Today's video editing software and equipment have opened up the world movie making to just about anyone. You no longer need to develop, process and manually edit your film by splicing sequences together, instead you can piece together your movie cuts with a drag, drop and click of the mouse. Then upload it on to YouTube and you're on your way to being a bona fide movie maker.
Of course, getting people to actually watch your movie can be a bit more of a challenge. If you're looking to flex your creative video muscles and put together a quality production - here are some easy movie making tips:
- It starts with a story - any director, screen writer or producer will tell you that a great movie starts with a great story. Unless you have the professional production budgets of the big studios, much of the entertainment value within your piece will rely on your ability to tell a good story.
- Include variety - unless you get top of the line actors, watching two people speaking to each other in a single shot for 20 minutes can get dull. You'll want to include a number of different camera angles and perspectives to keep your audience engaged. Switch between close-up, medium and long range shots to keep things interesting. Try shooting from above or below eyelevel to give a different impression of the relationship between your characters. Add some strategic fades and transitions or overlay two sequences on top of each other to create a flashback.
- Keep it simple - meanwhile, don't go overboard with variety! While it may be tempting to include every type of transition and effect that your video software offers, the most effective productions are relatively simple in their presentation. You can keep your audience engaged with relatively simple cut sequences to set the pace, as too many transitions and effects will only distract your viewer from the flow of the story.
The Equipment - Digital Video Cameras
Even though compact digital cameras and SLR cameras today come with video capture technology, if you're really looking to get into video production, it's worthwhile looking at dedicated digital video cameras to get the job done. Canon has a range of video cameras for home use, such as the flagship Legria HF S21 model with Optical Image Stabilizer and Video Snapshot mode that lets you piece together video clips in your camera without the need for editing software.
However, if you're serious about your movie project - then you'll want to consider professional video equipment. They offer more advanced features that allow videographers to explore all of their creative options including the highest quality image capture, with less noise for great pictures in all shooting conditions - perfect for fast-paced news capture, event videography and movie production.
Canon's newest range of professional video cameras, the XF105 and XF100 are the smallest and most compact professional machines available on the market. With the unique Canon MPEG-2 Codec for extreme colour detail required for accurate chroma-keying, colour-grading and compositing - the XF105 and XF100 are the ideal machines for digital filmmaking.