Flowers In My Garden

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been in my back garden, experimenting behind the camera to create Sony Z5 cinematic footage in a simple setting for a short montage called Flowers In My Garden.

It’s been a great way to test new ideas and see how cinematic I can make even everyday subjects look.

The result is a short montage I’ve put together called Flowers In My Garden.

I shot all the footage using my Sony Z5. Earlier this year, I managed to get a small grant to help me buy new equipment for my filmmaking work, and the Z5 was the best camera I could afford. It’s been great having something more professional to work with, and I wanted to see how far I could push it to achieve a more cinematic feel, even with something as simple as garden flowers as the subject.

A big part of this experiment was playing with depth of field. The Z5’s 1/3-inch sensors don’t naturally give the super-shallow depth of field you’d get on larger sensor cameras, so I’ve been using longer focal lengths and keeping my subjects quite far from the background. It’s been interesting seeing how much separation I can create between the blooms and the softer greens behind them.

Lighting has also been key. I tried filming at different times of day—the early morning and late afternoon light were definitely my favourites, giving everything a nice warmth and softer shadows. I’m also finding that gentle breezes can add a beautiful movement to the petals, giving the shots more life than static images alone.

In post, I’ve been experimenting with subtle colour correction to deepen the greens and bring out the colours in the flowers. I’ve tried not to push it too far, but I’m curious how far I can go before it starts looking unnatural.

This project has been a simple one, but surprisingly satisfying. Even filming in my own garden, I’ve learned a lot about what makes images feel more cinematic—and how much the right light and composition can elevate even everyday subjects.

I’ll keep experimenting, but for now, Flowers In My Garden is up on my Vimeo page if you’d like to have a look. Let me know what you think, or if you’ve got any tips for getting more cinematic shots out of smaller sensor cameras like the Z5.

Right now, I’m editing Flowers In My Garden in Final Cut Pro, which has been my main editing software since I started making films. I’ve always liked how intuitive it feels, and it runs pretty smoothly on my Mac, even with HD footage from the Sony Z5. For this project, I’m using it to piece together the montage, experiment with different cuts, and add subtle colour correction to make the flowers really pop. I’ve also been playing around with cross-dissolves and slow-motion to give some of the shots a softer, more cinematic feel. Even with a short film like this, I’m finding it fascinating how much of the final look and emotion comes together in the edit. It’s where all the ideas I had behind the camera finally start to make sense.

That said, I’ve been hearing a lot about Adobe Premiere lately, especially since the CS5 release came out with better support for different formats and native editing of DSLR footage. I’m curious whether Premiere might handle the Z5’s HDV files more efficiently, and I like the idea of tighter integration with other Adobe tools like After Effects, which I’ve started learning for graphics and effects.

For now, Final Cut Pro still feels familiar and reliable, but I’m tempted to try Premiere on a small test project soon to see if it might speed up my workflow or give me more flexibility, especially as I keep pushing towards more cinematic work.

Thanks for reading.

— Alan