Recent Project: Imagine A World…

Recently, the director of the Children’s Ministry, here at Crossroads, came to me for help brainstorming a volunteer recruitment video. By the time we finished talking about it, I was begging him to let me film and edit the piece.

I was excited about it because it was a chance to get a little more cinematic than I’ve been so far at Crossroads.

Here’s the video. It features some really talented and really cute staff kids and the extremely talented Matt Hadley, Jason Koerner, and Griff Ray. Below the video is some very self-indulgent process stuff that I recommend skipping unless you’re a masochist.

One of the things I really wanted to try with this piece was directing the viewer’s eye by using a rack focus. That kind of thing is fairly easily done if you’ve got the right equipment - namely a follow focus. While that kind of thing is on my “to buy” list eventually, I came up with an idea to try and accomplish the same effect on the cheap (and when I say, “came up with” I mean “was probably the last guy on the planet to figure this out”).

A follow focus is basically some gears and a knob that allow you to move easily from one pre-determined point of focus to another - on some professional shoots, there’s actually a guy other than the camera guy in charge of operating the follow focus, I’ve read. Below is my shoe-string solution:

Yeah, that’s a rubber band and some tape. Basically, each ink mark on the rubber band represents a pre-determined point of focus. When the mark on the rubber band lined up with the mark on the tape, I knew that particular point was actually in focus. So to move my focus from say, an actor’s face to a set of keys, I simply moved from one ink mark to the next. Simple. Amateurish. Effective.

This was also the first time I’ve attempted any sort of color grading with a video. Specifically, I wanted to give this piece a highly saturated, blue-heavy look kind of like a modern action flick. I was pretty fascinated by the whole process and clearly have a lot to learn. Curious what a little color grading can do for a piece? Well, here’s a nine second video to give you a little idea.

Neat, huh?

Okay, that’s enough rambling. Thanks to Jason for letting me work with him and the kids!