Video Communication-More Valuable Than Words Alone
By Internet Video Gal on May 15, 2007 in Story-Telling, Video Production Tips
How many words is your video worth?
Visual communication’s most important component is pictures. A good picture is worth a thousand words, right? So it follows that in the very best videos, each shot is worth a thousand words. You might have sixty shots in a fast-paced :30 commercial. Pull out the calculator.
60 shots x 1,000 words = 60,000 words in :30 seconds.
That's a heckuva lot of words in half a minute!
That's the power of video.
No narrator could read 60,000 words in :30 seconds, but amazingly, viewers can assimilate it. Visual communication is one of the most instantaneous and complete form of communication there is.
Visuals for video come in a wide array of different forms. No doubt you've heard the terms: wide-shot, medium-shot and close-up. These are common descriptions for video shots that help crew members communicate with each other about how they will go about telling their story.
Wide-shots- Wide-shots establish your setting and are generally the first shot in a sequence. Wide-shots are important, but beginners overuse them. Wide-shots are usually kept to a minimum because they really don't say much to your viewer other than:
- "we are here in the airplane,"
- "the house is located in the mountains,"
- "the interstate is suffering a traffic jam."
This is important information but your story should be told with details and details need close-ups. With a wide shot, your viewer has a lot to look at. Don't ever make a viewer hunt through a wide shot to see the details; only use wide shots when you want you viewer to consider the big picture.
Universal Newbie Mistake
Here's my theory on why beginners overuse wide-shots so much. (And this is definitely a universal newbie mistake.) When you look around with your eyes, everything is a wide shot. So inexperienced video producers assume their job is to capture on video what they see with their eyes.
WRONG!
Their job is to convey information to the viewer. Remember, your brain and your eyes work together to "zoom in" on details when you go through life seeing wide-shots. As I stare out my window at the house across the street, I can focus in on the doorknob if I want to and the street, the trees and the rest of the house can be easily ignored. Not so with video; the doorknob would be completely lost in a wide shot. As a video producer, it's up to you to show the doorknob in a close-up if that's what you want the viewer to think about.
Wide-shot is commonly abbreviated as WS. You might also see EWS which stands for extreme wide-shot. You will also see MWS, which stands for medium wide-shot. TV alphabet soup!
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