MovieChat Forums > Ghost Hunters (2004) Discussion > I'm always disappointed by the camerawor...

I'm always disappointed by the camerawork


I like this show and I keep on watching it to see if they finally pick up something incredible. I genuinely like the group (especially Steve and Tango). It rarely delivers amazing evidence, though. My main pet-peeve is that every time they see a shadow or a figure, the camera is never focused on the area they are referring to. And once the camera finally turns to that area, it is blurry while focusing. This leads me to start doubting. Not to mention the camera lights that create columns of light across the screen which obstructs the view of the whole room. I really wish that the camera crew would stop focusing their cameras on the investigators the entire time and maybe aim the camera in the direction the investigators are looking. I also think more evidence could be gathered by conducting more EVP sessions or using other equipment such as a ghost box or one of those word databases that seem to deliver decent results in other shows. They use these in Ghost Adventures, but the past few seasons of that show just became way too gimmicky and only show ten minutes of an investigation following a half an hour of cheesy re-enactments. This is why I continue to watch GH, since the focus is mainly on the investigation. What do you guys think?

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How else do you expect them to fudge evidence? There's no money in the budget for CGI.






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The biggest mistake viewers make is thinking that the show is about finding ghosts.

The show is called "Ghost Hunters", not "Hunting Ghosts".

The show is about watching TAPS hunt ghosts, it's not about watching what they're watching.

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[deleted]

I haven't watched the show for a long time so i don't know if this has been added since then, but considering how many times they've "missed" something by being a second too late with the camera, you would think that they might wanna use something head mounted if they seriously wanna raise the chance to catch something? But they don't ...and that's totally a conscious choice from their part. It's much more exciting to have that "Oh, did you see that?!" and keep people believing that someone might have seen something than shattering that belief by constantly (probably) proving that there was nothing there.

I don't believe in anything paranormal myself, but i still found some kind of entertainment in this show a few years ago. I stopped watching after all the obvious BS that made the show totally ridiculous (the jacket pull, to mention one incident.) In some way i can enjoy watching believers while they search for what they believe in, but when said believers are playing with the viewers minds and treat them like idiots, it annoys me.

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Actually they have! It wasn't for long, but they have used head mounted cameras from time to time... Season 8 or 9 they did some. I think. I bet they probably stopped using them because of it limiting their movement... and because THAT camerawork was worse than the SciFi cameraman's...


3rd generation American from a long line of Gottscheers... it was Drandul, dude!

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Head mounted cameras generally seem jerky and poorly focused, but then it's to be expected; when we hold a camera in our hand we tend to keep it steady and focused on a location, but with a head-mounted camera it's completely different - our instinct is to move our heads back and forth when scanning around a room, which is not exactly conductive to smooth camera work.

Plus it kinda looks ridiculous - sort of a Doc Brown look ;)

IMDB's ignore user button = priceless :)

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Yeah, silly looking. Well, another ghost hunting/adv show used(s) them all the time, and many fans were also arguing about not seeing what the crew was experiencing... so they tried it a few times... with somewhat negative results...

3rd generation American from a long line of Gottscheers... it was Drandul, dude!

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Yes... Using Head Mounted Cameras, can be worse. Think about using those and constantly moving your head back and forth, with the investigator looking around. I think the viewers of the show might get physically sick from watching the show with those kinds of camera movements. I don't think they would catch anything more either. Most people look at things with their eyes moving around, than their head. Mostly likely the camera would still be pointed in the wrong place.

Those shoulder mounted cameras are proving that point too. The few times the have used it, many times the camera is pointed at a wall at a "T" intersection, while their eyes, and maybe their head is looking left and right. Rather pointless, except that it leaves them with the capability to hold other tools in their hands.

I have to agree with the production crew evaluations on the forum here of them never pointing the camera where it should be, but that is not always the case. I have watched the show sometimes, and the investigators are saying the see a shadow blocking a light, the crew camera is pointing at the light, and I still don't see the light being blocked out. Things like that... WHY? Are human eyes capable of seeing more things than production camera. Maybe they need to use other camera types instead.

If the Thermal camera is so great, why doesn't every team have one (Jay & Grant AND Steve & Tango AND Amy & Adam...ETC.)...They only seem to ever have only one...that is shared...sometimes. I have wondered about that for a while. On GHI, they had an "infrared spectrum" camera that caught an apparition. Yet Taps doesn't use that, or rarely.

I like Britt. He is always using all sorts of devices, anything he can, pulling all sorts of devices out from this huge bag he carries, to try to catch any possible evidence of something being there. Yet, Jay just walks around with the same old thermal time and time again.

I don't completely blame the camera work when it comes to where to point it, they usually doing the best they can, and you can't just point a camera down a hallway for 45 minutes, and never point it a the TAPs team members to see their reactions. Some things will be missed. But they all could do a lot better than only using one type of camera, and only one at any given moment.

Can't there be a rig with several different camera types mounted to it, all running at the same time, and possibly those pointing in different directions?

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Seems like all they do is keep the Cameras on each other, & you never get to see what they see.

"All Games Contain The Concept Of Death"

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Yes... Using Head Mounted Cameras, can be worse. Think about using those and constantly moving your head back and forth, with the investigator looking around. I think the viewers of the show might get physically sick from watching the show with those kinds of camera movements. I don't think they would catch anything more either. Most people look at things with their eyes moving around, than their head. Mostly likely the camera would still be pointed in the wrong place.


Why does the entire show need to be filmed with the head mount cameras? It doesn't, let them wear the head mount and only show the images through it if they actually catch something with them (which they won't but that's another story).


GlobalWarmer
I can teach you how to shoot so close to a raccoon that he craps himself.

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If they used Google Glass and fed live video from it to the TV broadcast, it would be better.

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House. My room. Cant walk. My medal. My father. Father, dont!

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In the 200th episode the camera guys were AWFUL! Could not keep the cameras steady, had a hard time focussing. Close ups were WAY to close. Seemed very amaturish for some reason.

"All Games Contain The Concept Of Death"

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