How to Frame a Self-Tape

[Music] hello welcome back to book from tape I'm Jordan with Robinson empowering you with the tools to book from tape as an actor and since we have this video element here I wanted to I'm looking at my monitor I wanted to go over a bit what the standard expectations are for framing when when your self taping right because there a lot of people will say medium shot which means chest high or close shot which means shoulders high what does all of this mean right and I want to say pretty much right where I am now is a pretty this should be your default for the most part when you're setting up a framing nothing in the background it's neutral there's nothing distracting there's nothing else to look at except for a little ugly face I'm just the cameras just cutting off just above the top of my head and it's coming down to I guess that's top of bust it could you know you could have a little bit more maybe here like mid chest you know that's up to your comfort level the taping services accommodations and always always read the breakdown because every casting director most casting directors are going to have slightly different opinions as to how they would like to view these states and we can help accommodate that because they are watching dozens and dozens of tapes a day and whatever helps their process try to do it just try because that you know that's how we can respect the the process and now here's the thing some people might ask for close-up which I love I love close-up because when you're actually on set on the day you're gonna be filming most of the time in close-up right I mean they get so here's I mean some of the you know some close-up stuff is like this close man it's like no I don't recommend this for taping it I think it looks great I think it's awesome to tape like this because you see everything you see absolutely everything but not necessarily helpful for taping because they might want to see more so even if they ask for a close-up probably still don't come any closer than this try to get you know they want to see your hairstyle top or your top of your shoulders and everything sometimes they might ask you to talk directly into camera it feels awkward especially when you're seeing partners over here but allow yourself to talk directly into camera and then there's a medium shot as well which looks like this so now we're seeing about from my this is my belly button here so waist all the way up to the top the head this is popular for a lot of commercials or some recreation type things I've seen on like a crime shows or whodunit type stuff where they want to see more of your body because they're gonna have you in more physical environments right and what I've done here is that basically I've just stepped back I've zoomed out slightly but mostly I've actually changed my presentation of my relationship to the camera I've gone back about a foot and a half and then I had to adjust my lighting and I had to turn it up a little bit brighter you can tell I could actually do this I can adjust on my camera there so now I've actually tweaked my camera settings to make it a little bit lighter so see that already helps a lot you still the hard part with the half you know the full upper torso shot is just connecting with your eyes and it's a little bit darker in it so that's something you need tweak on your own but uh that's my set up there so I hope this helps with some framing stuff always try to you know when you can just overtop ahead to about mid shoulder that's that is standard and then always read the breakdown and if they ask for something else accommodate as best you can that's it for today thank you so much if you want to reach out to me go to book from tape comm you can email me I also have Skype and FaceTime coaching sessions available and I also have this as a podcast if you go into iTunes or your favorite podcast player you can hear most of these ideas just as little quick cell phone snippets that I've put down in order to share in the moment when I have a an idea just kind of spontaneously and so that's where those live and you can take it on the road with you thank you so much talk to you next time you