50 Quick, Digestible Tips to Improve Your Filmmaking [RF Video of the Week]

August 7, 2015

By Laura Brauer

There’s an inevitable realization in every learning process: the more you learn, the more you realize how much more there is to learn. This is where some creatives throw in the towel and call off their ventures, while others use it as motivation to push through and pick up as many tips as possible.

Filmmaker Simon Cade, who maintains his own how-to blog called DSLRguide, made a nice video recently that’s packed with 50 tips covering the bases of sound, cinematography, business as well as general, inspiration-based advice on working as a filmmaker.

It sounds like a lot of tips, but Cade cycles through them fairly quickly and efficiently. Here are some highlights:

1. Use a rubberband to help you with smoother pans and tilts (you can see how it’s done in the video).
2. Microphones, in general, should be held roughly 8 inches away from the source of sound.
3. Label all of your cables and cords so you don’t go crazy.
4. On-screen text should be smaller than you think.
5. Read books to practice the process of translating words on a page into scenes in your mind.

So get out a pen and paper, filmmakers, and listen up.

Check out more Videos of the Week, and email Libby Peterson with submissions.