Learning the principles of how to control your night vision camcorder is one of the best things you can do if you want to move up to shooting professional quality video. While there is no doubt that making an above average film or video requires a certain degree of innovation and personal creativity, you won’t get far if you don’t also master the technical skills you need for film making.
The night vision video camera of today is plugged full of ‘automatic’ settings.
Learn to use the basic aperture and shutter speed settings of your camera. By experimenting with the shutter speed you’ll find that you can get some very interesting effects, especially on moving objects. And by changing the aperture, you’ll see the difference that the depth of field makes in how the camera focuses. Interview type videos can be especially unique by using a large aperture opening and a shallow depth of field.
Shoot some video at the different white balance settings if your camera allows it. Many films and videos gain a professional look by intentionally using white balance set to a specific value to give a unique look to the scene. And you’ll want to set the white balance manually if you are shooting video where exact color replication is important.
Learn how to use artificial lighting and supportive infrared lights or infrared floodlights to improve the quality of your video. As we all know, additional lighting can be used to illuminate your main scene, but experiment using it for back lighting or fill light to obtain special effects that you would normally not see. Remember that your infrared video camera will pick up light from outside sources in addition to the light you supply.
Shooting in the dark is challenging to say the least. The more that you use your infrared camcorder, the better you will be able to make sure that you get the shots that you want. Work with changing and setting the controls in the dark. Having a red filter covered flashlight can also help you see what you are doing without making you loose your night vision.
And if you are using natural sound for your video, learn to make the best use of your camera’s microphone and be aware of it’s limitations. If the sound quality is not up to par, consider using external microphones. Testing your microphones and making sure that they work is very important. You don’t want to shoot a great video clip only later to find out that the audio is not acceptable.
Practice makes perfect for any skill set that you need when shooting with a night vision digital video camera. The best way to master the techniques and skills needed is to constantly shoot and critique your own work. Do practice shoots using all the settings of your camcorder at one time or another and try to see how the effects you achieve can be combined or used when making your final film.