Creating Live Action Motion in Tight Spaces

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Creating Live Action Motion in Tight Spaces

Hi, this is Jay P. Morgan. Today on The Slanted Lens, we’re out here on this great curvy road and we’re going to shoot a fabulous live action motion shot, a panning shot using our Syrp Genie Mini, and also our Matthews car mounts. Let’s get started and see what we can do.

We’ve got Randy here with his fabulous 1966 Chevy pickup. I think I almost bought this truck when I was in high school. I’m not sure any more, but I think I did. I wish I had. But, anyway, what we’re going to illustrate is how you can use your Syrp Genie Mini as a panning motion control device when you’re shooting live action car shots. We’re going to rig this on the side of the car, using our Matthew car mounts. We’re going to do three shots.

Using Matthews Car Mounts with the Genie Mini for Panning

For the first live action shot we’ll start with the camera pointed toward Randy, and then it will slowly pan and look towards the open road. The second shot will have the camera on the side of the car looking down at the wheel. It will pan out and then back into that rolling wheel as the truck drives along the road. We’ll see the double yellow line down the middle of the road. The third and last live action shot will have the camera mounted on the hood as Randy is driving along. We’ll have it pan from Randy out to the open road. Because of the Syrp Genie Mini’s small size, we can get 360 degrees of motion. It allows you to get motion, panning, in very tight spaces. I can put a camera on the side of a car, I can put it on a dashboard, I can put it on the hood. I also love that I can set up the Mini with the app on my phone. I can get my motion as far or as short as I want it to be. I can repeat the motion, so as a person drives away from me I can put my phone in the car with them and the motion goes, and then comes back, goes and comes back. So I just love the ability this Genie Mini has to function as a motion device, allowing me to get those live actions shots.

First Setup

For our first set up we’re going to use a Matthews Magic Riser. We’ve got a six inch cup against the side of the car, and we’re using that Magic Riser to get the camera up high so we can look into the cab and out to the open road. We’ve got two cups on the sides to stabilize it. I’m going to attach my rods to the hot shoe on the top of the camera. This is going to cause a problem, because my Genie Mini is turning. In order to overcome that I’ve taken two rods, put them together, twisted them apart about three turns, grabbed it with a magic clamp above the turn, and hooked it off to a five inch suction cup above. Now the Genie Mini can turn where they come together. This allows it to have motion, but it also stabilizes it on top using that hot shoe attachment. For this first setup, I’ve got a Sony A7Rii with a 15-30mm 2.8 Tamron Lens. I’ve got it at 15 millimeters, I want it as wide as possible, so I can look into the cab of the truck and it pans out and looks down that open road. It’s just a fabulous look. So, let’s take a look at the footage from our first setup. I’ve set my aperture at 22, I’ve pushed my ISO up a little bit, cause I want as much depth of field as possible, because I’m going to really focus shallow on Randy inside the car and I want to be able to carry that focus in the deep, as I see the open road in front of us, so I want a lot of depth of field.

Second Setup

This second shot was really simple, we have a five inch Matthews car mount cup. We set our camera on there, it’s going to pan slightly away from the car, and then I’m going to pan it right back into the car. So, I’ve got my app, I’m going to do about a 70 degree turn, it pans away and then back in. I pointed the camera down, which means it’s pointing on the lefty loosey side of the car mount. I’ve got to do something to keep it from just loosening and dropping towards the ground. So, I took a matthews clamp, clamped it on the side of the mount, put a rod back to another suction cup to keep it from falling forward, and it worked great. So, let’s take a look at our footage from our second setup. I used the same 15 to 30 millimeter lens, but I went in slightly. I was about 20 millimeters on this, so I could be a little tighter on the wheel, but you see it kind of pan away. We see the road, and the yellow line going by, then it pans up into that great logo on the tire and those white walls, it looks just fabulous, it’s a great shot.

Third Setup

For our third setup, we simply put a Matthews car mount on the hood, looking straight back at the drive, it’s going to pan forward to the open road, then back to the driver. Same camera settings, we’re at f/22, at the fiftieth second, and a 180 degree turn, because it goes back and forth. We turned it out, so it’s going to see out into the road, then back to the driver, then back out to the road, and then back to the driver. Those three together make a great mix of shots. You got the road and the tire and the driver and the arm where you were able to see on the one shot, we his arm with the tattoo that says “Hollywood” on it and then we see that same tattoo in the mirror. We set that up so we could see it in the mirror as it pans forward.

So, there’s three different shots using that Syrp Genie Mini, as a motion device for live action video. It’s not about just doing these three setups, but it’s the principle that you could use that Syrp Genie Mini as a motion device in a lot of different places. You can use it on the hood, inside on the dashboard, on the seat. You can use it a lot of different places, it doesn’t have to be on a car mount. It could be on a tripod, it could be on a lot of different ways to rig it. It’s the principle of using it as a motion device when you’re doing live action video. I just love it as a small device you could use it anywhere.

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Join our Facebook group and put some of your pieces up on there, so we can see them, we can talk about how you’re using that Syrp Genie Mini as a motion device for doing live action. Keep those cameras rollin’, keep on clickin’.

-Jay P.