How to Create Amazing Travel Video With Just an IPhone

Dewey notes, “if you’re just shooting using the automatic settings that come with your iPhone camera, it’s going to look more amateur.” You can unlock manual controls of your iPhone camera with the Filmic Pro app.

2. Adjust your bitrate, frame rate, and other settings.

In this example, Dewey is looking for a slow-mo effect that he’ll set up in the editing process. To capture that, he uses a frame rate of 60 fps in 1080p. He also boosts the bitrate to “extreme” to make sure that the camera is shooting in the highest quality possible.

3. Lock in your exposure and focus.

Using the app’s exposure settings, Dewey locks in the precise exposure and focus. He notes that when people fail to do this, and that when the exposure and focus change in the shot, “it’s a dead giveaway that the iPhone footage is more amateur.”

4. Apply LUTs to your footage in post processing.

The next stage is to play with the color grading of your footage by applying a LUT in your editing software. You can do this in either Final Cut or Adobe Premiere as well as different video editing apps on your phone. (Note that LUTs are not usable in iMovie.) Adding them is less complicated than it looks in the video, and you can find free LUTs available online.

5. Apply a cinematic crop.

The last thing Dewey does to his footage in post-processing is to crop 10% off the top and bottom, giving it a Letterbox look, which is more cinematic.

What do you think? Hard to believe that footage was shot on an iPhone! Please stay tuned for more episodes of our original Matador Filmmaking series coming soon!