Videoproduction for students
Composition
Composition describes the arrangement of things. In filming, this applies to all things that can be seen in the picture. Deciding what to show and what not to show is also part of the composition.
With the right composition, you can direct the viewer's eye and convey moods.
The composition is the place where the technique learned above and the story come together. The composition plays a decisive role in how the story is conveyed. The technology should only have a supporting effect.
You can make a good video with bad technology and good composition, but not with good technology and bad composition.
Remove, because that is now in a different order. That's why we no longer learn the technique beforehand.
There is no official right or wrong. All that is given here are guidelines and orientations. Sometimes it makes sense to consciously break them. No matter what you do, when you film a scene, you always make decisions. This can happen consciously or unconsciously. How you show something has an impact on the mood and the story. You can use this to consciously guide the viewer's eye.
Shot sizes
Extreme long shot
In the extreme long shot, the entire surroundings can be seen. This is done to get an overview and show the surroundings so that the viewer can get used to the environment or take in a new environment. This is about landscape. You see a lot. The focus is almost never on the specific actions of the protagonists.
Long shot
In the long shot, the focus is a little more on the protagonists' immediate surroundings. It's about the space they're in. As in the example: the person is sitting in front of a house. But you can still see a lot of the house and the square in front of it. This allows you to imagine new spaces for action.
Medium long shot
In the medium long shot, you can accompany characters on their actions. You get an overview of what is important for the protagonists in the respective situation.
Close-up
The close-up cuts away most of the surroundings so that you can only focus on the protagonists shown. This is very suitable for dialog, for example.
Extreme close-up
Often only small sections of the protagonist can be seen in extreme close-up. This shot is very suitable if you want to show emotions, such as a tear running down the cheek.
General information
This section contains a list of various things that you can or should consider when it comes to composition. It is therefore a small composition checklist. It may seem like a lot at first. But paying attention to just a few of these things can greatly improve your composition.
It's good not to overload the scenes. The viewer should simply be able to recognize what it is about and what is important and how.
Overloaded
Simple
To create a hierarchy, it is important to make the most important objects stand out from the others - especially from the background. This can be achieved by using different colors or different brightnesses, for example if the background is dark and the object is light. This would create a strong contrast between the background and the object.
No highlighting
Color-highlighting
Lighting
Coloring and lighting
To make it even clearer to the viewer where they should be looking, you can let the most important object take up most of the picture. There should not be several things fighting for attention.
No specific focus on one object
The most important object fills the picture
Symmetry can have something very appealing for people. It stands for order, organization, clarity, .... In general, however, it comes across as more natural and relaxed if you avoid symmetry. Symmetry is very good for large symmetrical palaces. For nature scenes or a group of objects, asymmetry is more appropriate.
Great symmetry
Poor symmetry
Great asymmetry
The "rule of thirds" was developed to make the image layout more appealing. This involves dividing the image horizontally and vertically into thirds. It is most appealing to people when the most important object is at the intersection of the third lines.
Without Rule of Thirds
With Rule of Thirds
An alternative to the "rule of thirds" is center framing. This can be used well when someone is seen briefly and the emotions are to be conveyed very strongly, e.g. for a very strong personal confrontation with the protagonist. For longer and quieter video formats, such as interviews, it makes more sense to use the "rule of thirds".
Another way of directing the viewer's eye is to use so-called guide lines. These are conspicuous straight lines along which the eye automatically looks. Aligning these lines with the object is a good way of drawing attention to it. Roads, railings or shelves, for example, can be guide lines.
Creating a perceptible depth in the video image enhances the realistic impression of a movie. This effect is achieved by positioning the object of interest between a foreground and background layer. Shadows also strengthen the three-dimensional impression of a scene.
Another simple trick is to cut off the image at the forehead or just above the head when filming people. This prevents the viewer's attention from being drawn to the empty space above the head and automatically focuses on the face. As you can see in the picture on the left, it is confusing when there is so much empty space above the person. There is nothing to see there, so it should not be in the picture, as in the picture on the right.
If you can see, you should avoid having it come to the edge of the picture, as this could otherwise break the illusion of reality in the movie. In reality, the person cannot run out of a picture. As can be seen in the picture on the left: The person is cut off at the bottom anyway, but if they reach out of the picture on the right, it breaks reality, unless they run out of the picture and thus change/leave the scene, in which case this break in reality can be used to emphasize this. If the protagonist leaves the picture in parts anyway, this is again not a problem. As is the case with a detail view, for example (image on the right).
The color that light can have, which is also described under "Light" in this learning module, can greatly influence the mood
In the example you can see two scenes from the movie "Up". Below the scenes you can see the colors that were used. In the left scene, the main character is having a very nice time with his wife, which is reflected in the warm, bright colors. In the scene on the right, they receive the news that the wife is not well and will probably die soon. There is almost no color here. It's almost all gray, which reinforces the coldness and despair of the scene.
A very interesting additional fact is that the viewer is very influenced before he/she has even watched the movie. For example, if you are a person reading from left to right. Diagonal lines that go from bottom left to top right in the picture, for example, are perceived as ascending.
Or a person entering the picture from the left is perceived as entering the picture and a person entering the picture from the right is perceived as coming back again
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