On a lighter note before Christmas, I’d love to hear of others experiences like this:
Last night was my usual December ritual of recording our annual Christmas dinner show at church. This year, I didn’t have much prep time, and had to hastily setup a half hour before the show, right after my real job.
I thought I had all of the contingencies covered, and was going to make it a bigger deal this year. I’m my own roadie, grip, sound guy, multi-camera operator – you get the picture. Plus, this year I was in charge of the audio reinforcement setup for the stage. That setup I did on Sunday, and was the only thing that went right last night.
Here goes:
Arrived at church in a pouring rain and unloaded the van. Soaked to the skin, I got inside, and setup 3 cameras – two movable, and one fixed. Hooked up a flashdrive recorder to the in house PA, Put a shotgun mic on one movable camera, a stereo tight pattern mic on another camera and put a Zoom H2 recorder out in front of where the bell choir was going to be. I got everything hooked up and ready to go in about a half hour. Checked with the director about lighting, and white balanced the cameras. All this was done in record time. Now ready to rock!
The bell choir director suddenly comes out ten minutes ahead of schedule to start the show. I rush over to the Zoom, put it into record and scoot back to the cameras. In front of the stage area, there is one place I can setup 2 cameras and do wide, tight and pan shots from the same location on those cameras, but it looks on video like they are in separate places, so I can work those 2 simultaneously. The 3rd camera was placed across the room and fixed at a different angle on the stage.
I barely had time to get the cameras rolling before the bell choir started.
Just then, a small kid comes lumbering over to where I’m setup, and manages to launch himself at the tripods. I grab both cameras and prevent them from going over. The parent comes up, and glares at me, as if I forced the little darling to jump into the tripods. The kid won’t stop bawling. I start getting different shots on the individual bell choir members. Seemingly each time I focus on one bell ringer, the still photographer gets in the way and takes a picture (we had previously had a discussion about this, of course).
The bell choir finishes, there is a brief intermission, and I move the Zoom recorder to a different location to get the children’s choirs. By the way, I think the Zoom is an excellent tool for the money, and has a really decent sound for such an affordable piece of gear. It’s saved my butt several times.
The main production starts, and I’m taping away. Just after the opening number, the stage lights change! What the . . . . I quickly throw the 2 cameras into auto white balance to compensate. I wish I had been told. They didn’t do that at rehearsal.
I’m listening in the headphones on the camera with the shotgun mic, and I start hearing a loud kid’s voice saying “99, 98, 97, 96. . .etc”. There is a kid lying down on the floor in front of the camera, rolling around and bellowing out a backwards countdown loud enough for half the audience to hear - where are the parents?. Oh, well, I say to myself – no big deal. I’ve got the OTHER MICS WORKING FINE (LOL).
The scene changes to a different part of the stage with the actors. Suddenly a PINK spotlight comes on and blows out the actors with light. Wait a minute, it was a low level white spot in rehearsals. Thank goodness I switched the cameras to auto white balance.
The rest of the production was relatively uneventful, if you overlook the still photographer getting in the way of the camera following the actors on stage, and the spotlight seemingly having a mind of its own, and kids constantly trying to bump into the tripods. (It’s a really crowded area during these major productions, as a dinner is served and there are dinner tables up all over the room).
At the end, I go to retrieve the audio recorders. The one hooked to the PA is turned off. What the heck. . . The Zoom’s record light is blinking, so thank goodness it worked. Then with a sinking feeling, I realize that on the Zoom, it blinks to let you know recording has been armed. Jeez, I didn’t hit record hard enough on the second push in my haste to get it going, and it was in standby the whole time.
I pack up everything in the van in the pouring rain and get home.Soaking wet, I anxiously, hook the flash recorder to the computer to see what happened with that. There is a file there! Yahoo! – BUT – it’s only 8 minutes long – now what! Oh lord, I discover a file folder I missed on the drive that contained a LOT of old audio files. How the heck did I miss that when I cleaned out the drive earlier? The thing ran out of space, and shut itself off.
What a night! I don’t think anyone can blame me for pouring three fingers worth of blackberry brandy and drowning my sorrows.
How about you guys?
Last night was my usual December ritual of recording our annual Christmas dinner show at church. This year, I didn’t have much prep time, and had to hastily setup a half hour before the show, right after my real job.
I thought I had all of the contingencies covered, and was going to make it a bigger deal this year. I’m my own roadie, grip, sound guy, multi-camera operator – you get the picture. Plus, this year I was in charge of the audio reinforcement setup for the stage. That setup I did on Sunday, and was the only thing that went right last night.
Here goes:
Arrived at church in a pouring rain and unloaded the van. Soaked to the skin, I got inside, and setup 3 cameras – two movable, and one fixed. Hooked up a flashdrive recorder to the in house PA, Put a shotgun mic on one movable camera, a stereo tight pattern mic on another camera and put a Zoom H2 recorder out in front of where the bell choir was going to be. I got everything hooked up and ready to go in about a half hour. Checked with the director about lighting, and white balanced the cameras. All this was done in record time. Now ready to rock!
The bell choir director suddenly comes out ten minutes ahead of schedule to start the show. I rush over to the Zoom, put it into record and scoot back to the cameras. In front of the stage area, there is one place I can setup 2 cameras and do wide, tight and pan shots from the same location on those cameras, but it looks on video like they are in separate places, so I can work those 2 simultaneously. The 3rd camera was placed across the room and fixed at a different angle on the stage.
I barely had time to get the cameras rolling before the bell choir started.
Just then, a small kid comes lumbering over to where I’m setup, and manages to launch himself at the tripods. I grab both cameras and prevent them from going over. The parent comes up, and glares at me, as if I forced the little darling to jump into the tripods. The kid won’t stop bawling. I start getting different shots on the individual bell choir members. Seemingly each time I focus on one bell ringer, the still photographer gets in the way and takes a picture (we had previously had a discussion about this, of course).
The bell choir finishes, there is a brief intermission, and I move the Zoom recorder to a different location to get the children’s choirs. By the way, I think the Zoom is an excellent tool for the money, and has a really decent sound for such an affordable piece of gear. It’s saved my butt several times.
The main production starts, and I’m taping away. Just after the opening number, the stage lights change! What the . . . . I quickly throw the 2 cameras into auto white balance to compensate. I wish I had been told. They didn’t do that at rehearsal.
I’m listening in the headphones on the camera with the shotgun mic, and I start hearing a loud kid’s voice saying “99, 98, 97, 96. . .etc”. There is a kid lying down on the floor in front of the camera, rolling around and bellowing out a backwards countdown loud enough for half the audience to hear - where are the parents?. Oh, well, I say to myself – no big deal. I’ve got the OTHER MICS WORKING FINE (LOL).
The scene changes to a different part of the stage with the actors. Suddenly a PINK spotlight comes on and blows out the actors with light. Wait a minute, it was a low level white spot in rehearsals. Thank goodness I switched the cameras to auto white balance.
The rest of the production was relatively uneventful, if you overlook the still photographer getting in the way of the camera following the actors on stage, and the spotlight seemingly having a mind of its own, and kids constantly trying to bump into the tripods. (It’s a really crowded area during these major productions, as a dinner is served and there are dinner tables up all over the room).
At the end, I go to retrieve the audio recorders. The one hooked to the PA is turned off. What the heck. . . The Zoom’s record light is blinking, so thank goodness it worked. Then with a sinking feeling, I realize that on the Zoom, it blinks to let you know recording has been armed. Jeez, I didn’t hit record hard enough on the second push in my haste to get it going, and it was in standby the whole time.
I pack up everything in the van in the pouring rain and get home.Soaking wet, I anxiously, hook the flash recorder to the computer to see what happened with that. There is a file there! Yahoo! – BUT – it’s only 8 minutes long – now what! Oh lord, I discover a file folder I missed on the drive that contained a LOT of old audio files. How the heck did I miss that when I cleaned out the drive earlier? The thing ran out of space, and shut itself off.
What a night! I don’t think anyone can blame me for pouring three fingers worth of blackberry brandy and drowning my sorrows.
How about you guys?