YOU CAN PULL FOCUS LIKE THE PROS …
From Chapter 3 of Paul Martingell’s Better Location Shooting - More Info
How to Keep a Moving Subject in Focus - Real World Tips and Tricks
When I was a very junior cameraman at Trillion Video in London we shot many pop concerts and football matches. They were great to work on but were also fantastic for improving your powers of focussing on moving subjects. A lot of concerts back in the eighties were lit to give a dark eerie feeling and consequently there was not a lot of light falling on the band members. So if you were trying to hold close-ups of individual musicians as they moved around the stage it could be an uphill task to keep them in focus, especially when the cameras were working on a very wide aperture. Same again on gloomy Saturdays in the dead of winter when we were shooting football matches.
I used the experience of these outside broadcasts when I started shooting single camera location jobs, and the method I devised for keeping focus on a subject moving toward or away from my camera works time and again and will help to produce nice sharp shots on even the tightest of lenses and widest of apertures. It’s best described in an example, and then you can refer to the photos below to work it out.
Let’s say you are shooting a presenter walking toward you from about 20 m away. He’s going to deliver his lines as he walks toward camera and the director wants to hold a mid-shot for the whole of the take, and he’ll finish about four feet away from the lens, preferably nice and sharply focussed the whole way. We start by plotting the walk and timing the delivery of the lines, and we do this back to front.
Set up the end position that you want your presenter to reach when he will be nearest to your camera. Be careful that the background of the shot works well; try not to have any tall buildings “ growing ” out of the presenter’s head or other types of distractions. Mark this position with a tape box or piece of camera tape so the presenter will be aware of the mark as he comes toward it ( Figure 3.1 ).
FIG 3.1 - The presenter at near point. “The presenter is at the end of his walk and nearest the camera.”
Focus your lens for this position and put your finger on the focus ring on the lens and butt it up against the zoom servo box or a bar, both of which are static and won’t move when you twist the focus. The idea being that you will use this static piece of the lens as a “ stop ” position and marker when the presenter hits his final mark, and you will be spot on focus. If you have a chinagraph pencil, then you can mark the focus ring at this position as well, or you could use camera tape ( Figure 3.2 ).
FIG 3.2 - A finger on the lens marking nearest point. “My finger has marked the focus point and
is also touching the static zoom box. Now when Ian, my presenter, walks to this front position I will always be in perfect focus.”
Ask the presenter to deliver the lines while walking away from the camera and toward the area that you want the shot to start from. Get him to stop walking at the point that he finishe’s the words. Don’t be tempted to change focus on the camera yet; simply watch the walk and see where the presenter ends up and how fast he’s walking. Some people prefer to walk quickly as it gives them a drive and pace that helps their delivery; others prefer a slower walk and more placid delivery. It’s up to them ( Figure 3.3 ).
FIG 3.3 - The presenter at far point. “Ian is now at the start position, farthest away from the camera, and ready to do a take. We know now that he will finish his words when he gets to the camera position marked earlier.”
4. Once he reaches an end spot get him to mark it with a coin or something similar so that it can’t be seen in shot (if you are asked for a wider shot, that is).
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Now refocus on the presenter who is at his first mark and zoom in to hold a mid-shot … but don’t take you finger off the focus ring while you do this. On most ENG lenses you’ll be moving the focus ring down as you focus back onto the presenter in his position farthest away from you ( Figure 3.4 ).
FIG 3.4 - A finger on the lens focussed at the start point. “Now refocus for the presenter’s new position away from the camera. Again you can mark this point on the lens if you need to.”
5. Rehearse the shot on tape. As your presenter moves toward the camera you focus forward (moving your left hand upward), the speed at which you move the focus ring toward your final, marked spot is governed by the presenter’s walk so you might need to practice a couple of times. But assuming he walks at the same speed every time you’ll soon know how fast you need to move your focus hand. And as long as he gets to his end mark or somewhere close to it, and you have your finger to rest against the end stop you are using, the shot will be in focus. To keep the shot size the same throughout the walk you will also have to zoom out while the presenter walks toward you. This is best done using a remote zoom attached to your pan handle as you can then zoom, pan, and tilt at the same time with your right hand. If you don’t have a remote you need to zoom from the lens servo box with you right hand, and you’ll need a bit of practice to do this smoothly.
You can look back at the taped rehearsal shot to see if you’ve done it right and also check if the shot is satisfactory, and then make any changes before you do a proper take. You can also show the director and presenter how it looks and again make changes as needed. They will undoubtedly appreciate seeing the shot before it’s recorded for real, and will also appreciate the trouble you’ve gone to set it out correctly. Another advantage is that they will know exactly how the shot will look when they come to edit. And this should rightly give you confidence in your work.
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