How to Produce a Stunning 'Hollywood-Style' Real Estate Video With a DSLR Camera

Introduction

One of the key factors in producing a property tour is to make sure everything is in perfectly sharp focus. This might seem an obvious thing to mention, but capturing the details across the full depth of the room can really bring alive the space in a home. This is called a deep depth of field (DOF) and by using a Canon 7D you can produce a property video will almost a 3D type effect.

Aperture (F/stop)

The size of the aperture determines how much of the shot is in focus. The iris of the camera works similar to the human eye - when there is a lot of bright light our pupils contract but they get wider when we are in a darkened room. On the camera we can adjust the iris to be wide-open (low F-stop) or more closed down (high F-stop) - this is called stopping down.

If we open the iris wide open, the focal plane (how much of the image is in focus) is very narrow and we get a shallow depth of field where one part of the mage is razor sharp and the rest of the image is blurred. This is useful when you want to highlight an important feature in a building i.e dado rail profile, fireplace engraving, designer handles, taps,etc.

Closing down the iris, widens the focal plane and brings more of the room into focus.

Hyperfocal distance

This is a complicated and specialised area of film-making that has been used on Hollywood sets for over 70 years. The following is a lay-man's guide to using this technique to get more of your shots in razor sharp focus.

The focal distance is the distance between the camera and what you focus on. This distance can be altered by changing the focus ring on the lens. For example the Tokina 11-16 lens can be rotated between 0.7m to infinity.

One would imagine by changing the focal distance to infinity when shooting an interior room it would produce a deep depth of field with everything in focus but that is not necessarily the case.

As a rule of thumb, when you focus on a subject, the focal plane extends to 2/3 beyond the focal point and only 1/3 before it. So if we focus on infinity at the corner of the room, 2/3 of the focal plane is being wasted beyond that, while only a 1/3 is in focus of the room.

The first thing we need to do is to measure the distance to the subject, in this case from the camera lens to the corner of a living room. A quick way to do this is to use an electronic distance meter (a lot easier than using a tape measure!) They come as either Ultra sound (cheaper but less accurate) or Laser (expensive but more accurate)

We take the measurement from the camera to the furthest corner we want in focus, and divide this length by 3 to give us the hyperfocal distance (HFD). We now set the camera's focal length on the lens not to infinity but to the HFD measurement (feet or metres). By doing this, both the first 1/3 before the focal point and the 2/3 beyond it will all be in focus - i.e the whole room.

The size of the aperture (f/stop) also comes into play here, but for the sake of simplicity and as a first step the 1/3 rule works well. When you reach the stage that you want to be more precise and incorporate the f/stop reading then you need to refer to a hyperfocal distance charts, which works out your HFD based on your focal distance and f-stop - there's also a great free iPhone App that works the distance out for you.

Sharpening

Artificial sharpening of the focussing can also be done in 2 ways and there is two distinct schools of thought on how to do it.

(1) In-camera sharpening - this is a setting in the Canon 7D under the picture profile setting. You have the option to either reduce or increase the sharpness level. Many people turn the sharpening down to 0 because they believe it increases the 'moire' effect, unwanted fuzzyiness on thin horizontal and vertical lines - eg it can often be seen on the thin line of roof tiles.

(2) Post-production - there's a range of sharpening tools that claim to sharpen up your DSLR. X is a great tool for both sharpening and reducing the noise in footage. Only issue with is the long render times. Another quicker solution if you are a Final Cut Pro User is to use the preset sharpen tool that does a decent job without the need to render.

Artificial sharpening is just that, an artificial way to manipulate the original video footage. If its over-used it can look crude and unnatural, its their to make good footage look great not to rectify poorly shot footage.

After first reading this explanation it may seem a daunting task to achieve perfect focus on your DSLR for property videos, but this is the science behind the creativity and with a little practice changing the settings will become natural and intuitive and your videos will have a Hollywood look to them. Check out some examples here - http://showmyhome.tv.

Jon Lindsay is Owner and CEO of ShowMyHome.TV - produces of Hollywood-Style Real Estate Video Tours.

Source: http://ezinearticles.com/6320503

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