How to film MINIATURES | Top 10 filmmaking tips

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Steve Ramsden here with DIY Moviemaking and this week I’m sharing my top 10 tips for filming miniatures! To demonstrate this I’m using this 1/350 scale model of Fireflash from Gerry Anderson's Thunderbirds.

Tip number 1 is to think about the scale of your miniature – basically, the bigger the better, and some famous films have used some enormous miniatures, referred to by Peter Jackson as ‘bigatures’. The bigger your model, the more detail it can have and so the more realistic it will probably look.

Tip number 2 is to consider your lens choice and camera position. A wider lens will make a model look bigger than a tighter lens. But this will only make your model look suitably big and impressive if you also get that wide lens really close to the model. Normally if you get lower with your camera or raise you model up if you can’t get lower, this again will make it look bigger.

Tip number 3: Depth of field. This refers to how much of the image is in focus and how much is blurry. You want to close your iris down to try and get as much of the model in focus as possible, otherwise you're going to be changing focus between different parts of the model and this is really going to make it look tiny. So on your screen you want the highest F number you can see displayed.

Tip number 4 is to think about Lighting, and how to use lighting to hide anything that doesn’t look realistic. A single main light source will probably look the most accurate to represent the sun, because multiple shadows can easily make something look like it’s in a studio.

Tip number 5 is to think about the TEXTURE of your model that the lighting may be hitting. There is a tendency for models to look way too clean and pristine and brand new, and again this can be a giveaway that they are not real. So painting or rubbing dirt onto a model can help.

Tip number 6 is to think about movement. If you’re planning to move the camera, use a slider to keep the movement steady. For shots where you plan on replacing the background, it’s often easier to move the camera rather than move the model, like ILM did in Star Wars, and they used a motion control system.

Tip number 7 is frame rate. When shooting at a higher frame rate such as 120 frames per second you can achieve slow motion by playing the clip back at your normal speed such as 24 or 25 frames per second - the whole shot will stretch out longer and so appear much slower, and this in turn will make objects look heavier and generally add a feeling of weight to any movements in the scene.

Tip number 8 is Shutter speed - this controls how much motion blur your shot will have. For normal-looking motion blur like what our eyes see, you should always set your shutter speed to double your frame rate.. But just like closing your iris, know that cranking up the shutter speed will once again make your scene darker.

High frames rates and shutter speeds are especially essential regarding Tip number 9 is know that anything involving fire and water will make things harder! It is very tough to make these things look convincing in miniature, as if your model is surrounded by giant flames or waves, they can just end up making your model look smaller.

Tip number 10 is think about combining your miniature shots with full scale elements. A good example is to shoot some foreground elements in front of a green screen, and if you light these to match your model then this can be another clever way to fool your audience. You can see a great example of this in the engine room scenes in Titanic where the entire background is actually a miniature. You can also do it the other way round, and add full-scale backgrounds or set extensions to miniatures to make them more believable, and again you can get some really fun results with this, like I did with this Saturn 5 model rocket which I tried using to recreate the launch sequence of Apollo 13. So the possibilities really are endless when compositing full-scale elements together with miniatures. And if you’re interested in learning how to do this easily using Adobe After Effects, then you’ll probably enjoy my dedicated After Effects Essentials course, and the link to learn more about that is below.

So hopefully all these tips have given you some fun ideas to try out in your own projects if you want to have a go at filming some miniatures.

#filmmaking #miniatures #diymoviemaking

[MrPeaceandLiberty]

The high speed frame rate was usually calculated based on the scale of the model. The square root of the denominator was used as the frame rate multiplier. For example, for a 1/16 scale model would be shot at four times the usual 24 fps rate, or 96 fps. A 1/25 scale model would be shot at five times the usual rate, or 120 fps. It would be particularly useful when a model is in water, , or the scene involves pyrotechnics or some other motion.

[danpalooza]

There's a formula to get the proper frame rate for whatever scale model you're shooting. Camera frame rate is increased as the inverse square root of the scale fraction. For instance if the scale model is 1/16th scale, take the inverse of the fraction (which is 16) then square root it (which is 4) then multiply that by what frame rate you want it to be perceived as (usually 24fps) and that gives you what frame rate you should shoot at (96fps in this example).

Once you establish this frame rate you can then calculate how fast your model needs to travel to have the perceived speed desired. Which lets say you want your 1/16th scale model to look like it's going 60mph. Multiply your scale fraction by your desired portrayed speed, then multiply again by your frame rate that we calculated before (96fps) then divide that by your normal frame rate (24fps). So the answer for this example would be 15mph or 22 ft/sec for the scale model to travel. (1/16 x 60mph x 96fps / 24fps = 15mph).

[MobileFilmmaking]

As a person who makes sci-fi shorts I really need to put these into play so that I'm not solely relying on digital effects. Another awesome video.

[albertol]

It was the Fireflash in the thumbnail that grabbed my attention. As one of the original audience of the programme, I grew up with it and all of Gerry Anderson’s “Supermarionation” programmes. It was a time when kids TV producers cared about what they were doing. There’s a great documentary out about Thunderbirds and Gerry Anderson’s Slough based 21st Century Productions. Many younger viewers or non-UK might be surprised to learn that the same guys that invented most of the methods for Gerry Anderson were involved in the UK shooting of the special effects in Star Wars. If you get a moment look out for the documentary. If you’re an aspiring film maker or just reminiscing, it’s worth a watch.

Thank you for explaining some of these techniques in this video.

[trespire]

The emergency landing sequence of the Fireflash is one of the most epic action sequences I've ever seen.
The suspention, the music score and dialogue were top notch.

[SamsDesigns]

Incredible stuff Steve! As a miniature film effects enthusiast this is the video I always hoped you’d make

[lilstarfishdude]

Great stuff! 😃👍
When painting miniatures, it's 'usually' best to use matte (not glossy) paint, as the glossy highlights have a tendency to make miniatures look like toys.
Happy Easter!! 🐇

[leokimvideo]

When I blew up the helicopter on Matrix there were multiple frame rates used. The chopper was 1/4 scale and had cameras set at 120fps and a main wide camera running at 500fps. The actual action of the crash happened over just over 4 seconds, explosives sequence was around 800m/s. Most of the charges were set at 20m/s delays. And I think what many people forget is a miniature shot at a high frame rate has to have the model moving quite fast to be believable.

[LilyUnsub]

This is so brilliant, come back to this regularly as a checklist for stopmo so thank you!! 💗

[CreepyDan]

Excellent tips sir! I have only used miniatures once so far, it sure was tedious but it was super rewarding when you see the final scene. These tips will help greatly, thanks again! Cheers!

[AsterixTheScot]

Thank you! Great tips. Thank you for sharing.

[TheCrafsMan]

Excellent tips! And straight to the point. Top-shelf video! Thank you!

[elijahrobertscinema]

ThunderBirds was my fav when I was a kid! Forgot all about them until you mentioned them! Great video!

[troybarnes]

Big support for the channel and keep on making awesome content and guides and giveaways in the future as well. Worked for me

[tomstamford]

Only yesterday I was recommended your channel by the algorithm and instantly became a fan and hooked.

A big thanks for your efforts to spread the knowledge of film making and digital processing with necessary detail while still maintaining clarity. The mark of a good teacher.

This seems so accessible to me now, with the tools even people like me can easily (sort of) afford (though the thought of learning PS and AE is giving me chest pains). I am really wanting to get into some small projects now.

I particularly appreciated the 'Add Yourself to Movies' video - I didn't finish until 8 am watching your tutorials - and it finally gave me the answer to how does one manipulate the background when you're not the film maker with 2 shots of the same scene.

[MalibuDollface]

Perfect timing for my short film I’m starting !

[micahheemstra]

Love this! I've been wanting to experiment with filming miniatures for a while. These are the perfect tips for getting started!

[Mr-S.C.]

Fantastic video!! You obviously know exactly what you are talking about and have the experience to prove it. Something I've always wanted to try is miniature film making and now I'm just a bit more confident after watching this.

[imagehouse]

So much knowledge, thanks for the tips & tricks.

[metafuel]

This was excellent and full of really good information.
Thanks for your time.