Coming into this studio, I look forward to furthering my cinematography knowledge. This week’s class has been a refresher on some of the basics in camera operation, the exposure triangle and cinematic properties such as depth of field. The term ‘coverage’ was not something I am personally familiar with. My initial thoughts on coverage remind me more of capturing sufficient footage, such as B-roll, for the edit. From what I took away this week, coverage meant breaking down a shot into its basic features. The idea of blocking was experimented upon in the first lesson, with the use of a floor plan, the team could accurately see the beginning and end of their movements onscreen. Prior to this class, I was told that T stops are a more accurate measurement of light entering the camera sensor, which is the reason why most Cine lenses are rated in T stops. However, I now understand that the reason why it is more accurate is that it is a measurement of the light after it passes through the glasses in a lens, although the inaccuracies are barely noticeable.

The exercise on the depth of field is a useful one in this industry. The effect of a shallow depth of field – the bokeh that is generated – is commonly associated with cinema. When clients ask me for a cinematic look on their videos, this is often what they want to achieve. The exercise we did in class showed us the extremes, by creating the most and least shallow depth of field possible. In the reading by Tom Reilly, he defines a shot as what is “photographed in between the words action and cut” (2009, p.16). The most interesting part for me was his mention that generally, 2 4/8 of a page is shot in one day. Taking into account the time it takes to set up lights and a camera, directing the actors and breaks, it does not surprise me that the average amount of script covered is 2 4/8 pages.