Music Video

Magnum_Blues wrote on 10/31/2002, 11:51 AM
My son and I want to start makeing music videos in our recording studio at home. We have a 16 channel Mixer going through a Motu into the computer and then use Sonar for regular sound recording.We've just been using Sonar for sound projects, and Vegas Video for video and audio projects. We have an analog camcorder,( we hope to go digital later), and we use a USB port to capture the audio and video and bring it into Vegas Video for editing. The sound quality with the camcorder is not good to say the least. So we want to record the audio straight to Sonar for editing and use Vegas for the video editing.Once the editing is done, we would bring the two together in one program or the other. Here's the question. I've heard so much about time code and sync that I'm not sure how to do this and keep the sound and video in sync with each other. I mean we are going to be recording the video into the camcorder and the audio into the computer at the same time. How do I lock the two together when I merge them? I've heard about SMTP and everthing, but is this already on our video track when we capture it from the camcorder and bring it into the computer?

Thanks,

Paul & Pat

Magnum Blues

Comments

miketree wrote on 11/1/2002, 2:39 AM
SMTP stands for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol. I don't see how that would help.

I believe in the 'old days' they used a clapper board! I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong.
pmc181 wrote on 11/1/2002, 4:35 AM
Sorry for the type-0. I meant SMPTE time. SMPTE is the acronym for the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers.
Thanks,

Paul
Former user wrote on 11/1/2002, 10:04 AM
The only way smpte time code will help is if you lock all of your video and audio sources to the same Sync generator with time code. Most (if not all) coonsumer setups are unable to do this.

The best you can do is to capture the video and audio and do visual sync on the music. Using clapboards or visual sync references will help later. You might experience some drift in sync, and will have to compensate by using cutaway shots or special effx.

Dave T2
soundguy63 wrote on 11/1/2002, 12:12 PM
Dave is correct. Generally SMPTE is not possible with consumer gear (although there are complex ways of cheating here). It's not even possible on a lot of low-end pro gear these days. Most people have reverted to clap-boards and guide audio only for the camera since it's so easy to nudge tracks in editing.
As long as both video and audio sample rates are the same, then drift shouldnt be a major problem during the short length of a song. This is especially true when the music is pre-recorded and the video is shot in very short segments that are staged to the audio playback. Since you're shooting video and recording audio together, you'll have a little tougher time during recording. Are you sure you dont want to totally complete the song first, then you'll have total freedom to shoot video anyway you want.
pmc181 wrote on 11/1/2002, 1:40 PM
Thanks for all of your posts. Pat and I will give it a try. What my thinking was that we could offer local bands a way to make inexpensive demos to show how they sound and look on stage to perspective club owners. Pat and I have a band and been playing out for about 2 years and one comment that club owners make repeatedly is,"You can have a great sound, but if you don't have any stage presence, forget it !" We were surprised ourselves how we looked on stage in a video, compared to how we thought we looked. We were zombies! Since then we're all over the stage to pump up the crowd and it made a hugh difference. We also have a small recording studio, so we thought this may be something neat to offer other bands, not to mention some extra money for us !
Thanks !
Paul & Pat McNerney

www.magnumblues.com
Former user wrote on 11/1/2002, 3:03 PM
One thing to think about when trying to make extra money with musicians is, how much are they willing to pay?

If you are a musician, you can probably answer some of this. How much would you pay for this service? Then ask, how much work is involved?

I haven't explored this from this point of view, but knowing how much work it takes to shoot, edit, mix and duplicate a video, it would be hardpressed for me to find a local band willing to spend the money. Also, with video and audio mixing becoming more accessible to people at low cost, you might find the bands thinking they can just do it themselves.

But I do agree, if more bands could see themselves, they would understand the difference between a successful band and a garage band. Music is only part of the package (albeit an important part). With MTV and video's being popular, people expect their eyes to be entertained as well as their ears. Unlike the 70's where the visual entertainment might have come from chemical assistance. (not that I know for sure of course :) )

This is just a FWIW comment, but good luck in your endeavour. Let us know how it works out.

Dave T2