Video Production

[gfirob]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8adMGF-me8

I am posting this to talk about the video production here, not the song (Summer Wages, by the 60’s folk group Ian and Sylvia, and later a bluegrass standard). Not sure this is the right forum, but here it goes.

With the Covid19 isolation all of my regular performing opportunities have gone up in smoke, so I wanted to post good looking performance videos on-line and this is my most evolved effort to date.

So I have been trying to generate the most production value that I can with just one person (also the performer). This video features a moving camera on a motorized slider, (Konova K2, about 32” long) together with Konova’s panning system, which keeps the camera pointed at the center of the frame (or where ever else you want it pointed). The slider sits on a tripod with a light stand supporting one end and when the camera reaches the end of its travel, it slows down and reverses direction automatically, repeating continually. The camera itself sits on a small fluid head on top of the panning device. .

Lighting is a fairly large soft-box off to camera right (the key light) with candles and lamps in the background (what are called “practicals”) in order to provide background lighting, visual interest and to emphasize the three-dimensional effect of the moving camera. Some fill light is provided by windows behind the camera. There is also an LED light behind the couch, lighting the dark oak armoire in the background which otherwise would be a black pit.

The camera is a Panasonic Gh4, which allows for capturing video as 4k files, and this file size allows for the zooming in or closeups from the original files in the editing software, Final Cut ProX. A 4k file is about four times the resolution of HD (or 1080) so zooms or enlargements can be done down to about 1/4 of the frame size without losing resolution.

The weakest part of this setup is the audio, which in this case is a small video shotgun mike on a boom stand about 3 feet or so from the performer, with an extension cable going into the audio input of the camera (which is always inferior to an external digital recorder). There was so much video hardware involved in the setup that I wanted to avoid all the additional sound equipment that I would ordinarily use (condenser mike and stand, digital recorder, headsets and then double-system editing to sync the sound with the picture). You can hear the clicking of the step motor belt at the very end of the song too. This is a problem with the system and only happens going in one direction. I have to trouble shoot it away.

I should also point out that the room is pretty big (24 by 20) so the camera is 10' from the subject and the background is 10' or more behind, so there is a lot of actual depth.

This same setup with a professional crew would take 5 people—cameraman, assistant cameraman, dolly grip, sound man, and lighting guy. I should also say that I am a retired television producer, so I am better informed than most people about how to make this work.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks

[pf400]

I'll offer my views:

- great voice, great playing...pro level.
- I would add a bit of reverb to voice and guitar
- maybe the lighting could be softer, less white

[Captain Jim]

Very nice production. The panning camera point-of-view really sets it apart from most "playing at home" videos we see these days. Fine job with the singing and playing, and as a retired professional photographer, I appreciate what you've done with the lighting and depth. It gives the rest of us who are doing these videos something to shoot for.

[gfirob]

Thanks for the comments. I agree about the reverb, I do use that while performing, but this audio was very rudimentary, the effort was really to work on the video. I wish I had more control on the levels between the guitar and the voice, too, but it is a work in progress.

And the lighting comment is probably because there is almost no fill lighting to soften the single key light. This is called high key lighting which is not only (to my eye) more dramatic, but it means you don't set up another light. But it it does make for a higher contrast image. If I didn't have a moving camera I would have put a reflector just off camera to bounce the key light into the shadow area as a fill. The wider the lens, and the moving camera limits the lighting to some degree, or just makes it a little harder. The single soft light source is meant to replicate window light.

Thanks again for the thoughtful replies.

[lkingston]

I like the camera movement. Did you have someone else shooting and moving the camera?

[Chipotle]

I'm curious how you might place mics for better audio. I've been playing with video production during the lockdown as well, and found that good close mic placement necessary for reducing the effects of a less-than-stellar-sounding room are at odds with the video part of things.

You can see what I came up with in this video. Vocal mic up high with a slight tilt up to reject more of the guitar, and a guitar mic just out of frame at the bottom, pointed at the neck/body join, and again tilted to lessen bleed from the vocals.


Would you do anything differently to mic but still keep a good visual?

Also, I'm finding my phone camera to be a bit of a limiter, along with the small room. I can't set manual exposure in video mode, so it tries to light the whole thing evenly and boost the shadows, which gets grainy. I did take the shadows down a bit in post.

I had a jury-rigged softbox to my left and a spot rim light slightly behind and to my right, but couldn't really get the high key lighting because of bounce off the walls in the small space.

Any ways to light this better or get better results from a phone camera (Galaxy S8 fwiw). I'm thinking the camera is the weak point but I'm not sure.

[lkingston]

It sounds like a number of us are tackling this same thing: how to get the best possible video and audio quality on our home shot music videos.

[slopeshoulder]

I thoroughly enjoyed both the video and the explanation of how it was accomplished. Thank you for sharing your knowledge. Sure does beat a cellphone video by a mile or more. Great performance.

[Rick Jones]

The problem I have is that my room is so tiny and my voice so loud that I am fighting dynamics all the time.

Can you guys hear clipping in this? It was just a rough 1 take that I was messing with because of the loud/quiet dynamic of the song.

It's a zoom h5 and two phones btw, nothing fancy, just edited in iMovie and I tried to lower some peaks and add reverb in Reaper but I'm very, very amateur at it all.

[gfirob]

Regarding mike placement, the choice is—in the frame or out. If you don’t want to see the mike but you don’t want to use the mike on the iPhone or ipad or whatever, then you need to boom it. A boom stand is like a light stand with an adjustable bracket to allow a horizontal bar with the microphone on it to hang out above the singer just out of frame (or a human being holding a mike pole doing the same thing). More sensible (and what I think I will do next time) is to have the mike in the shot in the best position you can get it, and use a pickup or guitar mike for the instrument, so you can have some control of the separation between the guitar and the voice. In the case of my video, I was making audio subordinate to the video, but that is kind of self defeating in a video of a musical performance. But I did not want to add all the additional hardware to the setup.

There is no one running the camera, it is operating on its own, riding on the motorized slider. I turn it all on and then sit down and pick up the guitar.

I think the biggest mistake or limitation most people find themselves in is being too close to the background. If your room is small there is not much you can do, but allowing the background to be a little out of focus, or lit to a lower intensity allows the player to be the focus of your eye. Some people use a black background (fabric on stands) to get around this, but I think this is a weak solution to the problem. I think if you have to use an artificial background, you are better off with a grey canvas, lt one or two stops darker.

A major limitation people have is the lenses on iPhones and iPads (if that is what they are using), which are wide lenses and almost always unflattering. You are much better off using a camera lens that can give you some control over the background and the focus. Also, camera mounting (tripod, clamps whatever) are important because they can allow or a better camera position. Ideally the camera should be at the eye level of the subject. Often guitar videos are shot from a low angle, maybe because the iPhone is on a chair or something, I don’t know, but this is a bad angle. I see that all the time.

Finally, I think people do not spend enough time really looking at what is in the background and whether or not this is distracting or flattering or whatever. A lot of what this is about is paying attention to how it looks and forgetting about how it sounds until you actually play. The location and the background are really important. Too often these things are shot wherever the guitar happens to be rather than the best looking location. And space is a major factor (as it is in the big room I shot this video in). Bigger is always better, which is why studios are big.

You don’t need a big lighting kit (there are only two lights working in my video, other than the practicals) and you can use a window either in the background or as a key light.

If it would be helpful, I’ll post some stills of the setup, so you can see what is behind the camera.

Thanks for the comments.

[difalkner]

Originally Posted by gfirob

If it would be helpful, I’ll post some stills of the setup, so you can see what is behind the camera.

Thanks for the comments.

I liked the video and the performance - both very good! Your description of the setup is well documented and detailed, too. And yes, seeing your setup would be a good visual to go along with the description.

David

[gfirob]

Here are three photographs of the camera slider, mike and stand and light. You can see from the windows behind the camera that they provided some fill light on the shadow side of the key light.

[Chipotle]

Originally Posted by gfirob

You can see from the windows behind the camera that they provided some fill light on the shadow side of the key light.

Was the video taken at a different time of day than those photos? How did you get the background so dark if there was that much light coming in?

What were your camera exposure settings?

[gfirob]

Well, light intensity is kind of relative, so while this may look like a lot of light is coming into the room on the still pictures (shot with an iphone) the room is very big and the soft box (which is much closer to the subject) ends up being the dominate light. The windows are providing quite a lot of fill light on the dark side of my face though. Without it the setup would probably be too stark and contrasty.

The camera is set up wide open (which I think is about 4.5 on that cheap zoom lens) with an exposure index (or the digital equivalent of ASA) of 800 and the camera is shooting video at 24 frames per second. It may have been more of an overcast day when I shot the video, though, I just don't remember. But what your eye sees and what the camera sees are often different in terms of light. And the iphone is exposing for the equipment and letting the windows burn out.

[ljguitar]

Hi gfirob

What fun, and above average for sure!

I don't miss the reverb a bit. A little goes a long way and too much…well easy to do and often hard to detect till after publishing.