Camera Basic #20 - Open Gate and its advantages for social media explained
Social media has become indispensable and the technology continues to develop. Open Gate technology offers the possibility to read out the full sensor for video, because most cameras crop the image section to 16:9 when filming, which is okay for YouTube, but if you are filming productions for fashion campaigns, for example, where you need video material in portrait and landscape format, portrait format is required.
Open Gate reduces the production effort because you no longer have to make two separate recordings or crop the image with a loss of image quality.
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The sensor format plays a role with Open Gate
The MFT sensor really comes into its own for social media. When filming with this sensor format in Open Gate, you almost have a square, which means that the image can be cropped with less loss on the sides.
MFT Open Gate aspect ratiosMFT Open Gate aspect ratiosWith full format, the 16:9 image section looks different again and you lose more pixels on the long side of the horizontal image of the full format sensor.
APS-C and full-frame open gate aspect ratiosAPS-C and full frame open gate aspect ratiosMaximum flexibility when trimming
If you film with a camera with 6K OpenGate, you can crop many different image formats in the post-production of the video and thus meet different customer requirements, all with just one video recording and less image material. This shortens the shooting day and increases productivity.
Whether 16:9, 1:1, vertical 9:16 with 6K OpenGate, you don't need multiple camera settings to make all this possible.
So far, the Panasonic brand has offered the full-frame solution here and those who like to use APS-C will also find the Open Gate on some models.
Maximum flexibility of the 6K Open GateMaximum flexibility of the 6K Open GateHistory of the "open gate"
Of course, our system cameras don't have open gates, as was once the case with analog film, where there was a person on set who checked the camera's film gate for hair and dust and removed it before the next take. In general, open gate should rather be called "full sensor recording", but there is no suitable term like the gate from analog photography for digital photography.
A practical feature
Another practical feature is that some cameras, such as the Panasonic S5II +amp; Co, allow you to set subframes that show you whether your subject is in the export formats in the image when filming, allowing you to set 9:16, 1:1 or 5:4, for example, and produce the content quickly and effectively.
Conclusion
The OpenGate offers many advantages and essentially no disadvantages for videographers. The only disadvantage with the current cameras available on the market (02.2024) is that no more than 30fps is possible in the OpenGate. This makes it particularly suitable for interviews and small showcases without slow-motion scenes.
A little task for you:
Have a look at your camera's setting options and see what the largest possible format of your camera is!
Show us your pictures on Instagram and/or Facebook and tag us @fotokochde! We look forward to seeing your results!
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