Slug & Lede

“Sin City Shooters”is a 2008 video shot by the Las Vegas Sun about the Sin City Shooters club in Summerlin, Nevada.

The video is extremely well done because of the good mix of different camera angles and shot types.  This was the major strength of the piece. Two shots that were used particularly well were the wide shot and pan shot. The wide shot was used appropriately to give the viewers an idea of the surroundings, which appeared to be the sweltering Las Vegas desert complete with beautiful mountains in the backdrop. The pan shot was used very well to follow two of the shooters as they moved from target to target. This can be a difficult shot because you have to follow at just the right pace and keep the camera steady will doing so. The camera operator did a good job of keeping the camera from shaking and moving at just the right speed as he/she followed the shooter.

The interviews were excellent, the “rule of thirds” was followed perfectly. The interviews were a big part of why video was the right medium for this story. Hearing the voices of the shooters, especially the woman, allowed people to hear the excitement in her voice firsthand. I also liked the gunshots that could be heard throughout the piece, the gunshots weren’t too loud and didn’t disrupt the piece at all. This was very important because the interviewers, especially the woman, described the sound very enthusiastically as an important part of shooting.

It was hard to find weaknesses in this piece, but I feel that there were a few. The first has to do with the caption below the video, which mentioned something about the club holding bimonthly shooting contests. Nothing was ever mentioned in the piece about shooting contests, it was about the enthusiasm the these people have for shooting.

While the story used many different types of unique shots, there were a few that could have been done differently. At the 37 second mark, there is a very wide shot of a man shooting in the direction of the camera. The wide shot was unnecessary, it showed a couple of people standing around behind the man as well as some parked cars, and the surroundings had already been seen in a previous wide shot. A medium shot or even a close up illustrating the facial features of the man probably would have worked better.