Any filter suggestions? (jpeg)
 

This was a last minute taping and the point was for audio so no time for much lighting or anything or set prep. So it's a real dull, locked down shot. Any suggestions on a filter spruce up? I added that lens flare over the right shoulder on the window.

Using NewBlue Video Essentials Color Fixer Plus:

You can also add a moving dynamic by incorporating a slow glacier zoom with Event Pan/Crop and key frames. Glacier zooms focus interest and anticipation. They have a very different effect than Uncle Charlie playing with the zoom on his camcorder. The magic word is slow.

Depending on the shot's composition, you can also do very slow pans as well. Be careful to not overuse either zoom or pan or it will become distracting and irritating to the viewer. The judicious use of zoom and pan on the timeline can make unmanned, locked-down footage look like manned footage. It sounds funny but movies should move. I'm not referring to erratic fire-hosing and fast zooms. Slow, planned zooms and pans are a different story.

If you shot in HD and are rendering to DVDs, you can zoom in 20 or 25 percent on the timeline without detectable softening - a bit more if you add a little sharpening.

Perhaps a vignette? Rack focus to lose detail in one or both sides of the frame?

Totally agree with Jim about the very slow zoom/pan (I like the term glacier zoom - very appropriate).

Not a big fan of artificial lens flare personally - especially when you can't see the light source that's causing it, as is the case here. Like I say, that's a personal observation.

What's he singing, out of interest? If it's a choral piece then everyone's suggestions so far are all good. If he's singing Firestarter by The Prodigy then you'll need entirely different effects ;-)

it's opera. This is a grab from Buonaparty.

Perhaps Vegas' own contrast filter, combined with the pan-n-scan to give a slooow zoom.
maybe a vignette, or using the cookie cutter with a gaussian blurr on the outside to give a shallow DoF look?

Ben

How do you do this? Sounds interesting.