How the Cameras Use Affects the Overall Production - Essay Example

Analyze How the Camera’s Use Affects the Overall Production One of the most important media production tool is the camera. Film cameras, digital cameras, video cameras, and professional cameras can be use in media production and using any of this require basic and special skills. It captures images, actions, or movements. In depth knowledge and proficient skill in operating a camera is important to produce aesthetic and more meaningful production. Camera operators must read and understand well the instruction manual of a camera before attempting to use it.

Constant camera practice coupled with technical knowledge are key factors in developing the skills needed producing the best picture for media production. It is important that camera operators are highly skilled in operating and controlling the technical devices in a camera and know to focus the lens to obtain the desired shot. They must also know the techniques in taking shots, panning, tilting, zooming, dollying, image framing, and positioning to produce the best pictures. There are different approaches that a camera operator can use in taking shots depending on the type and purpose of a particular media outfit.

For realist, modernist, or formalist aesthetics, differentiation is presented in the skilled application of image depth. Image depth defines spatial continuity. Broad image depth, where there are wide ranges of objects in focus, produced a different perspective from that of a restricted image depth where an object is isolated from the other objects in the scene (Musburger, Kindem 261). Positioning the Camera Camera operators must determine the best position for the desired image. This requires knowledge in framing, distance and movement.

They must identify the objects or actions that must be contain in the camera frame, determine the appropriate distance and angle, and the best placement of the camera in taking a picture. Camera-mounting devices help in controlling camera movement. The “180-degree action-axis rule” should be observed in positioning the camera to produce spatial consistency from one shot to the next shot. Good composition is possible with key knowledge and techniques in framing and positioning components like essential area, look-space, walkspace, and headroom, symmetry and balance (Musburger, Kindem 263).

Type of Shots There are four basic types of shot and each type has a different effect on the message that a particular picture delivers to the audience. For dramatic emphasis, intimacy, or focus on a specific detail, a director may call for a close-up shot which is a “head-and-shoulder” shot of the object. The camera is then zoomed to the character in focus. To show more details of an object, a medium shot is called for. The camera is then placed further from the object to show more details.

In a two-shot, two characters or objects are displayed in a frame to show the audience the “actions and reactions of two characters”. Long shots, full body shot of a character or broad shot of the location is usually called for at the beginning of a media production to establish the context of a setting and introduce characters (Musburger, Kindem 269) Today, camera and lens control can be preset or remotely controlled from a control room. This allows higher efficiency in covering scenes and camera operators can use more than one camera in one media production.

Good combinations of technical knowledge in camera and lens control and practice sessions are key factors in the production of best shots for any media production to effectively capture the interest of a targeted audience. Reference: 1. Musburger, Robert and Kindem, Gorham. Introduction to Media Production: The Path to Digital Media Production. Retrieved 18th May, 2011 from: http://books.google.com.ph/books?id=10KzsPD0xMUC&pg=PA395&lpg=PA395&dq=camera+effect+in+media+production&source=bl&ots=ibqPMmviXN&sig=eUoRXCyG1FvwVvl9XD9FC9YUaTI&hl=en&ei=n23WTb_zCIeEvAOt-