Dive Into Your Imagination

Think Before You Shoot

Assuming you know how to operate your camera system, I want to save you a lot of time in front of a computer editing station. When you have small children, you don't have hours to edit. I want to SAVE you time in front of the computer. The only way you can be effective with your time is if you think. Think before you shoot. What story do you want to tell? What are you going to use the images for?

Whether your choice is video or photo, both mediums are very similar. Many cameras on the market have the ability to shoot either photo or video, you need to see how the two mediums utilize the same principals.

Every family and therefore every story is slightly different. Nickie and Billy have twins and a three year old. Although they have a camera, video, desktop editing system and a printer, they tend NOT to use the equipment. We have discussed this and they usually overshoot and then don’t know where to start in the editing process. They get bogged down by technology because they run out of time. So then they don't pick up their cameras because they do not compose, shoot, stop and move. They film and film and film and film!

I wanted to show them how easy it can be so in the period of their bath time, we got some nice family moments. You do not have to film hours and hours of your kids bathing, yet it is a great memory to have on film…and let’s face it, a photo is worth a thousand words, yet video shows us so much more because of the action.

In addition, I filmed this because in another section on the website, I wanted to show mothers how they can safely and easily bathe their children. I know many mom's are scared to do this for their babies, so I was able to use this footage in multiple projects.

So what you need to do is think about the shots that you need to take in order to tell your story visually. This will prevent you from shooting hours and hours of tape and getting you stuck behind the computer! We know you want to be with your family!

Film Your Kids at Bath Time

Editing and Shooting Tips:

Compose, Shoot, Stop, and Move

Compose your scene

Press record and film for at least 10 seconds

Stop recording

Move and recompose another shot at a different angle so you can cut your pieces together like a puzzle! Watch this:

Whenever you pick up your camera to film, you want to Compose, Shoot, Stop and Move. To piece together this clip of Nickie, Billy and the twins there are nearly 20 different angles including wide, medium and close-ups all pieced together. Most people make the mistake of filming the whole bathing experience. You will know your child better than most. As they grow up if there is something funny they do every time they take a bath, then you might want to film that episode, yet rarely do you ever want to just continue to run tape because it takes way too long.

Think before you shoot!

Lighting Tips:

When filming inside I always white balance my camera. Many have presets for indoor or outdoor lighting. You also need to make sure you have enough light or the video will come out really grainy and bad quality. Same rules apply inside as outside, you want to always have the main light source coming from above and behind you. You might consider adding a few lamps to a room to help boost the illumination.

Music and Narration:

We just laid a music bed down on this as this is just the start of the story of the twins. If Nickie and Billy continued to film them through their first year, they could come up with a great memory for their children. We spend so much time writing in a baby book, that if we could only capture these small memories on video we would be able to show our children.

Funny Story:

Having twins and a three year old is a full time job for Mom and Billy works full time all day long and is still needed to help out at home. By the end of the day when I finally had the two of them together so we could have video of both Mommy and Daddy with the twins, Billy had a drink in hand, a Bloody Mary! This was not planned as a prop but it is a great memory to capture as I am sure Billy probably needed the liquid encouragement not because of the twins but because of the filming.

Lesson:

Family videos are meant to be fun. It is so much nicer when everyone participates. People can be camera shy, yet when you have the camera around often enough and people start addressing the camera, you can get some great sound bites to add to your memories and your stories.

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