in meticulous planning before rolling their cameras. As a DV filmmaker, you have a decided advantage. With dig- ital tools for storyboarding, you can more easily try out different visualiza- tions. And, with digital editing, your storyboards, animatics, and early work files can actually be repurposed to save time in your final post-production. These are all topics we’ll discuss in more detail later. And, these are all processes that require a lot of hardware. Choosing the right equipment will be your next task. Summary DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 48 CHAPTER 4 Choosing a Videotape Format 49 IN THIS CHAPTER • Delivery Is Everything • Video Basics • Video Format Features • Videotape Formats I f you don’t already own digital video equipment, you’re going to have to choose a video format. You may have thought you’d already done this— after all, you’ve decided to shoot digital video, right? Unfortunately, the digital video world has become increasingly complicated over the last few years as more and more hardware companies have released more and more formats (Figure 4.1). If you already own—or have access to—equipment that you plan to use for your production, then your format choice has been made by default. However, it’s still important to understand the workings of your format so that you can avoid its limitations. Also, just because you’ve decided to shoot on one format, doesn’t mean you won’t have to use some others during your production. From creating VHS copies for test screenings and promotion, to dubbing to high- end formats for transfer to film, you may end up using two or three formats before you deliver your final product. If you’ve already chosen a format, you might be tempted to skip some of the technical discussions introduced in this chapter. However, because many of DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 50 A quick glance at the Sony family of tapes gives an indication of the number of tape formats that exist today. This photo also includes audio tape formats. FIGURE 4.1 CHAPTER 4CHOOSING A VIDEOTAPE FORMAT these concepts and terms will come up during production, we recommend that you at least skim this chapter. Before you look at formats, it’s important to know what your end product is going to be. A projected feature film? A home video release? A Webcast? De- livery medium is an important consideration when choosing a format, as some formats are better-suited to certain types of delivery. You might be thinking “I’ll just shoot the best quality that I can and then I’ll be able to adapt my project to any medium.” Unfortunately, for any num- ber of technical (and financial) reasons, this is not a practical way to think. It’s better to make some decisions now about delivery so that you can choose the highest quality, most-affordable format for your intended delivery medium. Web/Multimedia The compressed video that is used for Web and multimedia projects is very low quality, but this doesn’t mean that you should just get that old VHS cam- corder out of the closet and start shooting. Although low quality, Web video is still good enough to reveal artifacts such as light flares and noise. Similarly, if you’re planning on night shoots or special effects such as blue-screen com- positing, you will need a higher-quality format. And, shooting better quality affords you the option of repurposing your footage later. Home Video If you’re planning a “straight-to-video” release, or are preparing a corporate pre- sentation or trade show video, you can count on your project being distributed and viewed on VHS. This means that you can get away with shooting in any tape format that’s better than VHS; that is, all of them. As with Web video, you’ll need to pick a quality that suits the type of shooting you plan on doing. Broadcast Television Although almost any of today’s digital formats pass the muster for being broad- cast, broadcasters all have different criteria for what they will accept. In general, you will have to provide a high-quality master, usually Digital Betacam or D2 with a stereo audio mix. In addition, you’ll probably have to provide additional copies with special audio tracks. Depending on the network you’re producing Delivery Is Everything 51 for, you’ll be required to deliver either a digital videotape output from a non- linear editing system like Avid’s Media Composer or a videotape Master cre- ated in a linear (digital or analog) online session. We’ll discuss the details of these processes in Chapter 18. Projection Any format can be used for projection, but there is one important thing to keep in mind: People will be seeing your video footage at 10 to 50 times the size of your video monitor. Noise and digital compression artifacts can be en- larged to the size of someone’s head. Consequently, you should try to work at the highest quality you can afford. TIP Digital Projection High-end digital projection systems are being developed with the eventual goal of replacing film projection in theaters. Although it’s probably too early to be con- sidering digital projection, if you have a project that you know will be projected digitally, you’ll want to be very careful about shooting with narrow depth of field and pay close attention to any special effects compositing, as these factors are fre- quently criticized in digital projection screenings. If you ultimately want your project to be projected from a film projector— in a movie theater, ideally—your final video will have to be transferred to film. Because of the technical concerns around video-to-film transfer, choice of format is very important. We’ll cover these issues in more detail later in this chapter. TRYING TO CHOOSE Once you have a better idea of how you will deliver your final product, you can begin to think about the best video format for the job. Whether or not you al- ready have equipment, an understanding of the workings of digital video for- mats will make much of your work easier. That understanding begins with a discussion of some video basics. Although digital tape specs are much different from analog specifications, dig- ital videotapes have a lot in common with the analog tapes of old. Just like audio tape, videotape works by manipulating magnetic particles that are sus- pended in a medium applied to a thin piece of celluloid. Video Basics DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 52 [...]... rates, numbers of scan lines, and horizontal line resolutions We’ve included relevant film specs for the sake of comparison Standard NTSC PAL HDTV Film Frame rate 29 .97 25 24 or 30 24 Fields 2 fields 2 fields No fields No fields Vertical res 525 625 1080 N/A Scanning method Interlaced Interlaced Progressive N/A Aspect ratio 1.33:1 1.33:1 16:9 or 1.78:1 1.33:1* * 35mm film has an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 when... 69 DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 70 F IGURE Professional analog formats: 3/4 inch and Betacam SP 4.9 Betacam SX A digital format aimed primarily at SNG (satellite news gathering) and ENG applications Digital Betacam (DigiBeta) Sony introduced Digital Betacam in 1993 as a digital upgrade of Betacam SP Its extremely high quality has made it the broadcast mastering format of choice Many high-budget digital. .. IGURE 4.11 Sony D-Series broadcast mastering formats 71 DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 72 D-5 HD A high-definition version of D-5, D-5 HD allows for the 1 .2 gb/sec data rate and 1080 line interlaced (1080i) or 720 line progressive scan ( 720 p) video of the American HDTV video standard D-9HD The high-definition version of JVC’s D-9 format, D-9HD (Figure 4. 12) HDCAM Sony’s contender in the high-definition formats,... down in separate “tracks” along the tape For more on the type and arrangement of digital video tracks, take a look at www.dvhandbook.com/tracks.html + Odd fields = Even fields Progressive Scan F IGURE 4 .2 Complete image DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 54 V IDEO S TANDARDS Unfortunately, we now have to tell you the big lie of digital video: it’s really analog Okay, we’re being dramatic, but, ultimately, all... frame of video Field 1 Field 2 Etc Five frames of NTSC video F IGURE 4.4 Illustration explaining 3 :2 pull-down Field 1 Field 2 Field 1 Field 2 DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 60 Video Format Features Those heady engineer types that we mentioned earlier love to throw around arcane terms when discussing digital video formats (or anything else, for that matter) As you begin looking into the specifications... 8mm 1.33:1 640 × 480 pixel computer screen 1.33:1 16mm 18:13 MiniDV 1.33:1 Super 16mm 5:3 DVCPro 1.33:1 35mm (projected): 3 :2 DVCAM 1.33:1 35mm full 1.33:1 DVCPro50 1.33:1 Vistavision 3 :2 DigitalS 1.33:1 65mm 16:7 Digital Betacam IMAX 6:5 1.33:1 70mm 2. 19:1 D1 1.33:1 Techniscope 2. 35:1 HDTV T IP 1.33:1 Betacam SP 16:9 or 1.78:1 DV by Any Other Name Don’t let “DV” and “MiniDV” confuse you; these are actually... the 29 .97 native frame rate of NTSC video, the film picture and audio is slowed down 1% during the telecine process This can lead to some complications in editing, and especially rotoscoping and other special effects See Chapter 13 for more on 3 :2 pulldown Four frames of 35mm film- each containing a distinct image Field 1 Field 2 1st frame of video Field 1 Field 2 2nd frame of video Field 1 Field 2 Etc... (Figure 4.11) D -2 Developed by Ampex in the mid-1980s, D -2 is a composite digital tape format that has recently been superceded by Digital Betacam as the most popular mastering format for American broadcast television D-3, D-5 Very high-quality digital studio mastering formats developed by Panasonic CHAPTER 4 CHOOSING A VIDEOTAPE FORMAT F IGURE JVC’s D-9 is one of several broadcast-oriented digital video... how far you are from the monitor, and how good your vision is The vertical line resolution is fixed and inherent to each video standard: 525 lines for NTSC, of which 485 are visible, and 625 lines for PAL, of which 575 are visible 61 DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 62 F IGURE 4.5 The black and white vertical lines in this image will look like a mass of gray if you hold the book far enough away from you... zero, even though the tape is wound forward to the two-hour mark! 55 56 DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK With timecode, if you’re two hours into the tape when you insert it, the counter on the deck will read two hours Or, if you’re two hours, ten minutes, three seconds, and twenty frames into the tape, the counter will read 02: 10:03 :20 Every time the counter displays that number, you’ll see the exact same . of comparison. Standard NTSC PAL HDTV Film Frame rate 29 .97 25 24 or 30 24 Fields 2 fields 2 fields No fields No fields Vertical res. 525 625 1080 N/A Scanning method Interlaced Interlaced Progressive. a thin piece of celluloid. Video Basics DIGITAL FILMMAKING HANDBOOK 52 CHAPTER 4CHOOSING A VIDEOTAPE FORMAT And, as with analog formats, the head of a digital tape deck is actually a metal housing. 3 :2 pulldown. 59 Four frames of 35mm film- each containing a distinct image Five frames of NTSC video 1st frame of video Field 1 Field 2 Field 1 Field 1 Field 1 Field 1 Field 2 Field 2 Field 2 Field