Hybrid Photography and Video

Today’s Post by Mark Toal

This year I wrote a few blog posts about shooting video with your mirrorless camera and next year I plan to do a lot more on the subject. Video is out of my photography comfort zone so I keep returning to still photography. For a lot of photographers including me, taking photos is a way to observe a scene without having to interact with it. Video tends to be the opposite in that you have plan and direct the video more than in still photography. Scary, huh? It is for me.

Lat year I did a lot of photography for a Facebook page that I manage for a local steam train preservation group in Portland, the SP&S 700 and decided to start shooting video along with the still images. After all, the billowing steam and the sound of the engine are some of the best things about a steam locomotive. Somebody suggested that I make a slide show with the stills and video of this year’s activity for the train.

When I put together the final show I realized that I am still shooting more still photos than video clips. In future posts I’m going to explain how I shoot and put together video and stills and what I’ve learned along the way. It’s going to a video 2015.