If you’ve ever watched a film, you have experienced the cinematic film look. While the aesthetic is hard to describe, you know it when you see it. It is what makes a movie look like a movie. And audiences have been conditioned over many years to respond to this look and feel. As a result, it behooves you to achieve a cinematic film look in your next project.
The problem is, making a film is challenging. Between writing the script, finding the cast and crew and making sure you stay under budget, there is so much to learn that you drown in a swamp of information and opinions. This is how I felt about a year ago when I decided to move from photography and begin making my own films. And one big obstacle centered around how to achieve a cinematic film look.
How To Achieve A Cinematic Film Look
I used the past year to grasp a solid understanding of what makes a video look ‘cinematic’ by reading tons of articles and watching countless tutorial videos on YouTube. In short, you’ll need to be mindful of your camera settings, frame rate, depth-of-field, aspect ratio and how you’re going to edit.
If all that sounds overwhelming, don’t worry! The following video highlights the cornerstones on how to achieve a cinematic film look.
With the short attention span of my generation I felt many videos explaining the basic technical components and settings were dry in its content and lacked the entertainment factor to keep the focus high. Learn the rules, understand and live them, and then break them. This way you can create something unique and stand out!
To experience the same I highly encourage you to go out there and share your learnings with the world.
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Joey Helms is a German photographer and filmmaker currently based out of the windy city of Chicago. Since 2008 his passion to capture the beauty and diversity of our planet manifested itself in a strong following on Flickr and various features within the Snapseed app. In 2016 Joey evolved from still photography to motion picture and started his own YouTube channel which is growing ever since. On YouTube his videos range from cinematic travel experiences, documentary footage and interviews, to tutorials and vlogs.
