Lucihub Academy

Make Me a Filmer Series

Written by Andrew Silva | Jan 17, 2025 9:00:00 PM

Hey guys!  Welcome to the first episode of our exciting new series, "52 Weeks Make Me a Filmer," brought to you by Lucihub! In this series, I willl dive into the fundamentals of filming using just your iPhone with our expert filmer, Aly Gibson. We are hoping to provide you with the knowledge and confidence you need to create stunning videos whether you're an aspiring filmmaker or just looking to improve your video skills.

In "52 Weeks Make Me a Filmer," we'll explore various aspects of filming with an iPhone, from basic settings to advanced techniques all in one year. Our goal is to make filming accessible and enjoyable for everyone, regardless of experience level.  Today, we'll start with some of the basics: camera settings, frame rate, and exposure.

 

Understanding iPhone Camera Settings

The iPhone camera is a powerful tool with a range of settings that can enhance your filming experience. As we began I knew nothing of any of these settings.  I'm sure my experience is similar to most as I simply open the camera and go. There are so many more options with iPhone that we can utilize to enhance our filming with very simple techniques. The frame rate refers to the number of frames that are filmed per second. The most common is 30 fps (frames per second), while 24 fps provides a more cinematic look and 60fps is great for capturing fast moving objects and translates well to slow motion.  Our iPhones are set to the standard 30 fps and I have not tried filming other frame rates yet myself.  We can also adjust the resolution which offer better quality video but may take up more file storage.  1080p is the standard setting for iPhone but if you want a higher quality video, you should definitely film in 4k.  Experiment with different frame rates and resolutions to determine which one best suits your project! 

 

Another feature we discuss in our opening episode is exposure.  Exposure controls the amount of light that reaches the camera sensor. Proper exposure ensures your video is neither too dark nor too bright. The iPhone camera app has several features to help you manage exposure.  The iPhone has an Auto Exposure feature that automatically adjusts the exposure based on the lighting of the environment but you can manually alter this as well.  Simply tap on the screen to focus, then slide your finger up or down to adjust the exposure manually.  Try various exposures in different lighting conditions to better understand what exposure is.

 

The last thing we covered is adding some settings to our camera for stabilization.  These can be found in the settings app, under the camera folder.  Here we turned on some gridlines and the level feature.  This will help to make sure your shots are perfectly straight and even!

 

By understaneing these basic settings, we are well on our way to creating high-quality videos with our iPhone(at least I hope I am!) . Stay tuned for the next episode of "Make Me a Filmer," where we'll dive deeper into more advanced filming techniques. Happy filming!