If you have a good story in your mind, only a smartphone can be enough to turn the story into a movie. But if you’d like to spice up your smartphone videos a bit, Jordy Vandeput from Cinecom.net will show you how. In this video, he shares five cheap and simple DIY tricks for shooting with a smartphone. They will give your videos interesting transitions, effects, and even correct color balance, using only stuff you have at home.
1. Tape your phone for unique angles
Ah, the good ol’ gaff tape. It has plenty of applications for photography and video, and Jordy suggests you use some of it to tape your phone to various places and give your videos some unique angles. For example, you can tape the phone to the door, so the camera moves as your subject opens it. Also, you can tape it to objects inside the fridge, so you have a PoV view from inside the fridge. Jordy goes that far that he tapes the phone onto a car wheel for some dizzying shots.
2. Creative transitions
For this trick, you only need your hands. Pinch your phone tight on one side. As you’re filming next to a table, let the phone drop on one side so it falls underneath the table surface. For the next shot, start underneath the table and lift the phone up. Here’s Jordy’s result.
3. Improve skin tones when using flash
In case you use the phone’s flash while filming, the chances are it will give a greenish tint to the skin tones. This is easy to fix with a magenta or red highlighter. Just paint the flash with it and the skin tones will look more natural.
4. Anamorphic lens flares
Perhaps you know of the fishing line trick for creating the anamorphic effect on your camera lens. Well, it works for smartphones as well. Just tape a piece of fishing line over your smartphone camera and you’ll get anamorphic lens flares.
5. Clay tripod
Those of you who have kids probably have some Play Doh lying around. You can use it to create a sort of a smartphone holder to stabilize your shots. When you lock your phone in the clay, you can put it on top of the towel and make the famous DIY slider.
There are plenty more tricks to improve smartphone videos and photos. Are there any tricks you particularly like to use when filming with your smartphone?
