Shooting films on your phone

Some of the advantages to shooting with your smartphone include:

• You just point and shoot.

• You don’t have to fuss with bulky movie lenses.

• No manual F or T stops to deal with.

• No depth of field or focus headaches.

• No exposure issues.

• No need to lug around a heavy, bulky camera.

• Your phone is always with you — ready to capture that million-to-one encounter or shoot that on-the-spot great idea.

Landscape not Portrait:

The first thing you have to remember is you’re shooting a movie, not a photo, not a selfie, and not something you’re just going to post to Facebook or Instagram. So, you now have to remember to turn your smartphone sideways. This is called landscape mode. The normal way you’re use to holding your phone is profile mode. Note that landscape mode resembles the dimensions of your 16×9 TV. Note also that when you watch YouTube videos or feature films on your smartphone, you turn it sideways for the image to fill the whole screen. If you don’t shoot your movie in landscape mode, you’ll have black bars on each side of the image, and your movie will not fill the entire screen. So, landscape, don’t profile!

Shooting Format and Resolution

Before you start shooting with your smartphone, you need to go into your camera video settings. You will have a choice of resolution quality. Usually the options are 720, 1080 (2K) and 4K. I’m sure that 6K and up will soon be available for your phone. I recommend shooting on 720 or 2K because the quality is awesome and both resolutions are broadcast quality. If you shoot in 4K, you will very quickly eat up a lot of storage space on your phone. In the video settings, you should also have the choice of shooting at 30 frames per second or 24 frames per second. Choose 24fps for a more film-like look. A great smartphone app called Filmic Pro will add even more professional shooting options to your already advanced smartphone.

Another ingenious advancement with the Filmic Pro app, is the ability to use the iPhone Pro 11 to shoot an interview in which both the interviewer and the interviewee are filmed at the same time. The app records footage from both the front and back camera at the same time and creates two separate digital files. So, you don’t have to have two separate cameras to shoot your interview! This unique technology is absolutely a game-changer for the independent filmmaker shooting with an iPhone and the Filmic Pro app!

Story Boarding:

please ensure you have a minimum 3 images planned in your story-board