(upbeat music)
- Hey guys!
Welcome to TravelFeels,
and welcome to another episode of TFF,
TravelFeels Feedback, where I give you guys feedback
on your film and at the same time we're learning something
about filmmaking.
First off, I just wanna say, check out the Placer Cam app.
It's an app that me and my brother made.
It's really good for making text for Instagram stories.
That's really what we built it for.
It's just a way to differentiate yourself
and just take your Instagram stories way above
everybody else's.
Because it's something that most people aren't
doing right now.
So you can make these really cool 3D text,
right in the app.
You don't have to use an sort of After Effects
or any other programs to get these cool track text.
So check out Placer Cam, and if you guys haven't
check out the Cine LUTS, the presets for your videos,
or the Lightroom presets I put out maybe a month or two ago.
They're just a really good way to improve your videos
and your photos and at the same time,
I like using other people's LUTs and presets
because I learn something.
I see what they're doing to manipulate the image
and I don't know if you guys know,
but I also have some courses.
One's on wedding videography.
It just goes through the whole process
of making a cinematic epic wedding film.
We used to do a bunch of those with my brother.
And actually this weekend is gonna be a momentous occasion.
I'm gonna be vlogging a little bit.
I'll tell you guys about that later.
There's also one on the business side of filmmaking,
how to earn money with filmmaking,
and a really comprehensive course on color grading.
Color grading is super-important,
so I made a whole course on just color grading.
You can find those courses down below.
Alright so for this episode of TFF,
we're actually gonna be looking at light.
And one of the big rookie mistakes
that a lot of people do is just using bad light.
And now you might be saying, I don't use any light
for my travel films.
I just go and travel.
I don't have any lights.
But you're still using lights.
You're using the sun or whatever ambient light,
weather it's the Tungsten lights indoors
or a candle, or a fire, you're using some sort of light
to light your films.
You're using natural light.
And one of the biggest secrets, it's not even a secret,
but people just don't do it,
is to film at the best time of day.
And that's gonna be sunrise or sunset.
And I've said it before, but people just don't listen.
But I guarantee you, that if you film most of your footage
during sunrise or sunset, or close too those times,
you're video's gonna be a hundred times better
because the light is just gonna be so much better.
It makes all your footage look way more cinematic,
and just way more interesting.
And not to mention it's just not as harsh,
so it just looks way better on your characters,
whoever's in your videos.
Everything just looks better.
And some reasons for that are first off, the colors.
The colors during sunset or sunrise are just so much nicer.
All the oranges and the reds, and all those colors,
just pop at sunrise or sunset.
So you really get way better colors in your films.
And number two, the light isn't as harsh,
so when your filming people, if you have midday sun,
you get, you know, those raccoon eyes, black shadows
in the eyes, and just it's really harsh and gross
on the people.
But at sunset or sunrise the light is gonna be much more
soft and just pleasing to the eye,
especially when you're filming people.
And then number three, which is something
that most people don't think about,
is the fact that the light comes from the side
and not from the top.
That makes for really interesting shots
where you have light on one side of the face
and then shadow on the other side and that's something
you can't do during midday.
The light's just coming from all over.
It's bouncing all over, and it's really coming heavy
from up top, and also you're just gonna get really cool
lens flares when the sun's coming from the side,
and not from the top, because it's gonna be
in the background all the time.
You can use trees or something in the foreground,
to kind of go in and out of the sun
and it just looks really cool.
And the first video's Norway's summer road trip,
ad it's by Conrad Zecina, De-china, Dey-see-zick?
I don't know how to say this last name.
But it's a video from glorious Norway.
I live Norway, it's one of my favorite countries
in the world, so I had to choose this video to review.
But it's also a really cool video.
It's maybe not quite my style, the music choice
and that kind of stuff.
It's not what I would choose, but I respect this video.
There's a lot of really cool shots,
and I like that it's a character driven video.
You see this couple, the girl traveling around,
going on the turn, all these different things.
It really adds to the story
to have a character-driven video
where you see these same characters throughout the video,
and not just once in a while sprinkled sporadically.
But the one thing that you could have done
way better in this video, is to just shoot some stuff
at sunrise or sunset.
I don't think any of these shots
were filmed during those times.
I think pretty much everything is midday.
It's really harsh and it's not the optimal lighting.
So if you would have just taken the time
to shoot some stuff at sunset,
you would have gotten so much better footage,
especially in a place like Norway.
All you gotta do is go to one of the fjords up top,
and you just get these epic sunsets.
It looks amazing from up there.
So a super-easy way to just make this film way better,
is to just shoot some sunset stuff.
Easy, it doesn't actually take that much,
but it'll make it way better.
But I do appreciate this video.
It's a really cool one.
Thanks for submitting this video and keep making
your films better.
Next, we're taking a look at exploring Germany
with Matt Wild.
This is a really cool film.
I liked a lot of the visuals.
I long the song choice and I even like the voiceover,
although the voiceover is a bit overused.
I've just seen it in so many different videos that,
that kind of takes away from it.
But if this was the first time that I heard that voiceover,
I would think that this is a really sweet video,
and I would like the storytelling in it.
I like shoots like this one, and I really like
the editing and the pacing of the video.
It just kept my interests going.
I would say that the sound effects levels
are a little bit too high.
They're a little bit distracting.
You never want your sound designer sound effects
to be too high, because that's just kind of makes them
fake sounding almost.
You don't wanna be distracted by them.
You wanna hear them, but they should kind of just be
in the background, just adding to the video,
and not distracting the viewer.
Also, I would say cut out these transitions.
I don't think they actually add anything to this video.
Again, I think they're actually a bit distracting.
I would have rather seen just straight cuts,
and none of these transitions.
But again, we have the same thing.
I have a lot of these shots would be so much better
if you just filmed at sunset or sunrise.
The lighting is super-harsh on a lot of these clips.
For example, this one, it would just look,
a hundred times better if it was a little bit softer light.
Now you're getting this really harsh light
on the arm and then the face is kind of in the shadows,
and it just doesn't look that good.
It's a really cool shot.
I like it, but the lighting isn't very good.
And one thing you can do, is if you have to shoot at midday,
when the light is really bad, find some shade.
Especially when you're filming characters.
Put 'em in the shade, and it's gonna be a lot more
flattering, the light's gonna be a lot nicer
and softer versus putting them in direct sunlight.
Especially, when it's half and half.
You never wanna go half in the sunlight
and half in the shadow unless you're using it
in a really cool creative way.
But it's really hard to make it look really good,
especially in videos, just because the dynamic range
isn't that good.
Also I would say, if you have to be out in the sun,
use it as a backlight.
Don't use it in the face of the characters.
Usually, that looks a little bit better.
But a really cool video, a lot of good stuff
in this one, guys go check it out.
And then our pick of the day is called Travel Sri Lanka,
and it's by Alice Daperkis, and right away,
look at that light.
The light is super-nice on these shots a
and it just makes them look so much better.
Imagine if these shots were filmed at midday.
It just wouldn't look good at all.
I don't think this is quite sunrise or sunset.
I'm guessing it's closer to sunset,
but it still looks way better, just because the sun
is lower down and it's a little bit softer
than it would be a midday.
It makes a huge difference.
I can't stress this enough.
There's also a lot of really cool shots in this,
like these temple ritual shots.
I really like again, the use of natural light,
using these candles to light the people's faces.
It just looks really cool, and dramatic.
My constructive feedback for this film
would be that the intro's a little bit abrupt.
I think you should have had some establishing shots,
getting the mind prepared that we're in Sri Lanka,
just giving us a little bit of context
and then going into those shots of the character.
And then that's my second criticism is that there's
really cool shots of the character in the beginning,
but then we don't really see the character
enough in the film.
I would have much rather seen the character
throughout the video.
You know, seeing that same girl in the temple ritual area
with the candles, making walking through there,
and in the train and all these different spots,
seeing that some character, but we're just not seeing
enough of that, and that's whey I think that this video
is just lacking a little bit of story.
But I do like the use of the the natural light.
Again, at the end, we're using sunset
to just get really nice shots
and these shots just wouldn't
be very good, at all, if it was filmed at midday.
They're not necessarily the best composed
or the craziest shots, but because of the fact
that they're are filmed at sunset, it looks really nice.
So great work on this film.
Great use of natural light, and this is why
it's my pick of the day.
I don't know if you were doing it consciously,
but keep filming at sunset.
It's gonna make your films so much better.
So next time you're out traveling and you're making
films, make a conscious decision
to film at sunrise and sunset.
I know it's gonna take a little bit more work,
and a little bit more effort to actually go out
during those times.
A lot of times it's not convenient.
You don't wanna wake up that early or you're hungry
and you wanna go eat, and so you miss sunset,
but it really helps to take the effort
and film at those times.
And that's really one of those, big, big things
that separates the pros from the beginners.
If you're not filming at sunrise and sunset,
you're videos are never gonna be as good as
the really pro guys who just have amazing videos.
It doesn't cost you anything.
It's free lighting.
It just takes a little bit of planning,
but it's gonna make your videos,
I'd say, 10, a hundred times better,
if you just film at the right time of day.
Alright, that's it for today.
If you wanna submit your videos, make sure to do it
on Twitter, follow me on Twitter, tag me
and use the hasHtag #TFEEDBACK.
If you like this video, hit that like button,
subscribe to the channel,
and guys enjoy the filmmaking process,
and so get some of those TravelFeels!
(upbeat music)