Transcription
Today I'm going to share how to film a basketball game like a pro. I'm going to share positioning, shooting angles, frame rates, focal length, gear. Also, I'll be sharing my biggest tip for filmers making social media videos. So let's get right into it.
As you can see, I have my board laid out and ready to go. And the first step is when I get to the gym, I need to find a place to put my bag. Ideally, I will put it behind the team's bench over here, or sometimes I'll have to keep it on me. When you start filming higher-level games, they're going to have a whole media room or media section in the stands that you can put your things. But for high school and some college levels, it really doesn't matter where you put your bag. You just want it in an accessible location that you can quickly access to get your gear, swap cards, get more batteries, offload footage, all of that.
And once I find a place to put my bag, it is now time to start filming the warm-ups. And so, just a quick note on gear, we're going to get more into this later, but I shoot on a Canon C70. During warm-ups, I like to keep my 16 to 35 wide-angle lens on and get really close to the players. These super wide, intimate angles create much more engaging shots for the audience, and there's a much more unique perspective as compared to what people are used to seeing. So I like to normally come onto the baseline right around here. The warm-up lines are normally like this, and as the players are coming in, I'll get really low. And then as like they're, say, they're going up for a dunk, I'll kind of orbit around and get a low angle, kind of orbit shot of the dunk. That's just one shot I love to get a lot.
But overall, warm-ups is really just a time to get creative. So get low angle shots, high angle shots, extreme close-ups, movement. Maybe use a gimbal, mess with in-camera transitions like whip pans. In my opinion, warm-up shots is where you can really set yourself apart. You don't have the same freedom during the game that you do in warm-ups. So this is when you can work on your cinematography and getting creative shots. However, you need to think about the framing of your shot. The biggest shift in my content came when I started thinking like a cinematographer and not a videographer. This means I'm much more conscious of the framing and especially the background of each shot. I'm not just pointing my camera at the action. I am crafting the image that I want in my brain.
Normally, this means creating the most depth. So let's look at this situation. If the player is here, say shooting, and this is a wall here, and then this is another wall. What I want to do is get right around here and get as close to him as possible. This is going to make him in focus and the entire background out of focus. That is much more engaging than say, if I was here and the wall is right here. He's not going to stand out from that, and there is no depth in that image. The other thing you can do is get extremely low, which is what I like to do, and that will make the ceiling the background as opposed to just the court or the wall. And this is a further away thing that is more out of focus and is also often more visually engaging than the other wall. Normally, they are dark or with cool lights and just make for a more interesting background. And you can also set your camera to a low aperture to ensure that there is a blurry image in the background.
And during warm-ups is when you also want to be thinking about your objective. So if you're shooting for one player, make sure you get a ton of different angles of him, close-ups, low angles, orbit shots, movement, all of that. However, if you're shooting for an entire team, this is when you want to make sure you get shots of each individual player. Sometimes some players don't play well in a game, so you won't necessarily be able to include their highlights in the video. But if your client wants you to include everybody, warm-ups is a great time to get shots of people. So b-roll shots of dunks, shooting, stretching, huddles, everything you can capture to create a more engaging edit with the objectives you need.
And then the other thing is hype clips. So players like yelling, getting hyped up, um, when the team kind of like comes in and then everyone jumps when they dunk, or the coach speaking, and then the huddle. These are the most valuable clips you can have because it can take an edit from just a highlight tape to a true kind of masterpiece that evokes an emotion in the audience. And then this is where the last kind of key thing about warm-ups comes in is capturing sound bites. The warm-ups is when you can get the coaches speaking or other players speaking. This can really help separate your videos as well from the ones that only have kind of music as the background.
And lastly, in terms of frame rate for warm-ups, I normally alternate between 24 frames per second and 60. At 120 frames per second, I like to get slow-motion clips of dunks and other things. Like I said, however, when someone is talking, I will shoot in 24 frames per second because I know I will be playing that back at full speed. So throughout warm-ups, you're going to move around, get as many angles as possible, switch up your frame rate, and try to capture emotion and good sound bites.
Now let's get into the game action. So the very first thing you need to do is figure out if you are shooting for one team or both teams. This will drastically change how you position on the court. So I'm going to cover both, and we're going to start with shooting shooting for one team. So when possible, you always want the action coming towards you. It looks really bad shooting from the back and having everything go away from you. There's no intimacy, and it's just not as engaging as having it coming towards you. Sometimes you cannot control where you're positioning yourself. Say, at the college or pro level, they will often assign you to a seat. But if you're filming the high school or AAU level, like many of you guys are, um, you are free to move pretty much anywhere you want. So you always want the action coming towards your camera in most cases.
If this is the offense of the team you're filming coming this direction, you'll want to be anywhere on this baseline, 'cause then, as you can see, if they're making a move, I'm right here and everything is coming towards me. The downside is I will not be getting great clips of defense. But let's be real, most of our highlights are coming from offense anyway. In an ideal world, you'd be able to move around the baseline as much as possible, but with referees and crowd and other filmers, that always isn't possible. So when I can, I really try to position myself as close to this corner as possible. I found that this has worked best for me because the refs tend to stick here, and if I'm in any of these situations, I've had ref block dunks and even gamewinners before. So I've kind of learned my lesson there. So I try to stick to this corner, and I found that I can really capture everything really well, except for some of these corner threes. But that is a trade-off I'm willing to give.
I normally shoot with my 24 to 70 lens from this baseline. I find that that is wide enough to capture everything while also tight enough to get tight up angles and some defensive clips. And I love to sit down here, not stand up, because I found, like I said before, that the ceiling of the arena is a more interesting background than just the stands. Um, I think the low angles, like I said in the last video, give the players more aura and just look more powerful on film. And then the other benefit about shooting in the corner here is that if this is the bench you're filming, you can get good reactions of the coach and the players, um, while also being able to capture all of the action.
And then second, in terms of positioning, you're going to want to change where you shoot from. So like I said, this is the best position to be in, but you don't want to be there the entire game. This can just be the majority of your shots. So say I shoot this for the first and second quarter, then for the third quarter, I'll go roam around. So I'll get up in the stands, shoot a high angle shots, come over here, maybe try to get some defensive ISO shots, um, and maybe some from this angle. And then I'll come back here and get those most important shots in the fourth quarter. This is going to give you great coverage and make for a much more engaging edit because it's hard to edit a good video with the same angle over and over and over again. You really want to be switching up where you're coming from, and it's just going to make the video flow much better.
All right, so that's that's the basic idea for positioning in terms of one team. But two teams is where it gets a little bit trickier. I really try to avoid shooting for two teams when I can. U most times I just get hired by one team. But in the situations where I do need to film both, say for like an event or a tournament, this means I'm going to have to position myself in the middle. This is really not ideal because it's too close to a broadcast angle in my opinion, and it just is not as cinematic as having the action coming towards me every time. But being in the middle is the most practical for capturing all of the action, which is at the end of the day, the most important thing. I'll move around a little bit, get high up in the stands with my 70 to 200 just to switch it up. But most of my time would be spent here with my 70 to 200, and I would be able to get the offense on both sides and defense on both sides. But again, this is not ideal. So try to avoid doing this. So try to avoid doing this if you can. Obviously, it's unavoidable if you're hired by a tournament, um, but I really just think it's a better video if you're only shooting for one team.
All right, so let's talk about gear. So like I said before, I use the Canon C70. While I'm on the baseline, I use my 24 to 70 exclusively. And then when I'm at the midcourt or high in the stands, I use my 70 to 200. These lenses are great because they're f2.8, which I found very helpful in dark gyms. Um, that extra stop of light while also creating more depth in the image has been very helpful. And then that's the main gear. A couple other things you can consider buying that I think are helpful are a shotgun mic to pick up good audio, an external monitor to just view your image better, and then maybe a rail system with a V-mount battery. This will just allow for your camera to last much longer. Um, but besides that, all you really need is a camera and a lens. If you're watching this without a camera and a lens yet, I think if your main goal is to film basketball, your best bet is a mirrorless camera. Any of them nowadays are good. Um, the A6400, the Canon EOS R, the R7, the A73, anything is good. Um, but I would pair that with a 24 to 70 or a 24 to 105 if your main goal is basketball.
So now that we've talked about gear and positioning, I'm just going to share a couple general tips for filming basketball. So first up is to always shoot handheld. Basketball courts are often too cramped to bring a high hat or a tripod, and I found that a gimbal is impractical for game use. Plus the fact that I'm normally sitting down with a wider angle lens means that my footage is much more stable, and I'm able to maneuver it and move around much easier. And then with this comes the second tip, which is to utilize three points of contact. So if I'm filming with my camera, I'll normally have it pressed up against my chest, which is much more stable than having it out here with just my hands, or what people do is put a strap around their neck and then they can push against that as a third point of contact, also creating more stable footage. So whatever works best for you, it is just a generally good idea to have three points of contact.
And then third, some of you guys are not going to like this, but use manual focus. This is a little less important for those of you who use Sony with their super fast autofocus. But for someone like me who uses a cinema camera, um, manual focus is a necessity. I just have so much more control over the image, and if someone were to walk in front, like a ref often does, it would not start hunting. It definitely takes some practice to get used to it, but in the long run, this will help you guys so much.
All right, and then fourth is shoot log. So this one's a little controversial. Some people say that when you're shooting in a low light environment, to not shoot log. In my opinion, I just have so much more room to maneuver when I'm editing and color grading, and I think the final product just looks a lot better. I know shooting in log can be a little intimidating, so I made this video. Um, you guys can go check out on four steps to start shooting in log that I think lays out really nicely how to ease into shooting and log. It's really not as hard as it seems.
And finally, here is my biggest tip tip for filmers shooting for social media. And I used to be a huge culprit of this, and I see videos all the time that still do this, and that is to not shoot too tight. There's a couple reasons for this. First, shooting wider allows for easier tracking of action and make sure that everything is in frame. And then the second thing that I never considered when I was shooting is that most of the time I'm cropping my videos to be 4x5 for social media. So if I shoot with my 70 to 200 and it looks good horizontally framed, but then I have to crop that in that much, it looks terrible. So my biggest tip I can give to you guys is to shoot wider than you think you need.
So I'm going to share a quick shot list with you guys of stuff you need to ensure that you get. First up is of course all the highlights as possible. You're going to want to switch angles, switch frame rates, switch focal lengths, and just get as many different angles of these highlights as possible. Next, you want to get any emotion clips. So like I said during warm-ups, this is the coach talking, the players getting hyped up, players' reactions to the shots. And then one that people overlook is fans' reactions. This is a great way to incorporate other materials into the video that is not just highlights and players. Next, just experiment with unique compositions. So get low angle shots, wide angle shots, high angle shots, tight close-ups, all of the above. And then finally, just capture good sound bites to use in the edit. This can set you apart from just a highlight video with music. Getting the coach talking, players talking, fans' reactions, all of this is super vital, and you should definitely have this on your shot list.
So this brings us to post-game. What you do here obviously is determined by if your team wins or loses. If they lose, I normally just bounce and I don't really film anything. Maybe I'll get some like, kind of like disappointment shots if I'm filming a longer project for them, but most times I just kind of get out of there. However, if they win, I will normally film handshake lines and then the coach speech. After they normally get in a huddle of some sorts. If you have locker room access, that's great to get in there. But if not, just try to capture as much player reaction clips as possible. This is a great way to close out the edit while also having more emotion clips that can add context to your edit. These are some of my favorite shots because they help share the emotion of the game.
So after this, then you're done. Get home and start editing. Speaking of which, I made a full video on my editing workflow. You guys can check out here. Thank you guys for watching. I hope this helped. Please consider subscribing and let me know if there's anything else you want to see in the comments.