Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Even if you're the only person in the scene, there are two players at work, you and the
background and choosing the right background can make or break your scene.
When you think of video, most people place the emphasis on the presenter
However after
a very short period of time, the viewers eyes start to wander beyond the person and on to the background
and the last thing you need is to be upstaged by a distracting back drop.
You only need to look on Youtube to see bad backgrounds, and more often than not they
seem to be the rule rather than the exception.
But its not hard to sort out the back ground issue, and if you want to put over a more
professional image, its something you will need address sooner rather than later.
So I have put together a list of 8 different backgrounds that range from the super simple
to the technically complex, that will suite anyone from complete beginner to the seasoned
video maker.
1. The painted wall.
Now this is the of our first backgrounds and it is probably the simplest background you
can come across its basically a white wall, in this case it's the brick wall in my garage
that has been painting white, very simple, very straightforward and is available in almost
every house and building across the land, across the world.
If you don't happen to have a white wall available or a brick wall which could be painted like
this then you could actually just use a large sheet of wood hardboard for example or chip
board, paint it with matte paint and stand it against the wall. You just stand in front
of it and that becomes your background.
Like I say this has been done in a garage so it sounds like echoy and there are cars
going past outside. The brick work shows up, gives it a bit of character, it got that urban,
industrial look about it. But also you will notice that I'm not getting much in the way of any shadows behind,
this is down for lighting and the lighting on white background is important. You need
to like the background almost separately from you.
Now there is limited space here so managed to get in three lights I got my twin strip
light here, another twin strip light here and also an LED light here. The reason for
this is that white video backgrounds tend to look grey if they're not illuminated enough, although
you can tweak the settings in post and you can crank up the contrast and brightness,
you tend to overdo the whole image and then you can end up yourself looking really washed
out or over contrasty when your trying to sort of massage a grey background to become a white
one.
If you light it properly in the first place you don't have that issue. So this is pretty
much it there is a simple straightforward and video background it can be done by anyone, anywhere
almost and is very simple.
The video backgrounds that will follow will become more sophisticated as we go along but basically,
to start off with this is an excellent starting point and gets used the working on a more
professional looking video background. Apple use it, not a brick wall like this but
it is a white background, so it's good enough for Apple, it good enough for you and me.
2. The room background.
Now you may think that this is a bit of a cop out because there isn't a background..
ahhh but there is. What ever is behind the presenter becomes the video background by default.
Now this is where the problems start. Its very easy to have all sorts of distracting
and potentially more interesting items in the background than the presenter. Most of
the time all that is required is a quick tidy up or if you cant do that, try to frame the
shot so that you get the cleanest back ground area behind you.
Another problem comes from the type of camera you are using to shoot the video with. You
see with most consumer grade video cameras and certainly devices like smart phones and tablets
have a very deep depth of field, which means that not only the person is in sharp focus
but everything behind them is too, making it all too easy see.
Here is an example, I have two cameras filming, a Panasonic SD900 consumer camcorder and a
Canon 600D DLSR with a canon 50mm f1.4 lens.
With Panasonic you can see that I'm in focus, but so is most of the background and you can
easily make out the record deck with pens and boxes on it.
now we see the results with the Canon DSLR and the 50mm f1.4 lens, I'm still in focus but the background is almost completely out of focus
been blurred so much that can not make the record deck let alone what is on it
This out of focus background is called BOKEH, and is used in the
TV, film and photography industries all over, in fact it is so common that you probably don't even notice it.
Once you have this mastered this technique of making the background blur out whilst keeping the subject in focus
you can deal with almost any type of distracting background
3. The Pop up Background.
Now we are coming on to one of the most popular type of portable backgrounds that are used
by video makers and photographers alike and that is the Pop up background.
The great thing about these is that not only are they relatively cheap but they are light weight
They have a metal sprung loop around them that stretch's out the creases. They are ideal for when you don't have space for a proper video setup
or if you are out on location
and because they are portable and fold away, it takes just a few seconds to fold them up and put them away ready for the next time
These backgrounds are normally available in black or white or ones like this on which is white
one side and black on the other. They are also available in green or blue for Chroma
key work as well.
The main drawback is that they are not very large, so if you want a longer thin shot or portrait shot but you don't have much room either side
especially if you step further away to reduce shadow you going to step out of the frame easily.
Now you can see it in the landscape format and I have much more lateral movement , I can move from side to side
the only problem here is I have lost a lot of height so you can only real do head and shoulder shots. But that is the nature of the beast, you can have tall and thin or short and wide.
Aside from this, these are a really useful background for all levels of users
and when you need a solid clean back ground but don't have the time or space for something bigger, these are ideal
4. The Stand Background
Now if you find the popup background too limiting and you have the space the you can opt for
the stand based ones. These normally use two stands which then hold
up a telescopic crossbar on which a roll of paper, vinyl or cloth is then draped down
to form the background.
The big advantage of these over the popup ones is the size. Most can be up to 3 meters
(9 feet) wide and up to 2.5 meters 8 feet tall, so you have a lot more room to move
around in or you can have more than one person in the scene at once.
You can get the paper roll backgrounds in many different colours and if it get creased
or torn then all you do is just cut of the offending piece and unroll a new section.
You can also get the rolls in vinyl, which is more hard wearing and can be cleaned. Again
if it gets too bad you can cut off the bad bit and unroll some more.
Finally you can hang cloth like this green screen on the bar, though you need to make
sure that you pull out the creases and wrinkles out with clamps and weights so as to make
the background as smooth and even as possible.
These are ideal for when you have area that you can dedicate to doing you video work in
as they can be a bit of a pain if you have to keep take them up and down on a regular basis.
5. The outdoors background
Filming outside can give you some really interesting backgrounds but it can also present you with some rather
awkward headaches as well.
One of the things is that you can't control what is going on in the background. If look
at the moment I'm standing beside a busy main road, with traffic going backwards and forwards
and people walking around. I can't control that but what I do is control is how much of
the background you actually see.
Depending upon the camera, here I'm using a Panasonic SD900 and virtually everything
is in focus including me and the background, so you see is really quite clearly what going
on.
But if I switch to the Canon 600 DSLR with the 50mm f1.4 lens, you can see it is blurred
out more.
Now this enables you to really focus in on presenter rather than what is going on in the background.
It also give you a more professional image with more cinematic sort of look which a lot of people quite like.
So again when you doing outside you might not necessarily be able to control you background
but what you can control is the amount of detail in the background and how it's going
to affect your shot.
6. Vehicle Backgrounds
Videoing in a vehicle can give you a really interesting shot and in particular the actual
backgrounds can be really nice depending upon where you are shooting and what you're shooting.
The great thing about this is that you've got something like a GoPro Camera which I have here
at the moment it has a wide angle lens, not only can see me and passenger and anything
behind me but it can also see out this screen, that screen, outside the big panoramic windscreen
we got here, basically you see everything and you got an awful lot of extra movement
going on which can be quite interesting.
Another way to do this would be to fit a different camera or use a different camera and mounted
on the side window like this. I'm using my iPhone 5 at the moment which is mounted on
the passenger window here and it's looking at me directly and obviously you're seeing
me and you're seeing what's going on outside my driver side window so now that becomes
my background.
Depending where your driving you can't control what is going on outside so you've got to
be careful if you're shooting into the sun. At the moment the Sun is pointing there so
I'm being lit this way so with that side camera there is actually is ideal.
So there are a few other little things to sort of look out for in respect but otherwise
shooting in a vehicle can give you some really great interesting shots and the background
that go along around it can also be really interesting but you don't want to be too overpowering
on the background and make sure you do concentrate on the person and not too much going on outside.
7. Green or Blue Screen
Now this is not so much a background in its
own right but it is more of a means to an end. Its rather unlikely that you going to
want to stand in front of a vivid green or blue background, but with and bit of video special
effects, your lurid background can be made to disappear and be replaced by pretty much
anything you want.
The thing to note here is that we are moving into the realms of special effects and not
only to you need a good clean smooth solid colour but you will also need good lighting
and the software to do the Chroma key removal of the green or blue background.
Good Chroma key work is a skill that takes time to master, it is one of those things
that looks great when its done right and it looks easy to do, but in practise can be a
real pain in the backside and can take a lot more time, effort and equipment than you may
first realise, you'll need this are to get a realistic results that wont embarrass you.
8. Virtual Background and Virtual Sets / Studios
Now we are coming to the end of our roll call
of backgrounds and these are all only available once you have mastered Chroma key or green
/ blue screen technique we talked before.
Once you can electronically remove the background, a whole new world opens up. The problem here
is that you now have so many options, that can get a little out of hand and you can end
up with a back ground which looks worse than if you had shot it with any of the normal
methods.
You need to exercise caution and make sure that the background you choose is complementary
to the subject matter you are presenting.
Having said that it, something which can work well is an abstract or completely made up
or un-natural background.
And finally we move on to virtual sets or virtual studios. This is where the persons
or presenter is placed in what looks like a real studio, complete with set furniture,
video screens, even a back office with banks of monitors. In reality none of it exists,
the whole scene is a CGI or computer generated image. You can make your video in a room in
your house but it can look like your presenting from a super slick studio that looks just
like you would see on TV.
You can buy pre-made virtual sets to use as your background or a couple of hundred dollars or less or if you are willing to learn
a 3D modelling software package like Cinema 4D or Blender, you
can make your own.
Once you have reached this point you can compete on looks with the TV professionals but at
a fraction of the cost and you don't need a multimillion dollar studio to do you work in.
So that was my brief run down the 8 different types of video backgrounds
and hopefully it covered most eventualities, if you have any suggestions
for backgrounds you have maybe used or questions about the ones I've talked about
Then put them in the comments box below
and if you liked this video please rate and subscribe
better still hop on over to video-alchemy.com and join our newsletter
and if you think some one would find this video useful then please share it with them
Thanks for watching and I'll see you again soon, bye :-)