The Socialize Podcast

Helen: 00:00

Welcome to the Socialize Strategy. Happy Friday. Another week has zoomed by. Okay. Let's kick it off with the unsponsored by segment because I have been thinking about what items I like to focus on for this this segment and I like to think of things that I do use often.

Helen: 00:18

So every time, I'm gonna try and focus on something that is in my life every day that I connect with every day. Because I think those things are where we should be investing. That's where we should invest our finances, really, in the quality things that we touch and use every day. And also, those are the things I feel that I should share because if I'm using them every day, it might be missing from your life. So the first one is beyond basic.

Helen: 00:42

I rest my head on my pillow every single night on linen sheets. I'm bringing the prop up into the frame if you're watching. So this is my pillowcase. For years, I have been a believer in silky, like, sateen type sheets, and that's what always what I bought, or 100% cotton or whatever. That's always what it's been.

Helen: 01:03

And then Julie, once again, had influenced me. That seems to be a theme. But she told me about linen sheets, and she said you really gotta try them. Once you do, it's like you can't go back. And she's so right.

Helen: 01:15

It has been game changing. I use the brand Parachute. They now have an actual shop a few blocks from my apartment, which is exciting. So if I need pillowcases, can just run over there and get them. But what I really will say, a couple of things, especially to my menopause ladies.

Helen: 01:30

It's much more cooling to sleep on linen than any other fabric in my opinion. And I think I think there's some fact behind that as well. Because that's why linen clothes are popular in the summer. They breathe more. It's the same thing with linen sheets.

Helen: 01:44

And I've always been that person that needs, like, silky for the pillowcases so it doesn't mess up my hair or whatever, like smooth. And since using linen, I almost can't sleep on anything else now. When I go to a hotel, I obviously they don't have linen sheets, so I'm dealing with it. But I always get so happy when I get to come home back into my own bed because of my my linen. I love it.

Helen: 02:06

And one might say it's scratchy. I don't feel it's scratchy. I feel there's something comforting about it and cooling about it. And that is what I have to say. So if you have not tried linen sheets, you might want to give it a go.

Helen: 02:19

You might never go back like me. I can't go back. It's linen or nothing. Parachute is my brand. And I think there's other ones that do linen, but you can check out Parachute because that's the one I use as my go to.

Helen: 02:32

Okay, it's worth it. You invest in something that is something you touch every day. That's what I truly believe. That's my thing. And I'm going to stick to it.

Helen: 02:42

Alright, the other thing I'm going to talk about is, this is funny because it's a food item and I'm going to give it an honest review and it's always on the United Airlines flights as a snack choice. And you either gotta love it or hate it, but it's the Stroop waffle. Holding it up, here it is. So this is the United Airlines, this is when I first tried them, was on a United flight, and now I want to talk about it. Why are Stroop waffles always my pick?

Helen: 03:07

A couple of things. They have the crunch, they have the sweetness, and they have the gooey, so it's all kind of all three things in one. You can make a cup of tea, unwrap this thing and pop it on top and it warms it and it makes it like a hot waffle caramel sandwich or something. And it's just like, it's not a lot of calories either. I mean I know it's sugar, it's probably not good for you and all of that.

Helen: 03:29

But it's 120 calories so it's not even like, it's a nice treat and it keeps for a long time. So when I get these, I could stick them in my bag if I don't want to eat it in the moment, I have a little treat for later. I'm a Stroop Waffle fan. I find people either love or hate Stroop Waffles. So let me know what camp what side of the camp you're on if you've never had one.

Helen: 03:50

You can actually buy these. So here's the brand. It's called Dahl how do we say it? Dammens? Dammens?

Helen: 03:58

Obviously, like a German brand of some sort. And, yeah, you wanna try them, I think. If you haven't had one, it's worth it's worth a gander. Go go check it out, and let me know what you think of Stroopwafels. Are you a hater?

Helen: 04:12

And it brings me to the idea of airplane snacks because is crunchy better? Is gooey better? Is sweet better? Is salty better? I think there's a lot of schools of thought on what the best airplane snack is, but I know that there's somewhere I read that crunchy is always more preferred on a plane because of the sound of the flight, you know the sound in the cabin where it's that dull And there's something about crunchy that is more satisfying when you're on a flight.

Helen: 04:36

So this does satisfy a bit of the crunch if you don't put it on top of the tea and melt it. It does satisfy the crunchy, but we can talk about another crunchy snack maybe next week. I'll be on a theme because I'm going on a flight next week again, and so I'll be thinking about my airplane snacks, and I have another one that I'm gonna bring to you next week. Alright? So hold on for that one.

Helen: 04:55

Now let's get into the topic for today which is camera angles. Why am I talking about it? So many reasons. I have a while ago did a video where, and it did go a little viral, about people who do shoot their cat when they're not looking at the camera or they shoot with the camera too low or the camera up high and what that says about your content to your audience. And I I had a lot of interesting comments on that I'll say.

Helen: 05:22

It was like people were almost annoyed like I was calling them out. I was just providing facts like this is what your camera angle is doing because you might not even realize it. And being in production, we think about the camera angles to elicit that emotion from the consumer in advertising. So it's a known thing that these angles do these things. So I was bringing my production expertise to the table, and I think some people felt attacked on that video.

Helen: 05:46

But so I wanted to dive a little deeper and explain uses for camera angles, what certain camera angles are good for, and when to make them up maximize them. And it's also related because next week I'm gonna be on a production shoot and what I'm going to do for my studio members is I'm going we're doing a meeting and I'm gonna do it on the pre light day while I'm at the location for the shoot. So I'm gonna actually dive into behind the scenes of my shoot. I'm going to share roles of people on set. And I'm gonna I have a DP there.

Helen: 06:16

I'm gonna see if he's gonna be willing to talk for a few minutes and say a few things about what he does as the camera guy. So I think it's gonna be fun. That's gonna be a nice little peek into production. And since production is heavily on my mind, I've gone from shoot to shoot to shoot recently, which is not always the norm. A lot of times there'll be a shoot and then there's a hiatus, there's a break, and then until another project comes.

Helen: 06:36

But this has been back to back to back. So I have production on the brain, and I'm gonna really while I'm in it, make use of the the things that are on the top of my brain, and I'm gonna start sharing. So we're going to talk about all the camera angles and what they do. Let it and I even in the newsletter you have reference photos. I'm going to describe here because I can't really show while I'm podcasting.

Helen: 06:58

I can't really show it as well. So if you wanna see the angles and you're not getting it from my description, you can go to the newsletter. I don't think I'm gonna have time to edit in the angles into this video. And, we'll see. I can't promise anything.

Helen: 07:09

I can maybe try. Alright. The first one is the wide shot. We call this the establishing shot. It's always been like this.

Helen: 07:16

Even in the toy industry, we would always have to shoot a wide establishing shot of the kids playing with the toy or the kids establishing where they are in their room or in their playroom. Always a wide shot. And the reason for it is when you're introducing and you wanna make sure you ground the viewer in the place that you are. So even if you don't use it for the first shot, a lot of times we like to tease the audience. So we might start with close-up, close-up, close-up, then we show the reveal of the wide shot.

Helen: 07:42

Doesn't have to be the first shot, but it is a helpful shot if you ever want to provide context for your audience. Okay? The next is the point five lens which is your ultra wide shot. And that's what you'll notice a lot of influencers using now where you see a lot of the arm in the shot. Okay?

Helen: 07:59

Their arm is in the foreground, you see a lot of it kind of like this. I'm trying to demonstrate on the on the YouTube video here. But so it's a lot of arm, but you get a much wider view of what's happening around you. And this is a style, and it exaggerates the space, and it adds like a little distortion. It's cooler because it's been very used by influencers recently.

Helen: 08:20

And in the vlog trend that's kind of trending pretty hard now, when people are lip syncing with the wide lens and they're doing like a spin around or they're spinning the camera, that is all done with the point five lens and that has to be done with your back camera. So you've got to turn your camera around, hold your arm out, and then you can always crop it in a little tighter if you want less arm because I know sometimes when I shoot I get so much arms, so I end up cropping in tightly to get less like this. But you can, it's really a good, it's a good one to use for those trends. It's great for character videos or or making things feel a little bit more chaotic when you're out and about. Next up we have the close-up, and that is really going to bring emotion and detail into focus.

Helen: 09:00

So you can have a close-up and then, I didn't list this in the newsletter, but I'll talk about it now, an extreme close-up. So where it's like you jump into the eyeball. So it's somebody's face and then they make a face, and it's like you get to go into a close-up of their eyes or a close-up of their mouth if they make some kind of an expression. The extreme close-up could be added for like super drama. But in general, the close-up is supposed to bring you emotion.

Helen: 09:21

It helps you make eye contact eye contact better with your viewer. It builds trust because you're you're closer. And so that is when you're trying to really make the connection. And it's great if you have a close-up and you're talking and talking and then you cut to b roll shots over your talking, so then you're establishing your your using your establishing shot. Maybe you're using other shots over the speaking part and then going back to yourself speaking so that you're constantly bringing the viewer back to you and the trust, but you're entertaining them with other visuals on top of your scenes.

Helen: 09:55

So that's a really good way to think about if you want to do an interview and then you want to cut some b roll shots and put some b roll shots on top of it. Some of the b roll can be the ultra wide or the establishing or what I'm going to talk about next, which is the POV shot. Do you know that a lot of people see on the videos POV I was at my friend's wedding or POV, I blah blah blah, and they didn't know what that POV stood for point of view. I just thought that was interesting. I think that everybody knows that because I've been in the business for so long that I know what a POV shot is.

Helen: 10:27

It stands for point of view. And the cool thing about a point of view shot is it can be done with and without something in the foreground, featuring Fluffy. So this is Julie's Julie's stuffed animal Fluffy. But you can hold I would be able to let's see. How would I do this?

Helen: 10:42

I would hold the camera behind Fluffy, and then I would be filming. And so Fluffy's actually, this is such a funny shot. I'm gonna shoot it right now, and I'm gonna cut it in. So Fluffy's looking at the computer and watching me podcast right now. Oh my goodness.

Helen: 10:59

Is trying to pay it get my attention. Alright. So this is where Fluffy is moving around, and I'm following Fluffy behind. And then that shot can be as if the dog you're seeing everything from the dog's point of view. So you can have the thing in the foreground with the camera or just the camera.

Helen: 11:19

So if I had a shot of a wide shot of Fluffy going, and then I cut to a a shot of the camera moving, which might feel like fluffy, the angle, it could have fluffy in the shot, in front of the camera, or not because it would still indicate that it was from the point of view because of the movement of the camera. So a POV can have your person in the foreground or not. That's the the thing about a POV. Alright? And the time to use this is really when you want your audience to feel like they're the one doing the thing.

Helen: 11:52

So a lot of times people use this in cooking videos where they have a POV of their their bowl and the stirring, you know, they're holding the phone with one hand, they're stirring with another hand, that's a POV shot. So there's lots of uses for POV shots. All of these things that I'm talking about now on the podcast, I'm gonna cover in great depth in the studio this week. So if you are a studio member, we're gonna do a lot more on this. And I'm gonna bring examples.

Helen: 12:14

I'm gonna show you which shots were used and why they were used. And I'm gonna talk about your content and how one of your videos could have used this shot to make it more compelling. So we're going be doing that in the meeting this week. So if you are not a member of the studio and you want to try it for a week, now would be a good week to do that if this topic interests you. Okay.

Helen: 12:33

Next. Oh my God, I'm losing my voice today. An overhead shot. And this is also used a lot in cooking and a lot of the, all the recipe people have companies that they use to actually make the videos for them where it's like an overhead camera and a nice white counter and you see the food and you see things happening. It's a style, I forget what it's called, it's some specific style of shooting for food.

Helen: 12:57

But anything like this, this can be used for anything, can be used for artwork, people who are doing, creating crafts, having an overhead camera. There's ones that attach to the desk and shoot overhead. You can have I think the one the tripod I have right here, you can pull up and then tilt it over over your counter. So lots of different tripods do that. If you are looking to do overhead shooting a lot, like if that's part of your content, you really do want to invest in a solid tripod that does that well.

Helen: 13:26

Because a lot of them you'll see the tripod legs if you don't position it exactly right. If I take this tripod that I have and I turn it like this to shoot overhead, I'm going see part of my tripod legs in the shot. So this isn't ideal for overhead shooting. I use this to shoot tutorials, but I tilt it a little so that when I'm pointing it at the camera, I'm not seeing the tripod legs. So I work around it.

Helen: 13:48

But you know you can always work around things. But it's nice if you do that a lot to get the equipment that's correct for it. Okay two more types of, oh a couple more types of shots to talk about. The tracking shot. This is fun.

Helen: 14:00

So if you have steady hands and you are really good at a lot of people get the rigs to steady the cameras. I forgot what they're called now. Those like handheld rigs where the camera doesn't jiggle as much. I have very steady hands so I can walk and be very smooth with my camera. But a tracking shot means you're following a subject.

Helen: 14:18

So if I was walking behind someone, I see, I love following the Savannah Bananas on TikTok. They are a baseball team that's like a showmanship baseball team and they make a lot of TikToks and dance videos. And their cameraman has the rig, a really big camera, not a phone, he's got the big camera and he's like jumping off the bleachers with them, running on the field with them. That is a tracking shot. Okay?

Helen: 14:43

I might try and put that in here too. Oh my God, they're amazing by the way. Love to watch them, they're adorable. And they lip sync and they perform and then they go right up to bat, so it's like a very, think of, think Harlem Globetrotters for baseball. They're showmen and they do entertain while they play baseball.

Helen: 15:00

So that's a lot of fun. Tracking shots can be used for vlogs, for behind the scenes, if you want to transition between spaces, you know sometimes you'll see a tracking shot where someone walks behind a pole and then when they pass by the pole they come out in a different outfit. That would be a tracking shot. That's a good example of what a tracking shot would be used for. Another one would be if I had not fluffy by POV, but if I had the dog in front of me and I wanted to follow the whole dog, I'd actually, I can't even do it right now because I can't get far enough away.

Helen: 15:31

But I would be back here and then Fluffy, I'd be following the dog and I'd be tracking along with the dog. It's a little harder to do that because dogs move fast. But it's good to, you know, it's just following a subject is the idea. Okay, let's go on to the next one. The Dolly versus the Zoom.

Helen: 15:48

A lot of people don't really know that there's a difference and wouldn't be able to tell the difference by looking at the film. But a zoom is when the camera is still but the lens zooms in. Okay? So think of that. Picture it in your head.

Helen: 16:03

Camera is still and then the lens goes like this and zooms into the thing. Alright? So nothing moves in the scene except the camera moves closer. The lens itself. So how can I say this?

Helen: 16:17

The lens moves closer. So it zooms in. But a dolly is when the camera actually physically moves closer. So it's gonna change the space around it in a sense. You're going to get a similar effect where you're gonna get closer to the subject, but you get close to closer to it by the camera traveling versus the lens just pushing.

Helen: 16:40

So camera stays still, lens pushes in versus camera actually moves. So it's very Dolly is more immersive, so it's taking you with, and the zoom is more observational. It's calling your attention to the thing. So it's like zooming into the dart board to see where the dart landed versus traveling to the dart board. So a dart thing, a zoom would make more sense.

Helen: 17:05

You'd zoom in. A, let's say if you wanted to, if you were on a dock and you wanted to get closer to a boat, you would instead of zooming, you might move the camera closer to the boat. Okay? So those are the differences if that helps clear it up for you. Then we've got our last two which is low angle and high angle.

Helen: 17:26

There's other camera angles I'm sure that I'm not even thinking of, but I'm giving you the basics. But we've got the low angle versus the high angle. So the low angle makes your subject look larger, ominous, powerful, think superhero. Think about all the superhero movies that you've seen. They always have those dramatic shots of the pose, usually low angle, very big drama.

Helen: 17:49

You're filming a boss move when you are filming at a low angle. And it's really fun in the fashion world now where it makes like the shoes look bigger and the the it distorts the the perspective on the person so it looks a little hipper. So those are really fun ones for fashion. The high angle is, I'm going to say, it looks down on your subject, makes them look more vulnerable and smaller. And I have said this in the beginning, in fashion when you're shooting and you hold up your camera high, it's like you're trying to go for a beauty vibe because you're trying to hide some things.

Helen: 18:24

So there's two uses. One is when you're doing it in a close-up and then one is when you're doing it in a wide shot. In a close-up it's trying to change what your face looks like, maybe hide some things. And in the wider shot, it's making you thinner. It will appear that you're thinner just because the camera is going up, so it's the thing that's closest to the camera is wider and from there it gets thinner.

Helen: 18:47

So a lot of people like to shoot shoot up high when they're doing videos because it makes them look trimmer. All the things. But it does capture more of a childlike energy. It can create a feeling of like loneliness if you were far away from a subject and they were just looking up at the lens. You'll notice it in films like, I don't know why the film Stand By Me comes to my head, but I picture like the little boy and you know, he's invulnerable and in the moment and at the train tracks.

Helen: 19:15

Don't know why I'm picturing this. I don't even know if it's shot. It's in my head though. But it's an, you know, that's a higher angle shot looking down to make them seem like they're, you know, in a big world or whatever for example. Okay, that is my rant for today.

Helen: 19:29

I went on a tear. I don't, oh I have a meeting and I have to go. Alright, signing off, See you next week. I can't believe I'm late for my pre pro meeting. Oh my goodness.

Helen: 19:38

Okay. See you next week.