It is an exciting time to be filming for sure. The mentality and psychology behind video has ‘up-ed’ it’s game big time. And the tools are better than ever. Today, we at Waves Media want to submit a few items that everyone should be using for the betterment of video everywhere! So here we go.
Gimbal Stabilizers
The title sounds fancy I know. But what a gimbal 3-axis stabilizer does is actually simple yet super cool. Using 3 brushless motors it always the videographer to move about as if handheld. However the gimbal will minimize or totally lose shake and unwanted motion creating a smooth movement.
Gimbals like this described used to be super expensive, heavy, and difficult but today you can use them even with your phone or small camera. And the options are both many, affordable, and easy to learn and use right away. The end product is sooooo worth it!
LED Lights
If you’ve been at a video shoot with lights over a few years back you may have encountered super hot to touch lighting that heats up the room. Great news is you can get lights now that use less power and are cool to the touch – that is LED lights. And they look good on the face of your talent too. Pricing in this category has gone down too. Here’s some we like that won’t ‘break the bank’: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1337224-REG/dracast_drsp_lk_3x500_b_s_silver_series_led500_bi_color.html
Good Mics (no excuses)
You will hear us say it a lot. Audio is super important. And good mics are a huge step in the right direction towards this end. Mics can be for ambient sounds (on camera) or externally utilized as with lavalier microphone sets or shot gun mics. The options are numerous for people on tight budgets to studio quality.
Once you have your mics, placement and strategy on how to get the best and most complete soundtrack can be really fun. Oh, and don’t forget a good set of headphones so you can hear it all correctly!
Drones
Maybe the coolest of all the new gear out there is the drone. The ability to shoot sky-shot footage has so many uses and can truly inspire and put in awe your audience and viewers. In contrast to popular belief drones are actually for the most part very user-friendly and safe, as long as the user acts in a safe manner.
One of the drones we use actually has a ‘come home’ button should we lose sight of it in the sky. And it will then proceed to come back on it’s own to where it took off in the first place.
Key things to remember with drones:
- Not all are created equal by any means. A $40 drone WILL NOT act like a $1,500-$5,000 drone.
- Drone footage flown low can often be far more meaningful than super high stuff where you can hardly see anything.
Online Project Review Spaces (Vimeo, Frame.io, etc)
Finally, something for ‘post-production’ that all video teams should be using: project spaces. Today we have a streamlined, easy-to-use form of collaborating on video editing and review and that is a good project space or platform. Our favorite is the award winning and ever updating Frame.io for it’s ease of commenting, sharing, reviewing, version keeping, etc. Vimeo now has built out its review space a bunch as well. YouTube on the other hand doesn’t really have the capacity (at least at this present time) to do good review work like these 2 previous mentions but is still the king of mass-hosting. Wistia has some pretty incredible features. And there are more… get out there and check them out. Just make sure you are using one that makes sense and uses the concept of shared-virtual-video-viewing well.