Episode 019 - What if Your Roommate was Batman?!

Ryan checks out the Paranormal Activity screening, asks San Fransisco who's the best director ever, and Batman haunts Josh.

Episode Run-time - 11:14

Push Pull Effect
Also known as the smash zoom, dolly zoom, and the vertigo effect (named after Alfred Hitchcock's film Vertigo), it has been used in films such as Steven Spielberg's Jaws, Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring, and Martin Scorsese's Good Fellas.
 * Difficulty: Easy
 * Needs:
 * Camera with zoom capability
 * Dolly (almost necessary)

Static Actor, Shrinking Background
While you can achieve this effect handheld, it is better to use a dolly for stability (and sanity).

Start close to your actor. Dolly the camera back while zooming in towards your actor. This will appear as though the background is shrinking while your actor stays relatively the same size.

Static Actor, Expanding Background
You can also do the reverse and get the same effect. Start far from your actor, dolly towards them while zooming out and there you have it.

The trick is to try to zoom and dolly at the same rate. Try to achieve the effect slowly on a static object, such as a vase, and incrementally go faster. Do this a day or two before your shoot to avoid multiple retakes.

Trivia
Tim's "Warning-Warned" turns to non-sense as his jokes start to contain toilet humor (pun intended).

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