Cross Canada Video Tour: Halifax

Filming has always intrigued me. There’s some superb travel bloggers and travel vloggers out there shooting their travels, and coming back with some incredible footage. Kinda makes me wonder, if a picture is worth a thousand words, what’s the going rate for video? Unfortunately, video has never really been something I’ve put a lot of time and effort into. Not because I didn’t want to, or because I didn’t have the skills. Part of my problem is that a) I got a case of the camera shy’s and b) I tend to break every video camera I’ve ever purchased. My last decent video camera died in a freak sandboarding accident; however, you can see the footage I was able to get before it met it’s maker (canon I believe).

All that is about to change though! With the recent purchase of my Canon 60d (which by the way, shoots beautiful video!), I was finally able to start filming again! You still might not catch me in a ton of video, and while part of that is because I’m still a bit shy, I also think I can let the destination speak for itself. My game plan is to do up a little video for each city I visit over the summer.

Halifax, Nova Scotia

My first finished travel video is on one of my favourite cities in Canada, and a place I was calling home for the last few years. The beautiful east coast metropolitan city of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Spring litterally sprung last week, and I took the opportunity to spend my long weekend filming out and about in downtown Halifax. I feel like I managed to do it justice, and even managed to include some of my favourite restaurantes in town. I wanted to play up the “artsy” side of travel, and really showcase the people and the general demeanor of life in Halifax. I think using some of these “vintage” techniques adds a bit of personality to the shots and kind of forces you to admire the subtle details of Halifax.

[box border=”full” icon=”none”]I primarily used my vintage 55mm F1.8 Super-Takumar lens for most of the video, mainly because of the unique light leaks it’s able to grab, but also because of it’s large depth of field. There’s a few shots in there that were done with my Canon 18-200mm F3.5 – 5.6 on; but only if the scene required it. I was really trying to play up the warm tints and beautiful colours I so frequently see on sunny days in Halifax, so I was always trying to shoot into the light in the late afternoon / early evening, right around sunset. The lens blurs and tilt-shift type effects were all done by hand by Free Lensing my Super-Takumar. The only post work I added was some color grading using the Technicolor Cinestyle S-curve.

I’m hoping next time around I can keep my hands a little more steady, and will probably have to dial down the focus fun. Still have lots to learn![/box]

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