The ultimate solution of video shooting for people interview

Interview with people is a common expression in documentary images. It seems simple, but it is the work that best reflects the basic skills and creativity of photographers. So, how to shoot a professional interview quickly?

First of all, the cameraman must communicate with the director and interviewee in time after receiving the task. When docking with the director, read the interview script to understand the background and purpose of the interview. Of course, the general interviews are interspersed in the whole film, so the cameraman will get access to the complete information of the whole film earlier and understand the original intention of shooting.

When docking with the interviewee, the cameraman should quickly grasp the basic information such as the interviewee's appearance characteristics, personality characteristics and professional background. The information of the interviewee will involve how to fill the light, how to set up cameras and lenses, and how to arrange interviews and answers. Therefore, when the cameraman prepares for the interview, it is most important to communicate with the interviewee in the early stage.

Secondly, the photographer should go to the interview site in advance to understand the environment of the interview site, whether in a professional studio or in daily life and workplace. What about the lights and noise? Whether it is necessary for photographers to step on the spot in the early stage is a problem that must be carefully considered.

As for the previous equipment inspection, the circle is not emphasized here. It is a photographer's basic ethics to ensure that the battery is fully charged.

Enter the live shooting session. According to the interviewee, the photographer has set the hard conditions such as shooting position, lighting and radio station, and confirmed the interview and answer methods with the director (interviewer). One or two pre-shooting drills are needed before shooting, which can not only make the photographer ready and relax, but also allow the photographer to shoot in advance, check whether the equipment is running normally, and then formally start to enter the shooting process.

What I want to remind you here is that as an interviewee, there will inevitably be nervous and unnatural performance in front of the camera. Generally, large-scale shooting teams will have directors or interviewers to give comfort and confidence to the interviewees during the interview, so as to ensure that the whole dialogue process is natural and smooth, while some small production teams often encounter the situation that the cameraman is the interviewer himself. In fact, in any case, the cameraman behind the lens should not be a cold shooting machine.

Especially when the interviewee is nervous, the cameraman should encourage the interviewee from the perspective of the picture. For example, when the interviewer acts naturally, he can nod his head slightly to show his approval, or make a smiling gesture to suggest that the interviewer should smile. These little gestures and micro-expressions of the cameraman are sometimes more effective than the interviewer's direct words of relief, and they are specific drugs that can give the interviewer psychological hints.

The classic three-camera camera is also used to shoot interviews with people. A main camera takes a front middle view of the person. It is particularly important to note that most people don't need to let the interviewee face the camera directly, but let their eyes deviate from the main camera by 30~45 degrees, which is where the interviewer and the host are located.

From this point of view, the characters in the picture are more natural, and with appropriate fill light, the three-dimensional sense of the characters' faces can be better highlighted. Of course, you can also let the characters face the camera directly. This kind of camera will be associated with the announcer, so it is often used in video texts with educational, reminding and warning significance.

The remaining two seats, one is close to the person to give a close-up above the neck, and the other can take a panoramic picture of the host (you can deliberately take pictures of the equipment, lighting, staff, etc. on the spot), as well as the more subtle expressions and actions of the interviewee. In fact, the pictures taken by this kind of "tour machine" are an "important role" to break the boring feeling of conventional interview pictures. Otherwise, simply switching back and forth between the two scenes will definitely make the audience fall asleep.

Close-ups that can be "flavored" can have the following options:

Highlight the eyes, mouth, gestures and other local close-ups of the characters.

Information that suggests identity background, such as clothes, jewelry and even tattoos.

Interview the decorations and props related to the theme on the spot.

Of course, three seats is a bit extravagant for small and medium-sized production teams, but in the case of limited budget, small production teams can still "surprise".

For example, you can shoot two scenes, the middle shot and the close shot, with equipment that can shoot 4k. When you need a close shot, you can cut the 4k picture of the middle shot.

Here's a trick. When editing later, one of the scenes can be reversed horizontally, which will produce the visual effect that the characters face two directions in the middle and close-up pictures.

After filming the whole interview process, the interviewee can relax and tell it again, and take other close-up pictures, panoramic pictures or host pictures with the host position just now for later editing.

In order to present objectivity and authenticity, the cameraman's choice of lens for interviewing people is limited. The 35mm or 50mm fixed-focus lens can present the most natural visual effect of human eyes, and the large aperture of the fixed-focus lens can ensure the shallow depth of field, blur the cluttered background and ensure people's prominence. In order to avoid character distortion, wide-angle lenses are generally not used.

It should be noted here that zoom lens is also a lens type that people use for a long time in interviews. The telephoto lens can keep a certain distance between the camera and the interviewee and reduce the tension of the interviewee. However, a longer focal length will compress the background. For example, at a focal length above 100mm, the background looks like a piece of paper, and the subject and background are completely separated, so the face of the person in the picture looks bigger, and the interviewee with wider face will not.

Circle suggested that, in fact, for interview shooting, high-end SLR plus 24~ 105 zoom lens is enough to meet almost all the needs of people's interview shooting, and it is a highly mobile and cost-effective equipment scheme.

The light-filling scheme of character interview is basically based on the principle of highlighting realism. Therefore, it is not too complicated to fill the light, and the basic three-lamp light distribution method can meet most of the needs.

The so-called "three-light" lighting, a main light is located at about 30 degrees on the oblique side of the figure to brighten the main body, and then a weak auxiliary light is used to enhance the too gloomy shadow. Finally, another auxiliary lamp is used to illuminate the outline of the character from the side and back of the character, so that the character is separated from the background, especially when the background is dark, this "outline lamp" can play the role of making the finishing touch.

Of course, some scenes need artistic lighting to express a special atmosphere. For example, the light source can shine on the background wall through shutters, forming regular shadows in the background picture, which can increase the rhythm of the picture.

Although the broadcast is written at the end, it is the most noteworthy link. For interview pictures, the importance of sound often goes beyond the picture and must be paid attention to.

If you shoot with a professional video camera, you only need to use a professional collar-clip microphone (commonly known as "Little Bee") or a handheld/boom microphone to receive sound.

What I want to talk about here is mainly a low-cost solution based on SLR shooting. If there is such radio equipment, it is certainly beneficial. If there is no such equipment, it is recommended to buy a better quality recording pen. A Japanese tascam recorder is recommended in the circle, and the price of several hundred yuan can basically meet the radio demand of daily interview videos.

Finally, don't forget to record the actual sound of the scene with a SLR for lip-synching later. Here is a little suggestion about turning around. Before each question, give a clap or applause, which is more convenient to align the track of SLR and recorder later and improve the editing efficiency.