How To Shoot A Sequence of ANYTHING! Our Go-To Formula + Free Template

so here's the scenario you're out shooting what you have planned isn't really working out you're getting a little bit flustered something more interesting is happening over here that you want to document but you're like not really sure what to do because you plan for this other thing but this thing is better what do you do in comes the seven shot sequence this is like my go-to strategy this is what i lean on when a story or a video isn't quite going the way i want to and i have to pivot on the fly and that oftentimes happens with helicopter videos so i always keep this in my back pocket anytime where i'm feeling a little bit flustered during a shoot and we touched on this in a previous video which i'll link up here but i wanted to dive a little bit deeper on it give you guys a bit of a behind the scenes look on how we shoot something like that a little bit of our thought process talk about the lenses we're using the lighting and some of the music choices thank you musicbed for sponsoring today's video but more about them later shall we yes i'm sweating it's so hot out here it's pretty humid it's so humid [Music] [Applause] [Music] so you just watched some clips from episode one of our helicopter series cold island if you want to check out the series i'll link it up here all of that was shot on the sony a6400 which is an entry-level aps-c camera and i use my seven-shot sequence list to make sure i got enough clips for that sequence so what is a seven-shot sequence i briefly talked about it in a previous video it's a very basic shot list which will help you capture a dynamic sequence for your video and so that looks like this one establishing shot so that could be a wide shot tripod shot drone or aerial shot the shot is to essentially just establish the scene to show location contacts etc then there's two wide slash medium shots and these could go throughout your entire sequence they don't have to be in order these are shots that will show what's happening in your sequence two close-up shots and these will show any interesting details of what you're shooting any cool textures we have one abstract shot so that could be a macro shot a fast panning motion shot something to add a little bit of interest to your video and then the last one is an unexpected shot so that's like a shot that might not be so obvious a little bit more creative you've begged all of the important standard shots now let's get something that's a little bit different a little more artsy if you want a quick reference for this shot list i've kind of outlined all of these things on our blog which i'll link in the description box and i've also included a free download on our website where you can just download a pdf where you can sketch out your seven shot sequence write some notes and this is kind of helpful to bring on set with you in case something kind of doesn't go your way and you're kind of planning on the fly you could take five minutes to look at that little shot list and just kind of fill it in sketch it in and kind of wrap your head around what you're going to be shooting as i mentioned earlier this is a very basic shot list if you need to capture something on the fly this will give you a nice short but dynamic sequence oftentimes when i'm out i'll actually use the seven shot sequence for multiple activities within the same scene so i'm making sure that i shoot a lot of stuff so say for instance the helicopter videos i'll shoot a seven shot sequence of flying so i'll go through that entire shot list and i'll shoot that of flying then i'll do the same thing back at the hanger opening the door cleaning the helicopter that's going to be a seven shot sequence and that's just to make sure that i have enough clips for a full-size video just seven shots alone is going to give you a very short segment but you can double or triple or quadruple that depending on what you're shooting whether it's that way where you're shooting multiple sequences within a scene or feel free to double the shots in one scene so instead of doing one shot maybe you'll do three establishing shots and maybe you'll do a drone shot a time lapse shot and a tripod shot these are all establishing shots but they're all shot differently and they're dynamic so they kind of make your edit look a little bit more interesting going back to the shot list two wide slash medium shots maybe you need four or six wide or medium shots to tell the story but the seven shot sequence is just to get you started if you are in a pinch and you're kind of having a little bit of a moment where you're like oh my god i don't know what to do right now i don't know what to shoot right now rely on the seven shot sequence to kind of get you started and as you're shooting through that shot list you may pick up other shots that you really want to shoot if you do only shoot seven shots for your sequence please make sure that you shoot at least 10 seconds if not more the longer you hold on the clip the more options you have because things obviously are going to change if somebody's doing an activity while you're shooting one clip then you have multiple points in that activity that you can use so your one shot can actually turn into two or three shots the music track that you pick for your sequence is going to help sell the story or the emotion of your edit so the music is just as important as the shots which brings us to today's sponsor thank you musicbed for sponsoring today's video picking the right track will set the stage for your sequence we love browsing musicbed's high quality selection of tracks from talented emerging artists and composers to find songs that help us tell stories their playlists make it super easy to find great tracks i've been really into blues lately so it's been really fun to explore the different vibes within the genre and then adding those to my favorites and projects and then i can easily reference those later when it comes time to editing my sequence in my experience most of the artists actually include an instrumental version of their song as well so no matter if you're editing a cinematic sequence or a narrative video the tracks are super versatile and you can find something that works within your edit free platform you music get a license for every track you download so you're 100 cleared and legal to monetize your youtube channel their custom sync id technology clears everything in the backend so you never miss out on ad revenue and you have a business on the side where you're doing corporate videos or weddings you can actually license single tracks from musicbed as well if you're interested in checking out musicbed link in the description box use the coupon code becky and chris at checkout for a month free of an annual personal subscription big fans of musicbed thank you guys so much for sponsoring today's video so now that we've covered the shot list we've broken down what the seven shot sequence is we've talked a little bit about how important the music track is to selling the story and the vibe of the sequence let's go back to the garage and shoot a new sequence and we're just gonna kind of walk you through how we shoot this new sequence we're back out in the garage we're going to shoot our little seven shot sequence chris is here hello this garage is a disaster zone i kind of wanted to shoot the sequence in a bit of like a gritty naturally lit environment but clearly this shot looks terrible this is what we walked into and oftentimes you'll be out shooting somewhere and you won't necessarily think to try to change your environment if you can for the better i.e lighting so in this instance we're in the garage we're going to kill these overhead lights and just open the garage door because essentially that's going to function like a giant window light or a giant soft box that is so much better already we are going to actually move our setup back a little bit so that the light is nice and even we're going to shoot about right here-ish so for the sequence i want to do like a sexy little boot cleaning sequence now i have done this before i have sexy sexy a sexy boot cleaning sequins i have cleaned my boots on this channel before but they actually do need to be cleaned again so sexy boot cleaning sequins i want it to be a little bit gritty but also relaxing so that's why we've chosen to shoot in the garage today with window light which is one of my favorites natural light from the side to be a little bit dramatic and the garage looks terrible but we're gonna shoot with the 2414 gonna give you sort of a wide field of view but also you can get shallow depth of field with the 1.4 and we'll also shoot with the 90 macro just to kind of give some real close-ups so you can really feel and see the textures of the boots first of all we need to shoot on something so we're gonna just found this palette this was my vote the power the palette so gritty right oh yeah absolutely all right got two saw horses on top of that a piece of plywood on top of that a pallet shims to keep it level it's a sketchy setup what we're using what we have in the garage shitty right what are you gonna do about it okay so we've done a quick little brainstorm session so i'm just gonna read you my brief shot list based on everything i've outlined here you know if you want like a list i actually made a guide on our blog if you want to check it out and a pdf download so you can download the pdf print it off you can even sketch in your little storyboards write it out real quick do it on your ipad whatever link in the description box okay for the establishing shot we're gonna do a wide shot probably walking to the setup the two wide shots and two close-up shots we're kind of going to mix so instead of doing two wide shots right away i'm gonna do a wide shot a close-up shot wide shot at close-up shots we're gonna do some kind of macro focus racking shot of wiping the boots off putting the wax on the boots these will all be hand-held so we'll do an abstract shot i'm gonna leave that up to chris i have just put rubbing the wax on the boots but chris is going to shoot whatever he thinks is cool that's kind of the beauty of the abstract shot whatever your creative mind can come up with do it and then an unexpected shot so i'm thinking like a dirty frame but again i'm going to lean on chris a little bit for that one all right wide shot with a 24 millimeter on the a7s3 this will be our camera of choice today the soundtrack that we choose will be very important in delivering the correct feeling of the sequence so we pick kind of like a chill gritty kind of soundtrack but then also we're going to be recording sound effects in camera while we're shooting because we want to have realistic sounds so don't be afraid to do that we're starting off with the establishing shot which is like a wide shot so i'm just going to walk in and lay my boots on the thing okay so even though i said it was a seven shot sequence oftentimes we will do multiple takes of the shots each shot so we can go to a medium wide shot now i'm going to change the angle here and these shots might change a little bit depending on what chris thinks looks good behind the camera so i might have a close-up of wiping the boots but he might think close-up of brushing is better so we'll leave it up to him we got our close-ups we got our medium shots we need our like abstract shot and our unexpected shot you're shooting activity but you can also shoot like stuff the person is wearing so like if you're shooting with somebody who's wearing like a cool hat or like a cool jacket like those detail shots of stuff can also make for cool like abstract close-up shots this stuff open and put it back down right in the same spot this actually top down shot here would look kind of neat i feel like waterproof sweet gotta take care of your boots [Music] so [Music] so that is how our sequence turned out seven shots will give you a very short sequence it gives you a starting point for something which oftentimes is enough to spark a few more ideas even better if you've picked a track ahead of time because then you can match the vibe of your shots to the track you've picked which is not always possible if you're doing stuff on the fly but if you're able to plan it out ahead of time it's helpful one more thing that's super important when it comes to shooting and editing a cinematic sequence for your videos or doing storytelling through making these sequences is sound design we did record some of the diegetic diegetic diegetic sounds while we were cleaning the boots because it was just easier to record it in camera and then be able to use it in sequence instead of looking for sound effects that may not match up using those diegetic sounds is super important in also delivering the feeling of your sequence so adding sound design will bring your edit to the next level so i just want to give you an example of this so here is the same sequence with just the music with no diegetic sounds [Music] and here is the sequence again with the sound effects and the sounds that we shot during the shoot added back in [Music] the sequence with the diegetic sounds is much better it's much more real it makes you feel like you're there you understand what's happening there's a disconnect when that's not there don't forget to record sounds or add sound design into your edit that's kind of our go-to formula for when we're kind of in a pickle when we're like oh my god i don't know what to say rely on the seven shot sequence double it triple it quadruple it if you need to make sure you get at least 10 to 15 seconds of a good clip that means no weird movements no adjusting shutter speeds or adjusting settings 10 to 15 seconds of a good clean shot okay so we talked about seven shot sequins we broke down the shot list we briefly talked about lighting using natural light changing the lighting in a scenario when you've been thrown into a situation that you haven't planned for especially if you don't have lights think about how you can easily change the environment to your advantage so that your footage looks better we briefly talked about lenses we use the 24 1.4 millimeter on a full-frame camera and the 90 millimeter macro to capture our shots don't let yourself get flustered in front of a client if you feel yourself going in that way just take a couple of minutes to yourself rely on that seven shot sequence double it triple it quadruple it write notes in your phone or you can download the pdf which is in the description box or reference our blog if you forget what these shots are always just keep this in mind when you're dealing with an unexpected story arc or even if you want to just practice shooting something a little bit mundane like cleaning boots thank you musicbed for sponsoring today's video and thank you guys for watching and sticking around i hope you guys found this video helpful we'll catch you in the next one i need water all right trash cans wait wait i got a chimney cricket one sec jiminy cricket tim i need more than that that'll do there's a hair no there's a mark a pencil mark

Channel: Becki and Chris

Views: 99,845

Keywords: beckie and chris, becky and chris, Filmmaking Tutorial for Beginners, filmmaking, How to shoot a video sequence, how to shoot a sequence for your video, b-roll footage, filmmaking tips, learn filmmaking, filmmaking techniques, filmmaking tutorial, cinematic sequence, cinematic sequence tutorial, cinematic sequence video, how to film a cinematic sequence, How To Shoot A Sequence of ANYTHING! Our Go-To Formula + Free Template

Id: VTOC-cLsGA8

Length: 14min 17sec (857 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 16 2021