Filming Video And Using a Gimbal

Ordering Online

Yesterday I put in an order for a DJI gimbal, the previous day they announced the new OM5. I’ve been watching a number of videos showing how to get the best use of a gimbal with various creative gimbal moves. It looks like I’ll be able to make more interesting and creative videos by getting better movement. The videos I made of the motorbike on our last trip to the Dam at Susqueda could be improved by better use of B roll clips. If we go to France in October I’d like to be able to really spend some time making some videos and make the trip more interesting. I’d like to spend some time really thinking about the shots I take and how to put them together. I’ll do what I can with the video clips in the iPad see how the look compared to what I can do with the Mac and Final Cut Pro.

However, the order I did with DJI directly rather than going through Amazon didn’t go smoothly. I paid through PayPal and it got the address wrong. It left out the street name and number and the courier is going to find that difficult. Hopefully the courier will be able to find me and if not maybe I can contact them to give them better information so they can get to the house. According to the notification it should arrive here from China on Tuesday. I did get onto their help section and they wasn’t able to sort the address out for me which was a pain in the bottom. When I spoke to the help section today there was still unable to help by contacting the courier to do anything with a stop and return, so maybe it will all work out right in the end. I just find it annoying to have this sort of annoyance and nuisance when all I want to do is to put in an order and have it arrive at my house without any problems.

Gimbal Moves to Try

I’ll have to make a list of the various gimbal moves I want to try. There is the push through or push forward where you are moving forward with the gimbal and camera changing the angle as you go maybe. The idea is to have some movement in the foreground as you move forward and then finish off with a reveal of the actual subject of the clip. This looks like it works particular well if using the low-slung mode and getting the camera close to the ground to start with. The push through is where you’re moving the camera in between objects to reveal the view on the other side.

Another move is to slide from the right to left or left to right from behind an object in the foreground to reveal the subject in the background. It makes it a lot more interesting to have this sort of shot after an opening shot like the push forward with a wide-angle lens used as an establishing shot.

One thing to remember is to get the focus and exposure locked. So the exposure doesn’t change based upon the amount of light going into the camera as you move from behind some foreground object into seeing what’s in the background. So I can focus on the background and have it out to focus on the foreground object in order to do the reveal. This would help as well with the transition from one clip to another where the blurred foreground object is the place where the cut is going to be. Cutting from one blurred portion to another blurred portion and maybe doing a speed ramp to get an extra bit of movement as the video changes from one to another.

I Have Found This Channel Useful

Telling a Story

All good stories have a beginning, middle and end and this is the case with videos. The establishing shot or shots is the beginning of the story. Then there could be a mixture of standard and close-up shots to follow and then finishing off with maybe the opposite of the push forward with a pull backwards.

With the DJI Osmo 5 there are some tricks you can employ such as the spinning camera shot. This is sometimes called the Inception Shot as popularised by the film. Spinning out of one clip and then spinning in from another clip which is another transition I want to try.

It’s also possible to do the dolly zoom with the zooming taking care of by the software. The camera operator only has to keep the subject in the same place within the frame while walking forwards or walking backwards.

I’ll want to try to do some hyper lapse shots and perhaps some timelapse as well. Then find a way to slot these into the finished movie. I think I’m going to have a lot of fun trying out all these different shots and getting creative.