Bookmark and Share

The 10 Commandments of Video

By Michael Lotti

“If you follow these commandments, you could be great. If you don’t, you’ll never be great.”

That was Al Tomkins’ start to his session on shooting video. His examples were from the world of broadcast journalism, but his lessons were for anyone incorporating video into their communications.

Al’s commandments, with highlights from the presentation:

  1. Thou shalt not zoom or pan. “When the eye and ear compete, the eye wins.”
  2. Thous shalt compose thy shots in thirds. Everyone in the room was making a viewing box with their thumbs and index fingers. They looked silly, but it’s an incredibly helpful (and portable!) tool.
  3. Thou shalt keep thy shot steady for 10 seconds. “Most shots are five to six second long. The first and last second or two of a shot are usually bad; if you cut them out of a ten second shot, you have your six seconds.”
  4. Thou shalt seek subjective soundbites. “Information rides on the back of emotion in video.”
  5. Thou shalt shoot cutaways, sequences, and transitions. “You have to help the viewer from scene to scene.”
  6. Thou shalt focus thy story into three words. “Who did what? Subject-action verb-object. ‘Man loses everything,’ ‘Fire destroys car.’ Doing this gives your story clear focus.”
  7.  Thou will seek great natural sound and will shut up while shooting. “The visuals point you to the scene. The sound takes you there.”
  8. Thou shalt always wear thy headphones. Without headphones, it’s impossible to really know what the viewer is hearing.
  9. Thou shalt put the camera on the shadow side of the subject. It’s counterintuitive, but every sample of shots on a lighted side of the subject were borderline ghastly.
  10. Choose a setting/background that puts the viewer in charge and enhances the interview. “Filming me in my office and me in my horse barn are two totally different interviews.”

It makes you want to start experimenting with a video camera, doesn’t it?

Al Tomkins is a former broadcast journalist who now teaches at the Poynter Institute, a St. Petersburg-based journalism school that offers classes to students of all ages, mostly via online courses.