shaky camera

shaky camera

A cinematographic technique in which the camera is operated by hand, as opposed to being fixed on a mount, resulting in a jerky, unstable image. This is done to emulate a first-person perspective or imitate what an ordinary person might have captured on a handheld camcorder in order to create a sense of immersion or heighten the sense of excitement, terror, urgency, etc. I'm really sick of the trend in recent horror movies to have the whole thing filmed in shaky camera. It isn't scary, it's just nauseating! It just felt like the shaky camera was a cheap way for the filmmakers to give the documentary a sense of authenticity. The director uses shaky camera to give the audience a glimpse into the protagonist's point of view during especially emotional scenes.
See also: camera, shaky
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
See also:
  • shaky cam
  • shaky-cam
  • cam
  • damaged
  • build (something) on sand
  • build on sand
  • drive (one) mad
  • drive (someone) mad
  • a basket case
  • basket case
References in periodicals archive
Once I got used to the shaky camera close-ups that gave me motion sickness, I enjoyed this powerful drama.
Instead of adding to its aesthetics, the shaky camera just makes scenes play out awkwardly and leaves the audience feeling slightly uncomfortable.
Shot like a gritty documentary, with shaky camera and close-ups, and with plenty of improvised scenes, it's a powerful and intimate look at relationships.
Using a hand-held, shaky camera technique to illustrate the instability of the artist's mental state, Schnabel forces viewers to both wince at and empathize with Van Gogh.
Director Julian Schnabel, also a painter, creates an homage to the artist's life, showcasing van Gogh's artistic process through a distracting shaky camera meant to mimic the chaos of van Gogh's own mind.
What they want is information, and as long as your video is informative, they will forgive grammatical errors and shaky camera angles.
Direk Dan incorporates the usual shaky camera works like most indie films do.
n Our Girl (BBC1, Tuesday) saw Nepal hit by an earthquake which came right out of a 1970s Doctor Who episode, the special effects being limited to a shaky camera and actors throwing themselves around like avant garde performance artists.
When we started I said, "For the battles, we will get the rough stuff, but I don't want a shaky camera all the time." He's a great camera guy, and all his crews were great too.
Told from street level, the film is a dizzying mix of shaky camera work and hyperactive editing where we're never more than a few minutes from something blowing up or someone being mown down.
In Hollywood action movies, directors mask their actors' subpar fighting skills with shaky camera moves and extreme close-ups.
Even just listening to score updates on the radio or watching the shaky camera shots on Match of the Day, you can feel the atmosphere.
If shaky camera work gives you a headache, I'd recommend giving this one a miss.
There were some grammatical errors in the subtitles and some shaky camera scenes, but overall the production values were fine.
With this technology, the phone's gyroscope will help with shaky camera footage when video recording and it will help prevent blurry images, especially when the person holding the camera is having a hard time keeping it still.