During my twelve years as a documentary filmmaker there is only one thing I could have been sure of all the time: Change. Especially when it comes to technology.
When I think of the washed out video material my first DV-Camcorder was delivering I can hardly imagine that this was the standard in video journalism less than ten years ago. Since then the technical challenges you had to face in the process of filmmaking have become less and less.
Today a state-of-the-art-smartphone provides a pretty good in built camera and enough capacity to shoot several minutes of full HD video footage. More than that: The processors inside these devices deliver enough power to edit the material, do a voice over and add some nice looking effects to your movie. Add some extra gear like a lavallier microphone, some addtional light and a small rig – here you go.
Even though I still love my professional camera – I left it at home for the time my fellowship at the World Press Institute. But this will not stop me from filmmaking at all. I will shot all of my upcoming videos with my smartphone. So I did when I arrived in Washington last week to do the first episode of this mobile video series.
[video: http://youtu.be/0B7cKaXjkEQ]