JPG Magazine: Stories: How To: ...from Photo to Movie

How To

...from Photo to Movie

By Jogintas Visockas

7 May 2008

Want to become famous? Dream of getting a role in one of those Hollywood blockbusters? And what are you doing to make your dream come true? Come on! Here is the "how to" for becoming an actor in your own movie, with your own scenarios and backgrounds.

Ok, so straight to the deal how to make a photographic movie, without making a movie. No need to panic – you do not need an expensive camcorder for that. Even more, you do not need a camcorder at all! Use your own photographic camera, the one you love and always keep with you in all those fantastic places you visit (from now on, count them as the place for your acting).

The idea is very simple, but still not very popular, so you have a great chance to make gold out of the mud. If you have a DSLR camera, it surely must have a burst (it can be called different in your camera) function, the one that allows several shots in a row. If you can, make the pauses between the shots as short as possible, but if your burst mode let's you shoot only some shots (like 4 or 8), than you can make the pause between the shots longer.

Ok, so mister Brad or miss Angelina, please choose your favorite position for the scene. Use the place where you have no big obstacles, because you will have to move quiet quickly and that is why you do not need anything, that can cause your injuries or the "black eye" effect. Let's say the backyard of your house, big stadium or empty street are the best options. Then after choosing your acting position (let's call it the START), go straight onto the other side of it, where the camera man should be. Find a chair, box, trash bin or even the tripod for placing your camera. Put it onto an object pointing towards the START position and allow your camera use the continuous focus for the center (in that mode your camera changes the focus depending on the moving central object's distance from the camera). Now here is the least interesting part of asking you about the remote control... Well, do you have it? If not, ask someone else to press the button and keep it pressed till the end, so that the burst mode would be active. If you have the remote control, you can do it on your own and create secret surprise movies without anyone knowing you are a great actor! Ok, so take your remote control and go to the START position.

Think of some really interesting movements, like bird shapes, jumping into air, doing some workout, running in one place or running towards the camera, which I just adore. The movements should place your body and your body parts into different positions every little piece of the second, so standing and singing does not count here. That is why I have used the example of running towards the camera. This is not only interesting, but can make the photos so stupid or funny, that you will laugh of yourself for some days. Ok, so if you like my example, do it like that: when you re ready, start running straight towards the camera while pressing the shoot-button (keep pressing it to enable several shots in a row, the burst thing). If you haven't got the remote control, ask someone else to press the button for you (just make sure he or she presses it all the time of your "acting").

After the shooting is done, viewing such photos in a fast way or just by using the screen saver with the least amount of time for the pause (the same with the slide shows) let's you experience the wonderful movie, where the main actor is You, and You are running towards You in a very fast speed! Be creative and funny while running or performing other movements, because the final result can become a real comedy or tragedy for you and your friends. And with some software you can make those shots into small movies and use them in your homepages or just as an icon to your photo portfolio.

P.S.

This works well with analogue cameras as well - lomographic cameras with multilenses, like Actionsampler, Supersampler, Oktomat and POP9, do produce a single image on one analogue film frame, but do end with 4, 8 or 9 shots. In order to make movies of such material, lomographic shots need to be cut into smaller pictures (divided into single pictures).

Report a Problem

VOTE: Should this story be published in JPG?