Edgar Wright often uses crash zooms with his close ups, and this is something I want to use for my project. First though, I had to decide which method to use, and so I filmed twice for each action for my test – once using a zoom lens to crash zoom while filming, and once with a still shot to edit in a crash zoom later with After Effects using a motion blur. Paul suggested that Wright probably uses the latter, and after testing both methods out I found that I prefer this method. It just looks smoother, and there’s the option to time it as you want and fiddle with the speed of the zoom, and I think being able to play with this along with sound effects for pacing is really great. I’ve posted the tests below so you can see:
Using lens to zoom:
Using editing:
What am I referencing?
My idea for this test comes from Wright’s tendency to use crash zooms with his close up shots, particularly in montages. The video below is a collection of his close up scenes from all of his films, about half of which include crash zooms, so you can see what I was attempting to copy. Now I know how/which method I prefer, I can use this in my scene I’ll be shooting next.
