Creatives, Design, Engineering, Tutorials, VideoVideo Tip: How to Incorporate B-Roll Footage
Some days, your interviews just don’t go as planned.
People cough between sentences. They pause every 30 seconds to dry a few tears. Their favorite word suddenly becomes “Um…..”
And then it hits you: That Oscar-worthy “1-take wonder” just isn’t going to happen this time. And these things aren’t awful. But they can detract from the flow & overall quality of your finished video.
Enter B-Roll:
Secondary footage that overlays your interview footage to drive home a point and / or to bandage some nasty editing cuts.
This can easily change a 10-minute video into a 2-minute video, and still drive home the same points in a shorter time.
Sound cool?
Interested in what this process looks like? Check out the video after the jump…
B-Roll happens all the time. Watch any local car commercial or reality TV show, and you’ll probably notice a person’s audio feed get hacked to pieces. (A good clue is sudden changes in voice timing & intonation).
If you’re looking for a few general B-Roll resources, check out DigitalJuice or iStockVideo.
What about you?
Do you use B-Roll or secondary angles to cover up edits or illustrate a point in your videos?
What creative ways have you found that work well?
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7 Responses to “Video Tip: How to Incorporate B-Roll Footage”
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1. I often use a Flip camera off to the side to give me the angle shot.
2. When appropriate for the interview or project, I shoot footage of a person’s hands. It gives a great personalized b-roll.
Thanks for this – could have used this idea a couple of years back but I’ll definitely look to incoporate it into newer stuff.
I have used B-Roll footage for years and it has made my videos much better. A recent example would be a video I did for a political campaign. I cut off 4 minutes and took out several camera bumps by switching to another zoomed out view. You can see both versions at http://www.youtube.com/timothywesco You would never be able to spot the edit unless you watch the unedited version first.
good tip !! thanks for this. will use that in my upcoming video productions
Hmmm, I tried this with a baptism story a short while back, and tried to make it interesting.
it is very effective for longer shots and helps the incorporation of the best pieces of different takes while hiding the cuts. The only problem is you have to plan for this.
As for stock footage: We don’t budget for that so I shoot my own, typical places I use it is in Title Packs and videos for music ‘videos’
We use b-roll of different types: picture slideshows, stock video, self-filmed stock video, etc.
B-roll is great… can’t live without. Totally use it to mask off edits all the time. However, sometimes I don’t use b-roll at all if the person whose testimony we’re filming is a great communicator or if the b-roll doesn’t help people connect to the emotional aspect of someone’s story. Or style reasons… sometimes, b-roll can be distracting if you’re wanting to do a super-clean vibe with your video or something.