Nbr 30 Featuring Ross Gardner

[Ross McArthur]

And we're both called Ross - Win.

That goes without saying Mucker.

Again, top job.

[Steve-A]

Nice video. Riding was good and varied, and I thought the music went well. Nice subtle editing feel, just calming down in the middle as the song broke down, then bringing the action back up. Just pleasant to watch.

How a trials video should be

One thing I did think is maybe you could try some shot variation, most of the shots had the rider pretty much full frame, why not get in really close sometimes, or get right back and get an overview of the whole line, I think it might make the video feel a bit more dynamic?

You and Ben mentioned colour correcting... Learning how to read a histogram is well worth it, that way you can easily see how bright your image truly is, whether the blacks are dark enough, whether the white is bright enough, and how bright the main portion of the picture is. Then using levels as opposed to brightness and contrast controls gives a bit more control of this. When your happy with the luminance then look at saturation, its likely to have been altered when changes to luminance were made. Finally go on to the colour balance. I quite often find using an application like the digital colour picker in OSX that gives me an RGB readout of the colour that the mouse is pointed over, helps with this. Using the colour picker I look at white portions of the image to see their true coluor, it would well be technically a pale blue or yellow, its normally worth adjusting colour balance till this is true white, to see how it effects the image, more often than not it looks better. Then its upto your eye, and the 'feel' you want the image to have. Often its to adjust the colour balance of the lights, mids and darks of the image separately, if your shooting on a dull day then adding a bit of yellow to lights and blue to mids can make the picture look closer to one shot in hazy sunlight. Its very much one of those black arts, you just gotta play with it.

Another thing to try is to adding gradients in post (on the computer), obviously a proper filter in front of the camera lens works best, but its surprising how effective a gradient in post can be. A subtle dark blue on the sky of a shot which is maybe sunny but the sky has blown out can work wonders. Using a subtle vignette to draw eyes to the centre of the video. Give it a try!

[Bearded Midget]

such a great video. so many lines! Looked really relaxed on most of that stuff aswell. BEAST!

[Josh Greenan!!!!!!!!!!]

Loved the vid, the drop gap build ups were mint. The music and was editing good aswell. Mint riding as always.

[that NBR dude]

You and Ben mentioned colour correcting... Learning how to read a histogram is well worth it, that way you can easily see how bright your image truly is, whether the blacks are dark enough, whether the white is bright enough, and how bright the main portion of the picture is. Then using levels as opposed to brightness and contrast controls gives a bit more control of this. When your happy with the luminance then look at saturation, its likely to have been altered when changes to luminance were made. Finally go on to the colour balance. I quite often find using an application like the digital colour picker in OSX that gives me an RGB readout of the colour that the mouse is pointed over, helps with this. Using the colour picker I look at white portions of the image to see their true coluor, it would well be technically a pale blue or yellow, its normally worth adjusting colour balance till this is true white, to see how it effects the image, more often than not it looks better. Then its upto your eye, and the 'feel' you want the image to have. Often its to adjust the colour balance of the lights, mids and darks of the image separately, if your shooting on a dull day then adding a bit of yellow to lights and blue to mids can make the picture look closer to one shot in hazy sunlight. Its very much one of those black arts, you just gotta play with it.

Another thing to try is to adding gradients in post (on the computer), obviously a proper filter in front of the camera lens works best, but its surprising how effective a gradient in post can be. A subtle dark blue on the sky of a shot which is maybe sunny but the sky has blown out can work wonders. Using a subtle vignette to draw eyes to the centre of the video. Give it a try!

Now thats a reply!!

Theres a whole host of colour settings on the camera, and I've been messing around with these to add some clarity to the shots. Im slowly getting there, its just finding that fine line before it starts to get oversaturated. The camera has more features than I've ever seen before, so theres a real learning curve in using it, not just like a point and record, so I'm having to spend a lot of time experimenting to get it right.

I've never tried adding graduation filters on the PC, although I used to use some square filters a few years back, but it became hasstle carrying round lots of them plus the matte box and filter cartridge was huge. Definitely something worth trying in the future. They can add some nice effects to shots.

As for camera angles ect, I'm still developing my style when it comes to shooting. I used to be very adventurous when it came to dynamic shots, but I got a lot of bad press for it. I've tried recently to dial it down slightly, but maybe too much. I'm still trying to find a wide angle converter to fit the camera (not a ghastly fisheye) but converters for an 82mm thread are rare, plus I want to find one of decent quality, so it doesnt effect the L series lens. Once I can find one that fits, I can play around more with angles again. I'd also like to try and work on some moving shots as well.

All in all I've not had the camera long, so I'm still adapting to it, to make the most of what its capable of.

[Steve-A]

Your doing the right thing by learning to get it right in the camera, rather than just sorting it all in post.

Cool to know your thinking about the camera angles. The experience you've had is I think the way the video learning curve goes. Find something new/have idea, do it to an extreme, have mixed response, tone it right down, then slowly bring it back into the videos at a tasteful level.

I always used to use loads of effects and transitions, various different types of dissolves and stuff, on my old videos, and like your camera angles I got mixed response. Then when I started working with video I went back to basics and learnt to cut with no effects and not even a single dissolve through. Now a couple of years on I've learnt how to do both sides of the coin and can find a tasteful compromise depending on the individual video.

I'm sure your camera work will do the same. After getting burnt by over extreme angles from before you've gone right back to basics, you did well to keep the rider as middle of frame as you did. When you feel the time is right to do more adventurous shots again your experience of learning simple shots well will help and the finished result will look better for it

I look forward to the next vid!

[eskimo]

Good video & riding.

[Linus]

That was awsome!

Riding was impresive! Sweet lines.

[Jonny Jones]

Superb Andy!!! Great video and some incredibly varied and controlled riding, wicked!

[Jonny Jones]

Yeah, I've no idea how to colour correct. I always play around with brightness and contrast though. I would really like learn though as I'm always finding myself feeling unhappy with the colour condition of my shots. I always overexpose when filming (mostly when the sun lacks) but I wonder if this somewhat relates to relative monitor/viewfinder settings.

One way of checking Ben is to wack some colour bars on the LCD screen then adjust the LCD brightness so that the blacks are black and the blue on the lower group of bars is blue, rather than purple/violet. That way you can get more accurate exposure. You can always use Zebra lines as well, these highlight over-exposed areas. I think your camera might have buttons to do this, not sure about Andy's Canon. Wow this thread has turned into one big IT lesson haha!

[that NBR dude]

One way of checking Ben is to wack some colour bars on the LCD screen then adjust the LCD brightness so that the blacks are black and the blue on the lower group of bars is blue, rather than purple/violet. That way you can get more accurate exposure. You can always use Zebra lines as well, these highlight over-exposed areas. I think your camera might have buttons to do this, not sure about Andy's Canon. Wow this thread has turned into one big IT lesson haha!

Yea have the LCD set up with colour bars. That was one of the first things I did. Always wondered what the Zebra lines did though. Set them on now so I can see how over exposed I am. Cheers Jonny

[Steve-A]

Make sure you know what brightness your zebra lines are set to come on. Most of the cameras I've used that have zebra lines you can pick if they come on at 100%, 90% or 75% brightness. So if you expose thinking they show over exposure and they are set to 75% it'll be rather under exposed. Most camera men I've worked with use them at 90% so you want some zebras in just the brightest part of the image, and once you've got a few zebra spots no the go your about right. With them at 100% you don't know if your underexposed so easily.

[Clownbike]

I love you! Makes me miss you XxX

Neil

[Jake Beach]

Amazing vid! Love the song and how the copper doesn't really care what you are doing.