hello welders my name is andrew and i'm the cameraman here at well.com lab and today it's
freaky friday since i'm hosting and paul is playing cameraman say hi paul how's it going
why the switcheroo well in today's very special episode i'm going to teach you
all content creators out there how to get a better arc shot for your very own welding videos
arc shots people love them done well they can be both instructive and beautiful
they can also be a formidable challenge sort of like taking a picture of the sun not only are you
trying to see into something that is incredibly bright but something that is usually incredibly
small so either you have to be really close or use a long lens and focus can get pretty tricky
so i've been the camera guy here for a little more than a year and i didn't come to this job from a
welding background some of you who saw those first videos i shot could probably tell anyhow
i quickly figured out if i was gonna keep this gig i'm gonna have to get good at arc shots then again
having a shot of a nice looking finish weld is in many cases more important to the welders i
work with how do i balance the two well i always tell everybody i work with to make
the best weld possible and i'll do my best to capture it getting the right angle and exposure
rarely happens straight out of the gate and for me it's always trial and error and i suspect
it'll be that way for you too but with a little patience and the knowledge i share with you today
you should be able to achieve something you'll be proud to share so here we have some different
gear we can use to capture that hero take let's start with the cell phone great thing about this
is pretty much everyone's got one of these and for most people this is the only camera they'll ever
need it's portable it's convenient and it's full of some fantastic camera tech i have seen some
absolutely lovely welding shots done with iphones like this one here from our very own dr wells
or this one shot on an android by new co-host tyler kayton
the great thing about a cell phone is it can hold focus from very near to very far because of its
small sensor size which is great when you're close up to your subject most cell phones can also shoot
4k which can be very useful in post-production especially if you want to like zoom in a little
more on the shot what are the downsides well it can be mostly automatic which doesn't allow for
a great deal of control when it comes to focus and exposure luckily there are some good apps
out there that can help give that control back to us content creators a big one that the video folks
like to use is filmic pro it gives you all the manual controls you'd expect on a dslr but you
do need to know something about photography and it can be overwhelming for the novice
some welders i know also like to use weld glass from hoods to control exposure again different
processes will need different densities so we'll take trial and error now if you're shooting alone
you can use a tripod or you can mount it any number of ways because this is pretty small
some of our most ingenious hosts have found ways to mount their cell phones on their hoods which
can get you fantastic angles and ensures that the is always pointed at the weld i guess you
really can't stop a fabricator from fabricating all right so let's see how this cell phone works
in a real world application i'm going to use this welding glass and let's see what that brings us
eyeball yeah
yeah that's that's pretty unnatural color just like i said pretty green
and not super clear now let's try it with just the camera's own manual settings this
will let me focus and then bring the exposure all the way down let's see what that brings us
you see that a little bit of noise there but i can quiet that down with some noise
reduction add a little color correction and that actually looks pretty good clear
good color as you can see a bit into the pool so i would say that using the camera's own internal
settings rather than using something like this piece of glass for a cell phone is the way to go
all right time to look at the next option which is an actual camera this one is a canon dslr
which just means digital single lens reflex it's got a viewfinder it's got this handy screen
now with all the used gear that's floating out there because everybody went to a cell phone
you can get this pretty cheap oftentimes less than what that iphone costs what's great about
it is you can go full manual or full automatic you can also use all types of different lenses
now even with all the manual controls it's still going to get pretty bright so to get you down
to get a good puddle shot you can use a welding filter lens or
an nd i like to use camera filters and this here is a variable nd filter which allows
us to have the ability to change the amount of light coming in by just turning this ring
pretty neat these filters can be pricey but i found good ones online for about 25 to 30 dollars
only thing you need to know is your lens thread size which is indicated on the front of the barrel
right here the drawback to a setup like this well it's not multifunctional you can't just put it in
your pocket it's heavier so mounting it can be more difficult it's probably not going to go in
a helmet or on a helmet usually it's positioned on a tripod to the side or behind a welder the issue
with that of course is that eventually whoever is doing that bead is probably gonna get in the
way obscuring your image other than that really beautiful results let me show you how i use this
right so now we're going to shoot with this dslr here and as you can see i'm looking at
my screen and i'm focusing to the center of the weld because i know when i stop down i'll
be able to carry the entire length of it and you see it goes very dark so having your focus and
your shot sized up before shooting because once you get ready to go it's going to be dark until
paul lights this thing up so you see it starts out quite bright so i'm going to take that variable
nd and i'm going to dial it down to right where i start to see the puddle now it's looking nice
but little wide so i'm shooting 4k now i can zoom in get right in there
and now we come to my secret weapon the melt view apex 3 camera from mel tools
as you can see this is much smaller than a dslr and with the mount can attach right to your torch
the big advantage of this of course is that nothing gets between your viewer
and that welds now the melt view apex 3 comes in both color and black and white
the color suits us nicely for the sort of videos we make while the black and white seems to be
for more industrial use the kit comes with two lenses micro lens like this is what is currently
installed on the camera and gives us focus from 6 to 16 inches right out of the box now you can
go even closer if you loosen some set screws on the camera this very focal lens is something that
you might use if you are shooting mig or stick and the kit comes with a great arm here it's
got a magnetic bottom so you can stick it right to your workbench recording happens here on my laptop
using a program called obs studio it's open source absolutely free now the camera is tethered to a
controller that has a menu so that i can manually control all the settings it also go full auto
now besides using the laptop to monitor i do loop through a larger tv so that i can make sure that
my focus is spot on once paul's done aiming up the camera then it's time to really dial in the focus
i like to use the micro printing on american currency just to make sure old hollywood trick
now the unit does come with an led light to help you look at stuff and focus while you're
not arcing off because as you saw i can get pretty dark i choose to use the manual shutter
to adjust myself up and down so paul you ready to get this shot let's get it done all right
so i'm here with our very own paul sableski uh paul's been working with me over this last
little while with the melt tools apex 3 and i know some of you might say well the weight of
this camera on the torch uh might might be awkward or difficult what is your experience with it paul
um at first it is a little bit difficult a little bit uncomfortable but you know the more
you do it the better you get so and it's kind of you kind of get that comfort zone knowing
um you know what it takes to uh make the whale look decent you know or just weld with it but
they come out with that new little bracket there that's a lot lighter so that helped a lot
obviously you don't have to use the bracket you can use the arm with the
magnetic bottom if you want to set this up in a more traditional way like i did the dslr earlier
and that is advised for when you're shooting stick or mig because those can be dirtier processes
throwing off more it's batter it does have a spatter it does have a spatter shields on it the
the camera does and you should always have filters on all your lenses whenever you're
shooting welding video uh you're gonna save yourself a lot of time a lot of money uh
but still you can set it up but what makes this camera special is the ability to ride on the torch
and really get that point of view that a cell phone you're never going to get it that close
and the dslr obviously it's just not going to happen so that's what makes this this unit
really special one of the downsides perhaps is the cost because obviously this is going to cost
more than your cell phone or your dslr so this is really meant for businesses and institutions
obviously if you're making money with your welding and you want to see what kind of
issues that you're having this is a great way to diagnose issues and get everything back on track
very quickly we've had a lot of a lot of fun with it and got some great shots as
a matter of fact many of the shots you've seen throughout this video are taken with this camera
and they're the better ones so obviously well worth the money hopefully this video uh has shown
you how to get a good arc shot no matter what camera you're using if you're watching this video
on our app called weld thank you for being part of the global welding community
if you're not you should check it out so until next time see you on the next one