Hi Luke –
From this and other message threads you have started or posted to, your questions and your work scream out for some basic photo/video knowledge.
I used to (successfully) teach photography and video production on cruise ships to everyone from 12 year old boys to 75 year old grandmas and everything in between. This was a photo & video 101 class. Here are PDF’s of the first two PowerPoints I used – If there is something mentioned you are not knowledgeable about, do a google search on that topic and read up on it.
Caveat – This hasn’t been updated in four years.
http://www.brucepaul.net/video/presentation1.pdf
http://www.brucepaul.net/video/presentation2.pdf
A good simple lighting tutorial:
http://www.lowel.com/edu/foundations_of_lighting.html
These won’t make Peter Jackson look over his shoulder for you, but they will help you.
