RINGING THE CHANGES
Smartphone filmmaking is not just the future − it’s the now. As SF3 Festival Ambassador, Phillip Noyce, says, you can not only shoot a film on your phone, but you can do everything else, as well − write, cast, edit and distribute it. SF3 co-founder and director, Angela Blake, offers her top 10 tips and tricks for making a professional film or self-tape on your phone.
1. Clean your lens
If you only remember one tip, this should be it. Pick up your phone and look at the lens. See those fingerprints, dust and other detritus from your handbag or pocket all over it? We don’t want that clouding our film, self-tape or even a video of our kid’s birthday party. Our phones are professional movie cameras and yet we treat them badly: we regularly drop them, let our kids watch YouTube on them, touching the lenses with their grubby fingers, and we chuck them loosely in our bags. No way would we do this with a DSLR or Blackmagic camera. The difference in the shot after you wipe the lens is astounding. You’re welcome!
2. Switch to flight mode and silence notifications
Even I have forgotten to do this and it ruined my shot completely. Don’t be like me; tap that airplane/flight mode icon.
3. Shoot in landscape mode
We all want our films to be accepted into big festivals around the world, to appear on all the streaming platforms and to premiere at Fox Studios, so remember to put your camera in landscape mode. Of course, there are exceptions to this rule − when making content for The Gram, shooting for your viral TikTok channel or even if you have decided to shoot a vertical film. These are all perfectly good reasons to shoot in vertical. Just make sure it’s a choice, not an accident.
4. Keep your phone steady
A bit of camera movement is acceptable, but only a little. Bear in mind that the image you see on your phone will be blown up more than 10,000 times when played on the cinema screen and that tiny shake will become huge. Hold the phone tightly, brace your arms and pull your elbows into your body. Turn your body into a tripod and keep the phone steady.
5. Pay close attention to the sound
While smartphones are now professional movie cameras, with all the whizz-bang technology that goes along with that, they are still phones, first and foremost. They have an in-built omnidirectional microphone, which is not ideal for filmmaking. But with a little knowledge and attention to detail, you can record beautiful sound on your phone. Firstly, stand as close to the actors as possible. Secondly, use another phone as a microphone, placing it closer to the actors, but out of shot, and recording the sound in the voice-recording app. Thirdly, shoot in as quiet and non-echoey a location as possible and watch out for wind noise. We always say at SF3, if you are going to buy just one piece of filmmaking equipment, make it a microphone. No one forgives bad sound, so do it properly.
6. Make sure you have adequate lighting
Whether shooting in the daytime or evening, illuminate your scene properly to ensure your phone is getting enough light to capture a clear image. Newer phones are increasingly producing amazing results in low-light conditions. Nevertheless, the sensors are much smaller than on traditional movie cameras and so they need more light to capture a crisp picture. This is easy to achieve by choosing to shoot in daylight, when possible, or by ensuring you have adequate lighting in darker scenes. This can be as simple as using a $10 light from Bunnings or Kmart or even the torch on the back of your phone.
7. Lock the auto focus and exposure
Press and hold on your phone’s camera screen and you’ll see a little square pop up with a sun icon next to it if you have an iPhone or a circle with a lock above it if you have a Samsung, or something similar on most other models of phones. This is your auto-focus and exposure lock. Due to their small sensors, phone cameras are designed to constantly adjust to the light, so you’ll notice your camera changing from bright to dark when the light source has altered in the image. We do not want this for filmmaking, as it can be very distracting for the audience. Similarly, phones are always trying to find and adjust the focus point in an image. By holding on the screen until the square, circle or similar shape appears, you are locking in the focus point and lighting for your scene.
Note: You can move that little icon up and down or side to side — depending on your phone — to change the light you let into the sensor, creating a darker or brighter image. This can be good if you want to shoot day for night or set your film on Mars, with no budget.
8. Find your creative freedom
Long gone are the days when filmmaking was super expensive and every piece of film stock cost you a week’s pay. Shooting on digital, you can be as creative as you want, so if you see something cool, shoot it. Explore filmmaking styles and have fun − there’s such freedom in shooting on a small and inexpensive device. Find the places that only your phone will fit and you’ll see that you can capture some unique shots and tell your stories in very interesting ways.
9. Remember to show, not tell
This rule’s a golden oldie and applies to all filmmaking, smartphone or traditional. It’s far more interesting for a character to show us that they secretly love another by the way they look at them or visibly weaken when that character enters the room than it is for them to come right out and say to us: “I love this other person.” Film is a visual medium and you must remember this right from the first scene header you write on the page.
10. Ultimately, it’s all about the story
Everything else is secondary. Audiences will forgive bad acting and low production values, they’ll forgive shaky camera movement and a lens going in and out of focus, but what they’ll never forgive is a bad story (and bad sound, so read tip 5 again!). A great film is a great story. It’s as simple and as hard as that.
Angela Blake is co-founder of SF3 — SmartFone Flick Fest, Australia’s international smartphone film festival. Founded in 2015 and after sell-out seasons in Sydney at the Opera House, Event Cinemas George Street, Palace Chauvel and the Actors Centre Australia, they are now in their eighth season. Angela teaches filmmaking and acting throughout Australia, with SF3 and NIDA, and is also the online accessible filmmaking tutor for Bus Stop Films. She is an accomplished emerging director and writer in both film and theatre.
