Get inside their head.

We bought a garden shed the other day from Rona near Duncan. I drove up-Island to get it and decided to take a side trip to Sansum Narrows and get in some hard physical activity climbing a route on a cliff overlooking the ocean. It's high above the water and boats of all sorts pass by, giving their passengers a good look at my progress.
The route took about an hour to complete and along the way, I began to dwell on the issues of objective and subjective camera angles. Glancing down at the boats, I’m sure the folks were wondering about my state of mind. Their voyeuristic/objective viewpoint would allow them to come to any conclusion. If privy to the subjective view, the one inside my head, they’d probably have been more richly entertained.

If you’re telling stories about the products and services you supply, knowing how to use these two perspectives in your videos is important. It’s relatively easy to plop down a camera and record a wide shot of an event or person doing a demonstration. With exceptions, this omnipresent point of view offers no real emotional clues. The subjective angle, on the other hand, is invested in the emotional state of the participant, it gets the viewer involved. It wants us to experience what the character experiences.

I was using a pair of board-lasted climbing shoes, ones I normally reserve for hard crack climbing. The subjective angle would showcase my experience with them - happiness at their great grip on the first big holds, progressing to unease on small edges to fear and near panic as the crux (the hardest part) demanded great certainty on polished nubbins. From the objective angle, none of this was “visible” - it was just some dude climbing a cliff. In my head, it was a much different experience.

If you want your videos to connect emotionally with your audience, your story must get them invested emotionally. Knowing how to use subjective and objective camera angles will make this much more possible.

Although it’s concerned with cinema, here’s a great link to a video on perspective.

https://vimeo.com/219223876
 

Have a great day - Allen Agopsowicz, Picture Story Productions.

PS - I successfully negotiated the crux and finished the route safely. Next time, I’ll use my slip-lasted shoes to see how they do. If you’re thinking about making a good preforming video, send me an email and we can talk story and how to get your audience involved.