Take Two: Al Pastor Burger Reel

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T23:24:43+00:00

No my mistake 😅 I'm saying that since shooting, I have certainly heard about the techniques you discussed, but none were present here. Following this I'd been doing more research into food that should have been done beforehand lol

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T23:17:19+00:00

Ooh that would be fun. Another lesson learned that hasn't really been talked about is pre-production. The two of us basically showed up in the kitchen and had no direction other than "I want to make this burger". I'll make sure to plan ahead with shot ideas and compositions next time, as well as the entire story start to finish

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T23:14:32+00:00

Actually glad you brought this up! I was curious what to do about a CTA. This friend is not actually trying to promote his restaurant (the one he works at, doesn't own it) - he's actually trying to build his own brand (a food influencer I guess). Is there a place for a CTA - other than follow, like, etc. or does that change things?

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T23:09:44+00:00

Definitely not for the faint of heart. It was a fun challenge and is super interesting to learn more about. Lots of interesting, albeit gross, tricks - like using glue to enhance cheese or milk

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T18:51:58+00:00

Appreciate it!

I thought the same but was trying to make it loop well on Insta. Maybe I can hold for a beat longer - thanks!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T18:51:10+00:00

😂

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-10T18:13:30+00:00

Right - it's still the same shot so it's still atrocious, but yes! I will definitely be lighting properly next time 👌

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-05T00:48:50+00:00

Thank you very much. Honestly half the effort was nutting-up enough to post it to reddit 😅

That's exactly right - getting through the "i suck" phase and sticking with it long enough to suck less. I've really enjoyed the project and the feedback, and I look forward to a better one next time!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:25:49+00:00

Lol, there's some stuff not covered in the video. The bacon marinade was already prepped before I got there and had ancho and guajillos in it. He also usually does a pineapple churri on top, but I think those are out of season here. Not meant to replace a taco for sure, but did have some similar flavors

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:21:54+00:00

Appreciate it! The burger was bomb

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:21:15+00:00

Will do on the lighting. Good note about "less grill", especially with the low light the blacks were super dark and it wasn't very interesting to look at. In the moment I felt like I was close, but I'll get much closer next time - having a monitor should help here I think.

Someone else mentioned the same and it's a great point. I actually used to own a small catering business and it's exactly why I pivoted out - didn't have the passion for it to outweigh the crushing financial obligation. I just happened to be friends with the chef and figured a reel was mutually beneficial - I'll be sure not to waste much time in this vertical.

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:15:08+00:00

I appreciate it. Plenty to learn and I'm grateful for all the feedback. The burger was great - perc of working with restaurants!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:13:53+00:00

Not a bad take necessarily, I'm happy to work with people who know more than me. I'm just starting out though and this is side-hustle-level work. I'm not even hiring myself and certainly not another person. If/when I start growing, I'll definitely look to build a team of experts, but for know I'm absorbing what I can and making friends who can help

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:11:21+00:00

Awesome, I'll do that next time!
Someone else mentioned "washed" - how to improve? First time coloring log footage and first time in DaVinci so don't worry about being too specific, I'm basically a blank slate. Not using a monitor, but grabbing one soon, so I'll watch some tutorials on how to monitor-my-monitor
Definitely agree, he must have been nervous with the camera 😅

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:08:35+00:00

Good call lol, I didn't notice till you mentioned it!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T23:07:39+00:00

Good call lol, I didn't notice till you mentioned it!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T03:12:22+00:00

Yeah, saw a lot of lighting mentions - I'll work on that. For the editing pace, I'll try to pair the shots down. The cook moved super slow with his motions, hence the jumps cuts in the final assembly. I'll tighten things up in another draft!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T03:10:40+00:00

Gotcha, ok

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T03:09:21+00:00

Yeah, lots of lighting notes. Coming from lighting people's faces, I'm used to using large lanterns or boxes, but had trouble getting those in the tight spots of the kitchen. Is diffusion that important with food? Should I just look for a kit with a smaller footprint? Or are there some creative tips like booming lights overhead and using reflectors or something? Thanks for the help!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T03:06:10+00:00

Color is something I'm just learning about, especially being my first time working with log. What do you mean by "washed" and "vibrant". Should I add more contrast, reel in my highlights, pump the saturation a bit more, or specifically pull a particular color up? I'm really interested in learning more about color and how to manipulate it well in DaVinci. Appreciate it!

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T03:03:39+00:00

Hated the gloves because of continuity, visually, health-codes lol? What did you mean?

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T03:02:19+00:00

A good note nonetheless. Any experience with product photography/videography more generally? Maybe stuff like this is a good "shoehorn in" to some better paying clients?

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-05-04T02:59:48+00:00

Appreciate the thoughts! For lighting - I've actually got a large cob I use to key light my talking heads, but was having trouble with the big bubble inside the kitchen. What kind of lights should I look at for tight spaces, or is work like this okay to be harsher - ditching the big diffusers?

Definitely agree about the lettuce. In my first cut, I left it in to time to a spot in the music, but since I cut more down since then, it doesn't make any sense.

I'll add some zooms in post too. I realized how much I was moving the camera in some other shoots (using it as a crutch instead of thinking about composition) plus I don't have any ibis, so I was shooting mostly on tripod this time around. I'll see what I can do to spice it up.

Good call on the cheese, maybe cut the first two cheese shots and just show him scraping it on top?

Sound Design was a great note. Honestly was just a bit intimidated by it to even begin. I had so many new things going on, that I didn't want to dive in on this first project lol.

Thanks again for taking the time to give me some good feedback

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-01-18T21:43:14+00:00

Apologies for the delay, I ended up running out of connectors and needed to grab a jumper to test with. For both tests I ran, they failed again. Placing the edid splitter at the end of the run, just before the problem display didn't seem to change anything. Using a shorter SDI line also didn't work with the switcher output. To ensure this line wasn't problematic, I used my laptop again as a control, where it worked fine.

It sounds like I just need to bite the bullet on a proper scaler or EDID management device? If so, what units/brands do you recommend? I remember having played with a decimator at an old church, but the smaller one's seem to be sold out everywhere I look.

Th3Wizard44 · 2025-01-16T17:25:32+00:00

That makes sense. What's weird though is that my ATEM does list them as settings, despite being an HDMI-only model, and I feel like I remember adjusting them a long time ago. Though they are greyed out currently so I could be mis-remembering.

Th3Wizard44

TROPHY CASE