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How to stabilise shaky footage without using warp stabiliser

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It’s funny how things go around in circles. The Warp Stabiliser was added to After Effects and Premiere to eliminate the need for techniques like the one shown in this video from Matti Haapoja. Introduced with Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 in 2011, it was supposed to make our lives easier and our footage perfect. But, as more and more people take to shooting video, the more and more its failures become apparent.

Although the Warp Stabiliser can do some wonderful things, and sometimes does its job perfectly, there are still times when it just doesn’t get it right. It’s a good video, and very useful information to know. At one time, this was just “the way”, but now it’s just one technique in our ever-growing arsenal.

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Get smooth handheld video footage without a gimbal or other stabiliser

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I often get behind the scenes video when I’m out on a shoot. I have a couple of DSLRs packed in the bag just for this purpose. One usually gets locked off on a tripod covering a wide shot. The other goes handheld. But getting smooth handheld footage can be a pain. A gimbal or steadicam would be fantastic, but often overkill. And it’s a lot more weight for me to carry out into the wilderness. Fortunately, there are other options.

In this video, photographer Peter McKinnon shows us some of the methods he uses to get stable handheld footage. I regularly use a few of these techniques myself. But there’s definitely some new ones here I hadn’t thought of that I’ll be trying in the future.

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How to effectively use Warp Stabilizer to make your shaky footage rock steady

Even if you’re trying to be as rock steady as possible with your footage, the camera almost inevitably moves in a way you hadn’t counted on. Sometimes you’ll just shoot it again, but there may be no opportunity for that. You might not even know there’s a problem until you’re back home reviewing the footage.

Sometimes, there’s no choice but to fix it in post. Adobe’s Warp Stabilizer that comes with After Effects and Premiere has always been something of a mixed blessing. It’s a fantastic tool that can often fail miserably. Mostly due to user error. In these two videos, we find out how to fix it.

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Advanced video stabilisation with Premiere and After Effects

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One of the most off putting things for viewers of video is shaky footage. The best way to keep the camera steady is to use a tripod, but sometimes we want to add a little motion. Quality sliders can still cost a fair amount of money, and not everybody has a gimbal or other stabiliser. We just have to go regular handheld. But this often leads to bumpy footage. So, what can we do?

Adobe Premiere Pro has a built in Warp Stabiliser, but it doesn’t always do the best job. When it works, it works extremely well, but it often falls over and gives results we really didn’t expect. In this video from Miesner Media, Theo takes us on a round trip from Premiere to After Effects, and back to Premiere again, resulting in perfectly stabilised footage.

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How I Learned To Stop Worrying About Wobble And Love The Warp Stabilizer

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It’s uber-awkward being in high school.

In 9th grade, I was a music kid and played in everything from pit orchestra to pep band.

High school marching band armed me with one mantra: heal toe, heal toe, heal toe, heal toe, roll your foot.

This mantra is basically a set of instructions to the “roll step”, which was paramount to marching band. It was our band director’s hope that we, as a bunch of awkward saxophone- and tuba-wielding 13 year-olds—in a costume that looked something like a bad rendition of the British uniform from the War of 1812 with a 3-foot tall faux-fur white hat (oh, I hope all pictures have been destroyed)—would glide past the audience come parade time.

This we did not do. More like we bobbled, uncomfortably.

But the “roll step” saying stuck with me, and to this day it works as a rule of thumb any time I’m walking with a camera, even with a MoVi. Yet, with it running constantly through my head, uneven terrain and any number of small obstacles can make good form and the right camera tool not quite enough.

For example, when trekking through the forest.[Read More…]

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