See this thing…? It’s a clapperboard. Granted, it’s just about the nastiest chunk of old shit you can get as a clapperboard, and I’ve had it for the best part of twenty years – but I wouldn’t want to be without it.
The reason…? You should always “mark” (ie, clap) your scenes when filming for two main reasons. The first is having a sync point for your sound. Even in these days of automatic synchronising in Premiere and Final Cut Pro, it can still fail, and not having a nice obvious visual and audio snap to manually synchronise picture and sound is a total nightmare.
The second reason is that the writing on the board (also referred to as a slate, as that’s what the earliest ones were made of) tells the editor exactly what the scene is of. Nearly all forms of video production are shot out of order, so this simple reference tool helps you to know when and where you are in the story when it comes to the edit.
As an addition to the above point, you can use Premiere’s “Set Poster Frame” function to set the thumbnail to be of the slate, so you can tell at a glance which clip you want to use next.
And there’s another reason – those black and white chevrons on the snappy bit of the board, which are technically known as the sticks. These days, the modern whiteboard style clappers have coloured chevrons as well as the black and white, and these help you when you’re colour grading. Put one of these at the beginning of your shot (or, if this isn’t possible, add it at the end of the shot – this is known as an “end board”) and you’ll always have something in the shot to match colours with.
Useful little things, aren’t they…?
A few quick tips for using them – add it to the beginning of the shot once the cameras and sound are rolling, otherwise the clap is useless. Try reading out the information written on it for the editor as well – for example, “Car Chase, Scene One, Take One”, and then call “Mark!” before bringing the sticks together.
Oh, and even though you do want a nice clean snap, don’t put the board too close to a subject’s face – you might know what you’re doing and why, but they probably don’t…!
So there we have it – the humble clapperboard. Bet you didn’t know they were so helpful, did you…? Get out there and grab yourself one now – trust me, you won’t regret it…!
Copyright © 2021 Chris Nelthorpe/Gasworks Films Ltd