The Digital Filmmaking Handbook

The
Digital Filmmaking
Handbook
Fourth Edition
This page intentionally left blank
Sonja Schenk
Ben Long
The
Digital Filmmaking
Handbook
Fourth Edition
Australia, Brazil, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Singapore, Spain, United Kingdom, United States
© 2012 Course Technology, a part of Cengage Learning.
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The Digital Filmmaking Handbook
Fourth Edition
Sonja Schenk and Ben Long
Publisher and General Manager,
Course Technology PTR: Stacy L. Hiquet
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Printed in the United States of America

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 13 12 11
eISBN-10: 1-4354-5912-1
M
any thanks to our editor, Marta Justak, for having the vision to take this book to
the next level and to Judy Littlefield for making it a reality. Thank you to our tech-
nical editor, Ben Nilsson, for offering exceptional expertise and sharing his passion
for filmmaking. And a special thank you to our publisher, Stacy Hiquet, without whom this
book would not exist.
Last, but not least, we’d like to thank the filmmakers who gave us their photos, their video
clips and, most importantly, their stories: Alexandra Komisaruk, Regina Saisi, William
MacCollum, Paquita Parks, and Jason Hampton.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
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S
onja Schenk is a Los Angeles-based writer, director, and producer. As a filmmaker, she
directed the feature-length comedy, The Olivia Experiment, and has written several
screenplays. Her short films have been shown in film festivals and galleries across the
country. Her producing credits include several prominent television series, including
The Bachelor, High School Reunion, and others. She has edited scripted feature films shown
at film festivals such as Sundance and documentaries for European and American television.
She is also the author of an editing handbook, Digital Nonlinear Desktop Editing, and has
contributed many articles on filmmaking and technology to various publications.
B
en Long is a San Francisco-based photographer, videographer, and writer. The author
of over a dozen books on digital photography and digital video, he has been a long-
time contributor to many magazines, including MacWeek, MacUser, MacWorld UK,
and more. He is currently a senior contributing editor for Macworld magazine, a senior
editor at CreativePro.com, and has created several photography instruction courses for Lynda.com.
With experience in every aspect of video production, Long’s video clients have included Global
Business Network, Blue Note Records, and 20th Century Fox. His videos have played around

the world, on Broadway, and up and down the Hudson River accompanied by acclaimed
musician Don Byron. He also dabbles in computer programming, and has written image edit-
ing utilities that are in use in the Smithsonian, the British Museum, and the White House.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
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CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xxiii
Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2
Better, Cheaper, Easier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Who This Book Is For . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
What Kind of Digital Film Should You Make? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Writing and Scheduling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12
Screenwriting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Finding a Story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Writing Visually . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Formatting Your Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Writing for Television . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Writing for “Unscripted” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Writing for Corporate Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Scheduling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Breaking Down a Script. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Choosing a Shooting Order . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
How Much Can You Shoot in a Day? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Production Boards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Scheduling for Unscripted Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
1
2
Contentsx
Digital Video Primer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34

What Is HD? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Components of Digital Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Tracks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Frames . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Scan Lines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Pixels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Audio Tracks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Audio Sampling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Working with Analog or SD Video. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Digital Image Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Color Sampling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Bit Depth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Compression Ratios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Data Rate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Understanding Digital Media Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Digital Video Container Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Codecs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Audio Container Files and Codecs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Transcoding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Acquisition Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Unscientific Answers to Highly Technical Questions. . . . . . . . 58
Choosing a Camera . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .60
Evaluating a Camera . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Image Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Sensors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Compression. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Sharpening . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
White Balance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Image Tweaking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Lenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Lens Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Lens Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
Interchangeable Lenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
4
3
Contents xi
Never Mind the Reasons, How Does It Look? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Camera Features. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Camera Body Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Manual Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
Shutter Speed. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Aperture Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Image Stabilization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Viewfinder. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Media Type. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Wireless . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Batteries and AC Adaptors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
DSLRs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Use Your Director of Photography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Accessorizing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Tripods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Field Monitors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Remote Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Microphones. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Filters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
All That Other Stuff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
What You Should Choose . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Planning Your Shoot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .92
Storyboarding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Shots and Coverage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Camera Angles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Computer-Generated Storyboards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Less Is More . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Camera Diagrams and Shot Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Location Scouting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
5
Contentsxii
Production Design. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
Art Directing Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Building a Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Set Dressing and Props. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
DIY Art Direction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Visual Planning for Documentaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Effects Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Creating Rough Effects Shots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .120
Film-Style Lighting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
The Art of Lighting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Three-Point Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Types of Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Color Temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Types of Lights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Wattage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Controlling the Quality of Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Lighting Gels. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Diffusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Lighting Your Actors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Tutorial: Three-Point Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Interior Lighting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Power Supply . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Mixing Daylight and Interior Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Using Household Lights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Exterior Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Enhancing Existing Daylight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Video Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Low-Light Shooting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Special Lighting Situations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Lighting for Video-to-Film Transfers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Lighting for Blue and Green Screen. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
6
Contents xiii
Using the Camera . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .142
Setting Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Using the Zoom Lens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Controlling the Zoom. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Exposure. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
Aperture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Shutter Speed. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Gain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
Which One to Adjust? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Exposure and Depth of Field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
White Balancing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Headroom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
Lead Your Subject. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
Following Versus Anticipating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Don’t Be Afraid to Get Too Close . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

Listen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Eyelines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Clearing Frame . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Beware of the Stage Line. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
TV Framing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Breaking the Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Camera Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Panning and Tilting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Zooms and Dolly Shots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Tracking Shots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Handholding. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Deciding When to Move . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Shooting Checklist. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
7
Contentsxiv
Production Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .176
What You Want to Record . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Microphones. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
What a Mic Hears . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
How a Mic Hears . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Types of Mics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
Mixing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Connecting It All Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
Wireless Mics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Setting Up. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Placing Your Mics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Getting the Right Sound for the Picture . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
Testing Sound. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
Reference Tone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Managing Your Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

Recording Your Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Room Tone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Run-and-Gun Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Gear Checklist. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
Shooting and Directing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .200
The Shooting Script. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Updating the Shooting Script. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
Directing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
Rehearsals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Managing the Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
Putting Plans into Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
Double-Check Your Camera Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
The Protocol of Shooting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
Respect for Acting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
Organization on the Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
Script Supervising for Scripted Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
Documentary Field Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
8
9
Contents xv
DSLRs and Other Advanced Shooting Situations . . . . . .210
What’s Different with a DSLR? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
DSLR Camera Settings for HD Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Working with Interchangeable Lenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
What Lenses Do I Need? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
How to Get a Shallow Depth of Field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
Measuring and Pulling Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Measuring Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
Pulling Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
Advanced Camera Rigging and Supports. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

Viewing Video on the Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Double-System Audio Recording . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
How to Record Double-System Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Multi-Cam Shooting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
Multi-Cam Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Challenges of Multi-Cam Shoots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Going Tapeless . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
On-set Media Workstations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Media Cards and Workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Organizing Media on the Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Audio Media Workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Shooting Blue-Screen Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Editing Gear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .240
Setting Up a Workstation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
CPU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
RAM. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Monitors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
Videotape Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
Custom Keyboards and Controllers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Backing Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Networked Systems. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Storage Area Networks (SANs) and Network-Attached
Storage (NAS) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Cloud Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Render Farms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
10
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Contentsxvi
Audio Equipment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249

Digital Video Cables and Connectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
FireWire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
HDMI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
SDI and HD-SDI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
Fibre Channel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Thunderbolt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
RS-422. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Audio Interfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Know What You Need . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Editing Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .254
The Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
Editing Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
Drag-and-Drop Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
Three-Point Editing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
JKL Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Insert and Overwrite Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Trimming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Ripple and Roll, Slip and Slide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Multi-Camera Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
Advanced Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260
Organizational Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Importing Media. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Effects and Titles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264
Types of Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264
Titles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266
Audio Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266
Equalization. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
Audio Effects and Filters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
Audio Plug-In Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
Mixing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

OMF Export . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
Finishing Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
Our Software Recommendations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
Know What You Need . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
12
Contents xvii
Preparing to Edit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .270
Organizing Your Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
Create a Naming System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Setting Up Your Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
Importing and Transcoding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
Capturing Tape-based Media. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Logging. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Capturing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
Importing Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
Importing Still Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Moving Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
Sorting Media After Ingest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
How to Sort by Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
Synchronizing Double-System Sound and Picture . . . . . . . . 286
Preparing Multi-Camera Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288
Troubleshooting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288
Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .290
Editing Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
Applied Three-Act Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
Building a Rough Cut . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
Watch Everything . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
Radio Cuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
Master Shot—Style Coverage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
Tutorial: Creating a First Cut . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295

Editing Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
Cutaways and Reaction Shots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
Matching Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
Matching Screen Position . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
Overlapping Edits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
Matching Emotion and Tone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
Pauses and Pull-Ups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
Hard Sound Effects and Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
Tutorial: Refining Your Cut . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
14
13
Contentsxviii
Transitions Between Scenes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311
Hard Cuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311
Dissolves, Fades, and Wipes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311
Establishing Shots. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311
Clearing Frame and Natural “Wipes”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
Solving Technical Problems. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
Missing Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
Temporary Elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
Multi-Cam Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
Fine Cutting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
Editing for Style. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
Duration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
The Big Picture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
Sound Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .316
Sounding Off. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
Setting Up. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318
Temp Mixes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
Audio Levels Metering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320

Clipping and Distortion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Using Your Editing App for Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Dedicated Sound Editing Apps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325
Moving Your Audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327
Editing Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
Unintelligible Dialogue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
Changes in Tone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
Is There Extraneous Noise in the Shot? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
Are There Bad Video Edits That Can Be Reinforced with
Audio? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 330
Is There Bad Audio? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 330
Are There Vocal Problems You Need to Correct? . . . . . . 330
Dialogue Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331
ADR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332
Non-Dialogue Voice Recordings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332
EQ Is Your Friend . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333
Sound Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
Sound Effect Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
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Contents xix
Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
Editing Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
License to Play . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
Finding a Composer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
Do It Yourself . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Fix It in the Mix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 342
Color Correction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .344
Color Correction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 346
Advanced Color Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
Seeing Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350

A Less Scientific Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
Too Much of a Good Thing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354
Brightening Dark Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355
Compensating for Overexposure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 358
Correcting Bad White Balance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360
Matching Footage from Different Cameras and Shoots . . . . . 361
Using Tracks and Layers to Adjust Color . . . . . . . . . . . . 362
Black-and-White Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362
Correcting Color for Film . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
Making Your Video Look Like Film . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
One More Thing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365
Titles and Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .366
Titles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367
Choosing Your Typeface and Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 368
Ordering Your Titles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369
Coloring Your Titles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 370
Placing Your Titles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 370
Safe Titles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371
Tutorial: Create Your Main Title . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 372
Motion Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
Keyframes and Interpolating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377
Slow-Mo and Speed Ramps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
17
16
Integrating Still Images and Video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
Special Effects Workflow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 380
Compositing 101. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 383
Keys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 384
Tutorial: Creating a Luminance Key. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385
Tutorial: Using a Chroma Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 390

Keying Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
Mattes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
Mixing SD and HD Footage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 398
Tutorial: Adding Camera Shake. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401
Using Effects to Fix Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 404
Eliminating Camera Shake . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 404
Getting Rid of Things . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405
Moving On . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409
Finishing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .410
What Do You Need? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 412
Start Early . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 412
What Is Mastering? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413
What to Do Now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414
Preparing for Film Festivals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414
DIY File-Based Masters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 415
Preparing Your Sequence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 415
Color Grading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418
Create a Mix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 419
Make a Textless Master . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 420
Export Your Masters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 420
Watch Your Export . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421
Web Video and Video-on-Demand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422
Streaming or Download? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422
Compressing for the Web . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423
Choosing a Data Rate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425
Choosing a Keyframe Interval . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425
Contentsxx
18
DVD and Blu-Ray Discs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426
DVD and Blu-Ray Compression. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 428

DVD and Blu-Ray Disc Authoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 430
High-End Finishing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
Reel Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432
Preparing for a Professional Audio Mix . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433
Preparing for Professional Color Grading . . . . . . . . . . . . 434
Putting Audio and Video Back Together. . . . . . . . . . . . . 435
Digital Videotape Masters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 435
35mm Film Prints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437
The Film Printing Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438
Printing from a Negative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 438
Direct-to-Print . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
Optical Soundtracks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439
Digital Cinema Masters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 440
Archiving Your Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441
GLOSSARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .443
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .471
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O
nce upon a time, the world of filmmaking was very small and most of it was
contained in one place: Hollywood. In those days before the advent of digital tech-
nology, through trial and error, the studios developed an exceptional workflow
designed to track a massive amount of data without using computers.
Today, thanks to modern technology, there are myriad digital tools available to filmmakers
in the form of hardware and software. And the old studio workflow, while still potentially
valuable, is in need of an upgrade.
In this book, we’ll guide you through the modern digital filmmaking workflow and show you
the tools (and toys) that will make your life easier. We’ll help you navigate the ever-changing
developments of new technology while keeping the big picture in mind: storytelling. Because
despite all the changes since the heyday of Hollywood, the heart of filmmaking remains

unchanged.
What You’ll Find in This Book
This book is organized into three parts, just like a film shoot: preproduction, production, and
postproduction.
Part I: Preproduction Chapters 2 through 5 cover the traditional stage of “pre -
production,” the part of the process during which you make all the decisions necessary
to start shooting: writing, technology basics, planning, scheduling, storyboarding, set
design, and choosing a camera.
Part II: Production Chapters 6 through 10 cover the traditional stage of “production,”
the principal shoot of your project: lighting, using the camera, shooting, and record-
ing production sound, including a special new chapter on shooting with DSLR
cameras.
Part III: Postproduction Chapters 11 through 18 cover the traditional stage of
“postproduction”: workstations and equipment, organizing and media management,
editing, sound design, color correction, titles, special effects, and delivery of the
finished product—everything from streaming video to a digital cinema screening in
a theater.
Finally, although we assume no formal training in video or film production, we might—
on occasion—use film and video production-related terms. You’ll find definitions for these
terms in the glossary. You might be surprised to learn how much you already know about
video production. Watching movies is the best way to learn the visual literacy required of a
good filmmaker, and most people have seen plenty of movies.
INTRODUCTION
xxiv Introduction
Look for the “What to Watch” tips for suggested movies and TV shows to watch along
the way.
Filmmaking is a challenging, exciting, and always instructive process. We wish you the best
of luck in your filmmaking endeavors. Now, it’s time to get started!
WHAT TO WATCH
Rewatch a film you saw recently. Pick a film you saw recently and watch it again. Instead of

paying attention to the story, pay attention to how the film was made. This time, look at how it
is shot, where the camera is, and why. Listen to how music is used (or not used), if there are
any graphics or special effects, and if there are any unusual editing choices. Try to imagine
the creative choices the director made during each phase of filmmaking: preproduction,
production, and post. Now start thinking about your own film in these ways. Remember, when
a film is well made, you won’t see “the strings.” So, to learn from the work of a good filmmaker,
you have to actively observe how the film was constructed.
Companion Web Site Downloads
The tutorial media for this book can be found at the companion Web site: www.thedigital
filmmakinghandbook.com.
The Web site also features blog postings, product reviews, and articles about new digital
filmmaking developments.
In addition, sections of previous editions that feature older technology, such as analog video-
tape, are now available on the Web site.