This video inspired me SO HARD to make vertical cinematography. One thing I can say about vertical movement and action is that ots WAY harder to contextualize because of gravity. Side to side movement can be of a person walking and we can see the distance moved, but to convey that simple action in a vertical canvas we have to get creative and probably stick the camera behind the character and walk in a 3rd person POV. Omg im already problem solving. LETS GOOO
It's not the future of cinema, because the vertical video is popular currently only due to the devices we have. With the undercurrent of VR and AR technologies, it seems that we'll soon see cinema that isn't bounded by boxes, of any orientation whatsoever.
The problems with this are: Social media use is not the way we experience cinema or most of our lives for that matter. Vertical compositions are contrary to how we exist: we don't move vertically through space, we move horizontally. You can get some clever vertical shots like the stair shot in that iPhone ad but it isn't a sustainable format for telling stories in an effective visual manor. It's an experimental technique at best, a novelty at worst.
The human eyes are placed on each side of the head. Not on top of each other. Vertical film are working against that. Panoramic screen are the natural way for us to look at. The trend with the vertical way to look is due to the fact that people is to lazy to turn the mobilphone. A filmmaker by heart will never approve the vertical format.
So to start a healthy dialogue, does making vertical films discredit someone as a filmmakers? How come great photographs work in both landscape and portrait framing? What distinctly makes film a panoramic medium and not other forms of art? We would love to hear your thoughts!
@@SozoBearFilms Vertical videos are one of the main tools for keeping the comfortable, addicted, run-of-the-mill consumer stupid. The aim of so-called SMART devices is to make the user dependent and addicted to consumption. This ideal, comfortable, stupid user is much easier to manipulate and control. As you can see, you can even convince such people that their eyes are overlapping, that's how it is from now on and you're going along with it because you want to be that user. The only benefit that I can get from it myself is the further development of the poster. For example, cinema posters are more appealing in portrait format and achieve better advertising. Therefore, vertical screens are nothing other than digital billboards for advertising. Billboards with movement, magazines, catalogs for goods, especially fashion presentations are suitable for this, I think. Postcards, for example, do not really serve this purpose in portrait format, although portrait format is common for images and is considered "normal". Be that as it may, the video in portrait format is attributed to the technically uneducated user, who does not want to learn any more. He wants to be entertained and liked. In projection, live visuals performance, and in the cinema, the landscape format is still used because you can create all other formats from it by cutting away edges and so on. Films, visuals and video material in general are always shot and produced with edges, the main focus is the center, working from the middle in all four directions so that it can be cropped if necessary. The same thing happens in reverse, including the so-called social media, by adding edges. Portrait format videos are a waste of resources, a waste of space, just like taxing illegal taxes again. Vertical video "producers" put up with all this; it is much easier to get them to only eat the middle of their freshly bought, delicious bread and give the rest to the authorities on either side. In addition, such users are easier to monitor, label and calculate. I feel most sympathy when the ignorant vertical format filmmaker watches the vertical format video recordings of the sea horizon at sunset on his TV at home after his vacation and is surprised because something doesn't seem quite right with it. In any case, people who actually know about photo and video technology can draw on it, make something out of it, deal with it in a constructive and productive way, and perhaps even educate an ignorant person here and there and wake them up. The whole topic also shows how great the power of the so-called social media is and it also shows their intentions, as mentioned, manipulation, surveillance, inability to think for oneself, let alone act, like-lust, superficiality, self-expression addiction and ultimately just fear of what or that the "others" (idiots) might think about one. Greetzz & Blessings from the horizontal city of Vienna, Nikita
Here’s my two cents as a videographer: Vertical videos are a way to dumb people down. They might make sense for short, clickbait videos, product or fashion photos, social media stuff, but they are not at all natural when it comes to cinema. Additionally, they significantly damage the dynamics of most scenes. If we want to show the vastness of a landscape with a subject in it, we end up showing areas that are usually not relevant to the composition: too much ground and sky. In dialogue scenes, if we want to have a shot with both actors (or worse, a group of actors), we need to use extremely wide shots or place characters in unnatural positions. And once again, in those wide shots, we end up with a lot of empty space above and below that probably won't add anything. This doesn’t mean we can’t create original works designed for vertical that work very well. For example, a music video designed for vertical screens. I even like and find it makes sense for festival screens to be vertical, especially for musicians with instruments, as it's the best ratio (though I still prefer 4:5 over 9:16). But for it to become the industry standard for films? I really hope not. Call me "old school," but I think we are destroying something that took years to find the best formula for, just because turning the phone is too much to ask of people...
I really admire the enthusiasm of vertical filmmaking advocates and the creativity with which they've been trying to make it work, but I doubt it'll ever catch on outside of the social media content space. It's clear that even when used by a skilled filmmaker such as yourself making the best of the format, it still shows its limitations at every turn while adding nothing of value other than "you don't have to turn your phone to watch it". The Damien Chazelle short film, which was meant to show inspiring ways in which vertical video could be explored, just cemented this impression. Not only were half of the shots awkwardly composed, but also the concept itself couldn't have made it more obvious how much the format ends up dictating the types of story that can be told. In other words, that was an entertaining short but if that's the best an Academy Award winning director can do with the format, that's not a good sign. On a more nitpicking note, I don't see much merit in the idea that getting a viewer's attention by occupying more screen real estate is that advantageous in a filmmaking context. That might be a decent argument for vertically-formatted trailers or ads, but usually by the time someone decides to watch a film (feature or short) it has already caught their attention in some way so having the entire film be formatted in that suboptimal manner just degrades the experience for very little gain.
I'm also kinda baffled by this notion that all visual media has to start crippling itself to conform to the arbitrary constraints of a particular platform. People have never had a problem turning their phones to watch videos on the mobile apps for TH-cam and streaming services, so why should we all bow down to TikTok and its copycats? TikTok won't be here forever.
Vertical media is a downfall and there is no rationality to it... It's just sucks... Are we really going to conform all our media format to a fricking handheld device??? Really??? I hope it will fade away in a few years...
It won't. This is how Apple, Google, Instagram, Tiktok, etc have planned it. The Auto Rotate lock on your phone is set to portrait. Can the screen be locked to landscape instead? Sorry, it can't. This is a bad design.
As an animator in film/games industry, these modern phones influencing vertical videos has bothered me since the beginning. 90% of videos are vertical now on youtube. The youtube shorts made it even worse because it brought the TikToxic people. TH-camrs like SSSniperWolf do nothing but watch other peoples' TikToxic videos for false "reactions" and get revenue from it. Vertical never looked good. 95% of humans don't know how to do basic film and turn the phone sideways for horizontal. The crazy part is, they probably think actual cameras in the store capture images in vertical, which they do not. True cameras capture photos in horizontal. Vertical videos cut off 50% of the raw footage. I don't comprehend why this is appealing. Almost every car video these days is vertical, short, and covered with TikToxic music. Everyone is attempting to do cinematic work in vertical form, and they have no clue what they are doing.
I don't really disagree haha We only started making vertical content because we had so much more success on TikTok. And this video is more of an essay to ask the question and argue it a bit but even in the end I said I don't think we'll be seeing vertical movies etc. We just shot a new short film and of course filmed it horizontally like we normally do. But we can't ignore the huge audience on TikTok and the fact that we are able to make creative content we enjoy on there and also monetize it. The price we pay is a ton of difficulty in shot composition because of the vertical format haha
Vertical aspect is perfect for psychological thillers/horror movies... I got so many ideas... 1. A child looking through a closet, while something happening on the other side, 2. A killer chasing upwards through the stairs, at every level the main character gets flashbacks, 3. A joker having a show in a small spaced multi level opera room, with people forced to watch and laugh, 4. A midget kidnapped for money. Basically, in order to get close shot, you should not just focus on one eye, but rather you must utilize the room in which the person is. Use a lot of perspective looking up, looking down, walking forward, walking backwards... utilize doors, stairs, legs, skyscrapers, spears, bow and arrow, crevasses ... anything that is vertical. Remember that closeup scene on both eyes was designed for horisontal ratio, as is the "child in a closet looking while parents are arguing" is designed for vertical. Every scene when a child watches parents arguing, is framed so that the child is behind door or planks, which limit the sides of the horisontal frame. If you really want to show a closeup scene in vertical with both eyes shown, then you must similarly limit the top and bottom sides of the frame, for example a child looking under the blanket or bed or something. The vertical cowboy scenes are very bad done, as they tried to embed horisontal frames for vertical aspect ratio... You must change the objects on frame, rather than trying to make same scene with verticals ! ! ! For example, mountains in a landscape is not going well in vertical, because it is horisontal = Never shoot landscape... BUT you can change the scene to be a crevasse, maybe a waterfall, rather than trying to put a mountain into the frame of vertical. Other examples when vertical is perfect... A person walking in a small alley between 2 brick houses, maybe someone is dragging their knife along one of the brick walls... You can use wide angle and point a little downwards, to get a lot of foreground... The film can have scenes in construction sites, or maybe tunnels underground which make natural vertical framing.
Wow tons of really great ideas! 👏 thanks so much for taking the time to share your thoughts with us! That’s also a great point about the cowboy scenes 👍
@danielalt7508 awesome! Love to hear that! Let us know how it turns out or if you post any of the results! Especially if you’re able to get cool closeups and subjectivity on someone’s face. That’s one of the more challenging parts for us we’ve found when filming vertically
Totally! In fact, that’s how we started out making vertical short films. It was mostly found footage horror and sci-fi until recently we started trying to make more cinematic vertical shorts. But I totally think this format works for found footage movies.
I believe vertical is more immersive, because you also "see" with your body, where feelings of emotions happen. With a vertical screen you feel more what you are seeing. i believe; it's not a techical conclusion! :)
I do not believe this is the future of cinema. I always film in a horizontal manner. Unless future TVs have that aspect ratio, I do not see vertical filming as the future.
Awesome love the challenge idea! And you’re right Haha I thought about doing this vid that way but I wanted to optimize it for TH-cam and have some stuff explaining it by rotating the screen etc. but trust me the irony was not lost on me haha however we do make vertical TikTok shorts every week. So pls check us out on there if you have a chance. Sozo Bear Films / @thelukepilgrim on TikTok. Thanks!
Vertical shooting is out of sync with human anatomy. We have two eyes on a horizontal plane. Our vision is therefore wider than it is tall. Shooting vertically will never feel natural for this reason.
That’s a funny observation actually haha hadn’t even thought about it 😂 I needed to show the different aspect ratios tho and it was easier that way Haha plus my real conclusion was that it’s prob not the real future of filmmaking. But it was fun to explore anyway 😂
Yeah it’s not our favorite honestly. We’ve been doing less of it lately. But it was an interesting exercise to learn how to make quality videos that work vertically. Lately we’ve tried shooting for both. So it works horizontally but if cropped vertically it still looks good. That’s much more difficult but we use the monitor that will add the vertical letterbox so we can see roughly what it will look like while we’re filming. 👍
This video inspired me SO HARD to make vertical cinematography.
One thing I can say about vertical movement and action is that ots WAY harder to contextualize because of gravity.
Side to side movement can be of a person walking and we can see the distance moved, but to convey that simple action in a vertical canvas we have to get creative and probably stick the camera behind the character and walk in a 3rd person POV. Omg im already problem solving. LETS GOOO
Would love to hear if you’ve tried any vertical shots yet? Let us know how it’s going! Thanks! 🎥
It's not the future of cinema, because the vertical video is popular currently only due to the devices we have. With the undercurrent of VR and AR technologies, it seems that we'll soon see cinema that isn't bounded by boxes, of any orientation whatsoever.
I like that idea. That should be the follow up to this video essay. Asking the question if VR is the future of cinema.
yet another reason I'm having the vasectomy carried out
The problems with this are: Social media use is not the way we experience cinema or most of our lives for that matter. Vertical compositions are contrary to how we exist: we don't move vertically through space, we move horizontally. You can get some clever vertical shots like the stair shot in that iPhone ad but it isn't a sustainable format for telling stories in an effective visual manor. It's an experimental technique at best, a novelty at worst.
More still: Our eyes see more horizontally than vertically. Horizontal is a much more natural orientation all around.
Manner not manor.
no it fucking isn't
But imagine if it is.... 🤔
@@SozoBearFilmsno.
awesome video !!! im working on a verticle project , your content is dope!!!
Thanks so much! Glad you are enjoying it! What type of vertical project are you making? Hope it’s going well!
The human eyes are placed on each side of the head. Not on top of each other. Vertical film are working against that. Panoramic screen are the natural way for us to look at.
The trend with the vertical way to look is due to the fact that people is to lazy to turn the mobilphone. A filmmaker by heart will never approve the vertical format.
So to start a healthy dialogue, does making vertical films discredit someone as a filmmakers? How come great photographs work in both landscape and portrait framing? What distinctly makes film a panoramic medium and not other forms of art? We would love to hear your thoughts!
@@SozoBearFilms The Sozo Bozos of this world always shoot imbecilically vertical; we cannot fix bone heads.
...
@@SozoBearFilms Vertical videos are one of the main tools for keeping the comfortable, addicted, run-of-the-mill consumer stupid.
The aim of so-called SMART devices is to make the user dependent and addicted to consumption. This ideal, comfortable, stupid user is much easier to manipulate and control. As you can see, you can even convince such people that their eyes are overlapping, that's how it is from now on and you're going along with it because you want to be that user. The only benefit that I can get from it myself is the further development of the poster. For example, cinema posters are more appealing in portrait format and achieve better advertising. Therefore, vertical screens are nothing other than digital billboards for advertising. Billboards with movement, magazines, catalogs for goods, especially fashion presentations are suitable for this, I think.
Postcards, for example, do not really serve this purpose in portrait format, although portrait format is common for images and is considered "normal".
Be that as it may, the video in portrait format is attributed to the technically uneducated user, who does not want to learn any more. He wants to be entertained and liked.
In projection, live visuals performance, and in the cinema, the landscape format is still used because you can create all other formats from it by cutting away edges and so on.
Films, visuals and video material in general are always shot and produced with edges, the main focus is the center, working from the middle in all four directions so that it can be cropped if necessary.
The same thing happens in reverse, including the so-called social media, by adding edges.
Portrait format videos are a waste of resources, a waste of space, just like taxing illegal taxes again. Vertical video "producers" put up with all this; it is much easier to get them to only eat the middle of their freshly bought, delicious bread and give the rest to the authorities on either side.
In addition, such users are easier to monitor, label and calculate. I feel most sympathy when the ignorant vertical format filmmaker watches the vertical format video recordings of the sea horizon at sunset on his TV at home after his vacation and is surprised because something doesn't seem quite right with it.
In any case, people who actually know about photo and video technology can draw on it, make something out of it, deal with it in a constructive and productive way, and perhaps even educate an ignorant person here and there and wake them up. The whole topic also shows how great the power of the so-called social media is and it also shows their intentions, as mentioned, manipulation, surveillance, inability to think for oneself, let alone act, like-lust, superficiality, self-expression addiction and ultimately just fear of what or that the "others" (idiots) might think about one.
Greetzz & Blessings from the horizontal city of Vienna, Nikita
Here’s my two cents as a videographer: Vertical videos are a way to dumb people down. They might make sense for short, clickbait videos, product or fashion photos, social media stuff, but they are not at all natural when it comes to cinema. Additionally, they significantly damage the dynamics of most scenes. If we want to show the vastness of a landscape with a subject in it, we end up showing areas that are usually not relevant to the composition: too much ground and sky. In dialogue scenes, if we want to have a shot with both actors (or worse, a group of actors), we need to use extremely wide shots or place characters in unnatural positions. And once again, in those wide shots, we end up with a lot of empty space above and below that probably won't add anything. This doesn’t mean we can’t create original works designed for vertical that work very well. For example, a music video designed for vertical screens. I even like and find it makes sense for festival screens to be vertical, especially for musicians with instruments, as it's the best ratio (though I still prefer 4:5 over 9:16). But for it to become the industry standard for films? I really hope not. Call me "old school," but I think we are destroying something that took years to find the best formula for, just because turning the phone is too much to ask of people...
I really admire the enthusiasm of vertical filmmaking advocates and the creativity with which they've been trying to make it work, but I doubt it'll ever catch on outside of the social media content space. It's clear that even when used by a skilled filmmaker such as yourself making the best of the format, it still shows its limitations at every turn while adding nothing of value other than "you don't have to turn your phone to watch it".
The Damien Chazelle short film, which was meant to show inspiring ways in which vertical video could be explored, just cemented this impression. Not only were half of the shots awkwardly composed, but also the concept itself couldn't have made it more obvious how much the format ends up dictating the types of story that can be told. In other words, that was an entertaining short but if that's the best an Academy Award winning director can do with the format, that's not a good sign.
On a more nitpicking note, I don't see much merit in the idea that getting a viewer's attention by occupying more screen real estate is that advantageous in a filmmaking context. That might be a decent argument for vertically-formatted trailers or ads, but usually by the time someone decides to watch a film (feature or short) it has already caught their attention in some way so having the entire film be formatted in that suboptimal manner just degrades the experience for very little gain.
I'm also kinda baffled by this notion that all visual media has to start crippling itself to conform to the arbitrary constraints of a particular platform. People have never had a problem turning their phones to watch videos on the mobile apps for TH-cam and streaming services, so why should we all bow down to TikTok and its copycats? TikTok won't be here forever.
Vertical media is a downfall and there is no rationality to it... It's just sucks... Are we really going to conform all our media format to a fricking handheld device??? Really??? I hope it will fade away in a few years...
It won't. This is how Apple, Google, Instagram, Tiktok, etc have planned it. The Auto Rotate lock on your phone is set to portrait. Can the screen be locked to landscape instead? Sorry, it can't. This is a bad design.
How does this video not have more views? Well explained , Informative and interesting. Thanks
Thanks so much! Really appreciate that! Pls consider subscribing :)
As an animator in film/games industry, these modern phones influencing vertical videos has bothered me since the beginning. 90% of videos are vertical now on youtube. The youtube shorts made it even worse because it brought the TikToxic people. TH-camrs like SSSniperWolf do nothing but watch other peoples' TikToxic videos for false "reactions" and get revenue from it. Vertical never looked good. 95% of humans don't know how to do basic film and turn the phone sideways for horizontal. The crazy part is, they probably think actual cameras in the store capture images in vertical, which they do not. True cameras capture photos in horizontal. Vertical videos cut off 50% of the raw footage. I don't comprehend why this is appealing. Almost every car video these days is vertical, short, and covered with TikToxic music. Everyone is attempting to do cinematic work in vertical form, and they have no clue what they are doing.
I don't really disagree haha We only started making vertical content because we had so much more success on TikTok. And this video is more of an essay to ask the question and argue it a bit but even in the end I said I don't think we'll be seeing vertical movies etc. We just shot a new short film and of course filmed it horizontally like we normally do. But we can't ignore the huge audience on TikTok and the fact that we are able to make creative content we enjoy on there and also monetize it. The price we pay is a ton of difficulty in shot composition because of the vertical format haha
What do you mean by true cameras? I'm just curious.
Great points man
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!
I like this video. Thanks man!
I'm working on my first vertical feature film now. I really appreciate this video. Tremendously informative. Thank you. 👍🏾
Glad we could help! Cheers!
Cannes just made Tik Tok a partner and that short films made on tik tok will be able to compete in the competition.
Vertical aspect is perfect for psychological thillers/horror movies... I got so many ideas...
1. A child looking through a closet, while something happening on the other side,
2. A killer chasing upwards through the stairs, at every level the main character gets flashbacks,
3. A joker having a show in a small spaced multi level opera room, with people forced to watch and laugh,
4. A midget kidnapped for money.
Basically, in order to get close shot, you should not just focus on one eye, but rather you must utilize the room in which the person is. Use a lot of perspective looking up, looking down, walking forward, walking backwards... utilize doors, stairs, legs, skyscrapers, spears, bow and arrow, crevasses ... anything that is vertical.
Remember that closeup scene on both eyes was designed for horisontal ratio, as is the "child in a closet looking while parents are arguing" is designed for vertical. Every scene when a child watches parents arguing, is framed so that the child is behind door or planks, which limit the sides of the horisontal frame. If you really want to show a closeup scene in vertical with both eyes shown, then you must similarly limit the top and bottom sides of the frame, for example a child looking under the blanket or bed or something.
The vertical cowboy scenes are very bad done, as they tried to embed horisontal frames for vertical aspect ratio... You must change the objects on frame, rather than trying to make same scene with verticals ! ! !
For example, mountains in a landscape is not going well in vertical, because it is horisontal = Never shoot landscape...
BUT you can change the scene to be a crevasse, maybe a waterfall, rather than trying to put a mountain into the frame of vertical.
Other examples when vertical is perfect... A person walking in a small alley between 2 brick houses, maybe someone is dragging their knife along one of the brick walls...
You can use wide angle and point a little downwards, to get a lot of foreground... The film can have scenes in construction sites, or maybe tunnels underground which make natural vertical framing.
Wow tons of really great ideas! 👏 thanks so much for taking the time to share your thoughts with us! That’s also a great point about the cowboy scenes 👍
@@SozoBearFilms thx for response. Also I think might work with wide angles, like 10mm, to give space for the vertical sphere. Will be experimenting!
@danielalt7508 awesome! Love to hear that! Let us know how it turns out or if you post any of the results! Especially if you’re able to get cool closeups and subjectivity on someone’s face. That’s one of the more challenging parts for us we’ve found when filming vertically
I've been thinking about this a lot. I always wondered what if we saw a found footage movie like this?
Totally! In fact, that’s how we started out making vertical short films. It was mostly found footage horror and sci-fi until recently we started trying to make more cinematic vertical shorts. But I totally think this format works for found footage movies.
I believe vertical is more immersive, because you also "see" with your body, where feelings of emotions happen. With a vertical screen you feel more what you are seeing. i believe; it's not a techical conclusion! :)
Thanks for the comment! Sorry for the late reply! I appreciate your perspective!
I do not believe this is the future of cinema. I always film in a horizontal manner. Unless future TVs have that aspect ratio, I do not see vertical filming as the future.
😑
😮
No, it's not, because classic smartfones are not the final stage in the evolution of this type of gadgets.
I think you’re probably correct! Any idea where the phone will end up in terms of how it looks or even how we will interface with it in the future?
uuhhhh...
yes "uuhhh..." indeed
@@SozoBearFilms Obviously
very interesting. i would like to do this on as my new videography challenge for 2022. (you should have done this video vertically too 😅)
Awesome love the challenge idea! And you’re right Haha I thought about doing this vid that way but I wanted to optimize it for TH-cam and have some stuff explaining it by rotating the screen etc. but trust me the irony was not lost on me haha however we do make vertical TikTok shorts every week. So pls check us out on there if you have a chance. Sozo Bear Films / @thelukepilgrim on TikTok. Thanks!
Has someone ever pointed out that u look like Jared Leto?
It was my first thought too
Great tips, thanks.👍
Vertical shooting is out of sync with human anatomy. We have two eyes on a horizontal plane. Our vision is therefore wider than it is tall. Shooting vertically will never feel natural for this reason.
yet you didn't make this video vertical (*sighs)
That’s a funny observation actually haha hadn’t even thought about it 😂 I needed to show the different aspect ratios tho and it was easier that way Haha plus my real conclusion was that it’s prob not the real future of filmmaking. But it was fun to explore anyway 😂
A trend that I would happy not to see 😢
Yeah it’s not our favorite honestly. We’ve been doing less of it lately. But it was an interesting exercise to learn how to make quality videos that work vertically. Lately we’ve tried shooting for both. So it works horizontally but if cropped vertically it still looks good. That’s much more difficult but we use the monitor that will add the vertical letterbox so we can see roughly what it will look like while we’re filming. 👍
Just turn you phone horizontal. 🤦🏽
😂
Please God no!
Vertical isn't the future of anything except an education for people about how to hold a camera properly.
This is a joke, right?
😂
😝
🤷♂️
NO!
😂 I agree honestly