Frame Rates For Slow-Motion

Arguably the most important ingredient for slow-motion footage is having a camera capable of recording footage at a high frame rate. Since you will slow down the movement by stretching the clip in the timeline, you’ll need more frames per second to document the capture. In this day and age almost every camera, including the smartphone in your pocket (or table), records some sort of high frame rate. By high frame rate, I mean a frame rate that’s typically higher than the base frame rate used for normal speed motion which varies between 23.976, 24, 25 and 30 frames per second (fps). The base frame rate is usually the standard rate that we watch movies, on TV or cinema screens, computers, and mobile devices.
Common high frame rates you’ll find on these devices may vary between 50 to 240 fps and anything in between.

Why High Frame Rates?

Imagine that a rubber band is your video clip recorded at 24 frames per second, where each black mark is one frame. When the clip is not stretched, (i.e at its normal standard rate of 24 fps), the clip will playback at the normal speed of 100% on a 24 frames per second timeline (or 23.976, or 25 fps). This is how most of your standard speed footage should reside on your base project frame rate. That’s why it is recommended to work with a project (timeline) base frame rate that matches the frame rate of the majority of your clips.

But you might get the idea (rightly so) to slow down the movement on a certain clip that was initially recorded at a normal fps. So you stretch it to let’s say 50% of the normal speed then you play it back at the standard project frame rate of 24, and obviously results are not what you expected:

While the movement slowed down, the flow looks choppy and unnatural. This is simply because the clip was stretched out on the 24 frames per second project frame rate, and now there are gaps between the frames since there are 24 frames spread on a longer time unit.

The program will try to fill these gaps with frame duplicates or computer-generated frames blending giving way to all sorts of jitters and artifacts. It gets complicated.

How To Get Smooth Slow Motion?

The solution to getting a smooth, flowing slow-motion movement is to plan on shooting your footage with a higher frame rate than the base frame rate. I won’t go into detail on what frame rate works for what situation since Brandon Li explains this extremely well in his video on frame rates:

Shutter Speed vs FPS

The only thing I’ll touch on before diving into post-production is shutter speed. There’s a certain relationship between your camera’s frame rate and shutter speed that results in an acceptable motion blur. It’s more complicated than this, but it has to do with the motion blur we were accustomed to watching Hollywood movies.
This is important to keep in mind since not having the right shutter speed might result in something called ghosting, or hyper-realistic motion blur.

The easiest way to remember this is to keep your shutter speed at double your frame rate. For instance, here I recorded this clip at 120 frames per second so that means that my shutter speed should be at 1/240. I don’t have that particular stop value on my Sony a6500 so the closest available is 1/250th. The same rule should apply for standard frame rates like 24, 25 or 30 unless you are going for a more stylistic, gritty look like that of Saving Private Ryan, where dust particles, splatters, and grit were amplified by the lack of motion blur.

Editing Slow-Motion

In the example here I am using DaVinci Resolve but the same principles apply for any NLEs you happen to be working with (Vegas, Final Cut, Premiere Pro, etc.).

Start by creating a new project

This next step is very important since we won’t be able to change this later. Make sure to set your Timeline Frame Rate to one of the standard values you intend to work with. It always helps to know the end media target you are creating your movie for. In my case, I’ll just leave it at 24 frames per second since my movie will probably live somewhere online.

I’ll be importing the footage from a shoot that has clips with various frame rates – some at 24 and some at 60 frames per second. We’ll just grab them all and import them into the media pool.
Resolve is telling us that our imported batch has clips with different frame rates and asks us if we want to change the initially set timeline frame rate to match the clips frame rate.

This is another important step to keep in mind. If I choose CHANGE, my timeline resolution will be set to the clips with the highest frame rate (60 fps in my case) and Resolve won’t let me change that anymore. That’s not necessarily a bad thing but in that case, we won’t be able to manipulate the high frame rate clips and mix them seamlessly together with the 24 fps clips. So make sure to choose DON’T CHANGE to stick with the initial set timeline rate.

Conforming HFR Clips

With that out of the way, we can actually start editing and manipulating the slow-motion clips in a process called conforming. Conforming is simply the adapting high frame rate footage to fit a standard frame rate timeline so they playback at the project’s base frame rate (in my case 24 fps). Think of it as spreading the frames out by stretching which in turn slows the movement (as in the rubber band example above).
Since I am primarily a stock media creator, I would group the standard and high frame rate clips on their own separate timelines for an easy export organization.

Slow Motion Editing Workflow

Here’s my workflow for editing, adding and slowing down high frame rate clips to the timeline:

• Group all your high frame rate clips into a smart bin so you can have them separated from the other standard frame rate clips

• Select all clips in the bin you’ll be working with, right-click, select Clip Attributes and for the Video Frame Rate, select the project timeline frame rate you are currently working, in my case 24 frames per second. This will conform the clips to the proper timeline frame rate.

• bring up each clip in the source viewer by double-clicking on it in the media pool, scrub through the clip and choose the IN and OUT points by pressing I and O on your keyboard.
• drag the video-only part of the clip from the source viewer overlay onto the timeline since we won’t need the audio. You can also Alt-drag the video on the timeline. This will exclude the audio. Do this for the rest of the clips
  

If I would export the entire timeline as an edit containing a variety of clips with different frame rates, audio, intended to be viewed as an entire unit, my export would need to be rendered as a single clip. For my specific use as a stock footage content creator, my workflow is geared to deliver individual clips to upload as shoots to stock agencies. So, in the DELIVER tab, select the Individual clips setting since I want the clips to be rendered individually.

Then choose the codec you want to export the clips with, and click Render at source resolution.
Unclick Export Audio in the Audio tab since we don’t want to export audio.
In the File tab, choose Source name, click Use unique file names, and choose Prefix or Suffix to make sure they are not overwritten when exporting clips from the same master source clip.

• In the Video tab choose the codec you want to export, in my case H264 with a Quicktime format, select Best for quality, Encoding Profile on high and click Render At Source Resolution to make sure you don’t accidentally downres or upres footage at the wrong resolutions.

• In the Audio tab make sure you have Export Audio unselected.

• In the File tab select Source name, Use Unique filenames and Prefix or Suffix. This will make sure you won’t be overwriting clips cut out of the same video source.
• choose a location for the exported clips, Add to render queue and start the render

And this is it, friends! It’s a long one but really it is easier than it seems after you go over it once or twice. Please leave comments or questions if you have any!

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B What?

Let’s clarify the term first. B-Roll is a cine jargon for any footage that is not fundamentally supporting the main spine of the story. B-Roll is NOT the key shots that define a turn of events in the narrative. Can be categorized as transition shots, cutaways, simply auxiliary footage that’s supporting the main (A-roll) shots. Never heard of A-roll? Neither did I. The term isn’t used anymore as it fell out of favour among cinematographers. Go figure.

What is Stock Footage?

While working on a project, did it ever happened to you to realize that you missed a certain shot? Of course, it did! Or am I the only one who arrives home after a full day filming to discover that I forgot certain shots? Well, it isn’t all lost. Chances are that for a way cheaper price than paying the crew again, or models, locations, etc., you can in fact purchase a similar clip you had in mind from a stock agency at only a fraction of the price. For instance, you might need a clip of a girl practising her cello, or a boy doing his homework, or a girl practising her soccer skills? Chances are that you will find what you need on stock agencies. Editors feed on stock media content.

Prepping Your B-Roll To Submit As Stock Video

There’s a little housekeeping to be done before you drop everything and start to sell your b-roll as stock video. As with everything, you want to slowly but steadily build a library that holds the best of your work and will stand out among the others. You can in fact go out an intentionally shoot stock footage. In fact, veteran stock content creators are planing whole shoots, sets, just to film footage that’s intended to be sold as stock. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Film unique and trendy subjects. There are subjects that are overdone and the market is saturated with them. Or if you decide to film something that’s been done before, ad an interesting twist to it so it’ll stand out from the crowd.
• Trim clips to only the region of interest. Lose the fat. Trim only the part from a clip that is free of camera shakes, blurred focus, awkward moments, visible logos, etc.
• Recognizable people. if your footage happens to have recognizable people, you will need to have signed Artist Releases from them. You want to cover yourself for any possible liability issues. And of course, the agency won’t even accept footage with people without an artist release unless it’s for editorial use.
• Property Releases. If you happen to film in a location such as a unique home, museum, town square, or any other ticketed venue, you will need a property release. There are certain places that cannot be filmed and sold commercially as stock without property releases.
• Visible trademarks. A major aspect of stock media is that it cannot feature recognizable trademarks, like logos, trade dress, like the Coke bottle, or the VANS shoe patterns, the 3 lines of Adidas, or anything that might be protected by international trademark laws. Here’s how to remove signs and logos from your footage.

Where to Sell Your B-Roll as Stock Video?

Here we go. I thought of three main agencies and one favourite of mine. Neither of them is perfect but they each have an aspect that might appeal to you at this point in time for your video content production.

Pond5

I would recommend Pond5 for anyone starting or at least wanting to test the waters of selling stock media. They feature anything from footage to music, images, After Effects templates, overlays, etc. You will be able to set your own pricing, which takes a while to get used to, especially for new-comers who don’t know how to gauge their work. But also gives you the freedom to play with the price in a competitive way.
You will receive a 40% share if you sell non-exclusive (meaning you can sell the same media on other stock agencies), or a 60% share if you will sell exclusively your stock media only on Pond5. It’s a per shoot contract and means that you as an artist can still sell other stuff on other agencies.

Storyblocks

Having a completely different share system compared to other typical stock agencies, Storyblocks stands out because it is based on client subscription. Your pay is strictly dependent on the performance of your portfolio. The more downloads you have, the more pay you get relative to other contributors. It is a scalable earnings system that will grow exponentially with the growth of the entire Storyblock library. The system is designed to encourage you to produce and upload a lot.

Adobe Stock

Adobe stock has a big audience and it can be a great fit if you already have a portfolio and you want to receive some exposure for your work. But also can be hard to climb the ladder sometimes due to competition.
They offer 35% earnings on non-exclusive media. This agency is a decent place to get started to learn the ins and outs of selling stock media.

Stocksy United

And finally, we get to my favourite stock agency on Planet Earth, Stocksy United. First of all, because it is probably one of the most contributor-friendly agencies in existence. Stocksy United strives to support the contributors in a fair manner, receiving a well-deserved cut of their royalties. Stocksy pays 50% of royalties on standard licenses and 75% on extended ones. On top of that, Stocksy contributors receive annual profit-sharing returns based on the co-op’s surplus sales.
That is like Pond5 and Storyblocks added together!

Stocksy United Co-op

It is worth noting that Stocksy’s business model is unlike any other stock agency’s in the market. Typically at other agencies, the decisions and regulations come from the top down from a handful of people behind a closed door without any input from the contributors. At Stocksy that’s reversed so that major decisions are set in place by member resolutions and voting, making the process democratic and fair.
Stocksy United it’s NOT just another stop to sell your footage. It is a living organism that lives on the lifeline of its own members.

I hope this post will give you at least a little direction to sell your b-roll as stock video and receive fair pay in return. Stock media content creation an ongoing process, but your persistence and consistency will start to pay back.

The post How To Sell Your B-ROLL As Stock Video appeared first on GABRIEL BUCATARU.

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You can use this set of 4 LUTs in DaVinci Resolve, Premiere Pro, FinalCut Pro or any other NLE you might be working with that accepts LUTs.

Works extremely well with flat Log color profiles like S-Log2 from Sony or Film dynamic range from Black Magic Pocket Cinema 4K cameras.

WHAT’S IN THE FREE CINEMATIC LUT PACK?

TEALORANGE: A cinematic teal and orange look with a high priority on preserving skin tones. Works great in outdoors, natural lighting situations.

GREENGOLD: I designed this LUT with the golden hour light in mind. Brings out the richness of colors cast by the sun at that time of day.

BLUSHADE: Great indoor looks with blue-ish tones in the shadows but preserving the life and trueness in skin color

FILMICBW: A little black and white won’t hurt anyone, right? Add your footage an instant mysterious mood with this black & white film look.

INSTALLATION GUIDE

DaVinci Resolve

Open Project Settings->Color Management->Lookup Tables, and click Open LUT Folder. Drag the unzipped PHOTOGABI folder containing the LUTs to this folder then click Update Lists. You will see a PHOTOGABI menu under the 3D LUT menu item in the color page.

Premiere Pro

In the Color workspace, go to the Lumetri Panel and under Creative choose Looks and browse to the location where you’ve previously un-zipped and saved the PHOTOGABI folder. Choose one of the looks and apply them to the footage.

Final Cut X (versions 10.4 and later)

Select the clip you want to apply the LUT to, open the Effects Browser->Color section, select Custom LUT, drag unto your clip in the timeline. In the Inspector-> Custom LUT section select Choose custom LUT from the LUT->None drop-down box, navigate to the PHOTOGABI folder location and select it (choose Slog for input color space and leave rec 709 for output color space). This way the LUT’s will be accessible from the PHOTOGABI menu entry in the LUT drop-down box.

Add some contrast and saturation to your mix and you’ve got yourself some easy good looking cinematic grades! Please send me links to your project where you’ve used these FREE cinematic LUTs, I’m curious to see the creative way you’ve applied them to your footage.

DOWNLOAD the FREE Cinematic LUT Pack giveaway package here: https://photogabi.com/free-luts/

THANKS AGAIN to come along on this ride with me!

Yours, Gabi.

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When I first received the Black Magic Pocket Camera 4K after many months of waiting, it became rapidly clear that to bring this otherwise amazing camera to a point where I can streamline it in my stock photography workflow, it will need some additional accessories. And those accessories will need a way to be attached to it without the use of gaff tape. The hunt for the ideal camera cage was on.

The TILTA full cage for the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4k (BMPCC4K) prooves to be one of the most affordable best-value option to build an ingenious handheld rig on the market. In this video, I’ll talk about my experience using the Tilta cage for my Blackmagic Pocket Cinema 4k. Enjoy and please comment, like and subscribe for more content like this in the future. Thanks!

TILTA FULL CAGE LIST

TILTA BMPCC 4K Cage Basic Kit (GRAY, not TACTICAL FINISH!)
– 1x Full Camera Cage for BMPCC 4K
– 1x SSD Drive Holder for Samsung T5
– 1x Quick Release Top Handle
– 1x 90-Degree USB-C Cable (20cm)
– 1x HDMI 90-Degree Adapter

SEPARATE CAGE PARTS

• TILTA Camera Cage for BMPCC 4K (Tilta Gray)
• TILTA Quick Release Top Handle for BMPCC 4K Camera Cage (Tilta Gray)
• TILTA 15mm LWS Baseplate for BMPCC 4K Cage (Tilta Gray)
• TILTA Black 90-Degree 20cm USB-C Cable for BMPCC 4K
• TILTA SSD Drive Holder for T5 (Tilta Gray)
• TILTA Half Sunhood for BMPCC 4K Cage

OTHER ACCESSORIES

• SmallHD Focus 5 On-Camera LCD (Monitor Only)
• Kamerar Follow-Focus With Gear Ring Belt
• Rode VideoMicPro
• Benro SystemGo Plus Aluminum Tripod with Monopod Conversion

MY OTHER GEAR

• Sony Alpha a6500 Mirrorless Body
• Blackmagic Design Pocket Cinema Camera 4K
• Aputure 120d II LED Light
• Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100mm F4.0 PRO Lens
• Sony E PZ 18-105mm F4 G OSS

DISCLAIMER: The links above are affiliate links, meaning that if you do purchase gear using those links, a small commission will be attributed to me. This commission will not affect the price you are paying. Links like these help me creating content like this in the future. THANKS A LOT!

This review was not sponsored by any manufacturer with any gear or commission. I simply wanted to express my experience with the reviewed item. The review in this video is strictly my own opinion as a filmmaker and was not influenced by any manufacturer.

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If you’re an avid or aspiring filmmaker in the stock footage world like me, you must have run into times when you wished that particular signs or objects wouldn’t be present in your frame. Or maybe you just need to rotoscope someone out of the frame, fix that blemish on someone’s face, or simply you wanted to hide certain spots, signs, logos in a skyline shot in an urban setting. While some of these things could have been taken care of by using gaff tape, there are things that we cannot control while filming in the field so they have to be fixed in post-production.
That’s when Fusion’s planar tracker comes to the rescue.

FUSION’S PLANAR TRACKER

The planar tracker in Fusion is a complex and extremely useful tool to track surfaces that change perspective during a certain camera movement. Take for example the sign on the top of the building in the video below. The perspective is completely different at the end of the shot compared to the one at the beginning. It’s not as easy as pasting an image over the sign to mask it since the perspective will change continuously during the whole movement. The planar tracker tool will track and keyframe the perspective morphing on a given surface. The generated tracking data can be applied to a foreground surface, in my case the cloned windows which will follow the distortion.

PLANAR TRACKER VIDEO TUTORIAL

In this video tutorial, I’ll demonstrate how to track and remove signs and logos on buildings using the Fusion planar tracker tool within DaVinci Resolve. The perspective of the sign on the top of the building warps slightly in this simple tilt down movement from beginning to end.
This technique can be applied to virtually any surface that can be tracked in your videos. The steps are simple – tracking the object, then sample texture from a neighboring area and mask.

Follow along to see how I masked a sign on a building in Chicago replacing it with a cluster of windows from the same building:

Here’s an image of my node structure in Fusion:

NOTE: I noticed that sometimes adding a lens distort node at the beginning of the node structure (in front of the planar tracker) will help the planar tracker have a more precise tracking. Use the 3DE Classic LD Model with a distortion value that matches the lens you used. I usually eyeball the distortion amount base on how straight the perspective lines are (horizontal and vertical).

Please leave a comment if you have any questions or suggestions. I’ll read every one of them.

The post How To Remove Signs And Logos In Your Footage With Planar Tracker in Fusion? appeared first on GABRIEL BUCATARU.

Every now and then, when time is not an issue I pull out my Sony a6500 and get creative with dinner. This one was one of those when I really wanted to experiment with in-camera transitions, after being inspired watching Daniel Schieffer’s YouTube video about filming B-roll.
Tonight’s dinner turned into a delicious fajita feast so I thought of filming the preparation of the veggie side.

FOCUSING

I quickly realized that filming in this style where you follow the movement, keeping things in focus can become is challenging. I had to take a couple of takes for each movement to find one where I actually worked. Of course, checking for focus accuracy on the tiny SONY a6500 display can be a pain, so it helps to have an external monitor for more detailed viewing.
Against all odds for the fact that the SONY a6500 has an amazing auto-focusing, I chose to go manual since, with this crazy kind of movement, I didn’t want to rely on the camera’s decision to choose what should be in focus.

TRICKS OF THE TRADE

• The first trick is to actually follow the exact movement of the object you try to keep in focus, but probably the most critical aspect is to know exactly the point where your subject will end the movement. So, pull a practice focus at the end of that movement, this way you can remember the position and distance of the camera from the subject.
• It helps to work with a higher f-stop to have a more forgiving depth of field. But if you are filming at 120 fps and the light is getting scarce as it did for me filming at sunset, things can get dark quite fast.
• Communicate with your model, and have a few cold runs before you start shooting so you know what to expect.
• As with everything, it takes a lot of practice to become skilled at what you are doing.

Hope you guys enjoyed the post, please subscribe if you didn’t already for more posts like these. And of course, I am curious about your tricks on keeping things in focus when you are filming. Do you find manual or autofocus more reliable? leave a comment and let me know!

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