Sony Z1E - Audio from Desk

[Craig Hume]

Apologies for the basic nature of this post.

Can anyone tell me the best way to capture the audio for a live band video shoot?

I own a Sony Z1E and have never done this type of project before. My initial thought was to shoot one full Wide shot version of the song with the band playing live and take an audio feed from the desk in the club, so I have the audio in full. Then shoot some medium and close up shots without the audio for use in editing.

Can anyone tell me if there's a better approach and also the best technical way to do this with a Z1E in terms of the connections?

Many thanks

Craig.

[Steve House]

Originally Posted by Craig Hume

Apologies for the basic nature of this post.

Can anyone tell me the best way to capture the audio for a live band video shoot?

I own a Sony Z1E and have never done this type of project before. My initial thought was to shoot one full Wide shot version of the song with the band playing live and take an audio feed from the desk in the club, so I have the audio in full. Then shoot some medium and close up shots without the audio for use in editing.

Can anyone tell me if there's a better approach and also the best technical way to do this with a Z1E in terms of the connections?

Many thanks

Craig.

Is this a concert shoot where the band is performing live in front of an audience or is it a music video style shoot?

A basic problem with a board feed in a club is that not all the band is likely to be mic'ed. In a club venue the drums, for example, will usually be loud enough they don't need amplification so they aren't mic'ed and the audience hears them directly without benefit of PA. Same with guitar cabs. Vocals and some other instruments are mic'ed and the board op balances them against the drums and guitars. But your recording can't hear any of those unmiced instruments except by virtue of their bleed through the vocal mics. Also the house board op is going to be mixing for the audience, NOT your recording, and a recording mix is qute different from a live sound mix.

The best technical approach, the one that is used for professional TV network concert broadcasts, is to mic the entire band yourself completely separate of the house audio, just as if you were setting up in a recording studio to make a commercial CD of their music. That's probably not going to be practical for you. You might consider putting a stereo mic pair "front row center" and recording that way.

Your idea of recording the entire number on one take and then picking up MOS shots to lay over the sound from the first take is a good way to go. It's almost impossible to edit the music from two or more takes into a coehesive audio track - tempo's change from performance to performance, etc. In the music video world, the normal practice is to do all the video mimed to playback of the music because of that.

[Craig Hume]

Thanks so much Steve for that reply.

We're a music management company (agent) so all we want to do is capture enough footage for a 3 minute promo for our marketing purposes. Anything more than this and I would have to hand it over to a professional to handle..but as I have the camera and a bit of experience, I thought I would give it a go!

They are a top 4 piece band playing in a London Jazz Club venue so the mix from the PA should be reasonable and we'll do the shooting during the day so we don't have any time or audience pressures to contend with. Once I get into the camera manual I was going to look into the possibility of a Desk Mix to one side of the stereo mix and an ambient mic to the other side to fatten it out a bit if certain elements of the desk mix are not balanced. However because the club will be empty, we can mute the PA more or less and use the desk to get our own mix right - remembering to set it back to the live mix of course!

We have a very nice studio set up with all the Apple suite (Logic Pro/Final Cut etc) Mackie monitors and Euphonix mixers etc, so I'm hoping we should be able to get something usable from it.

Re sync issues. The band are top US players so they would nail it to a click track if we asked but it's a bit much for our purposes. We'll only do one song live (maybe a few more if time permits just to have some live audio recordings) but may overlay the final cut with some of their studio audio tracks too if we can get them cleared).

If you are in London between Xmas and New Year and you want to help a newbie...please let me know! (joke)

Thanks.

Craig.

[Steve House]

If the club is going to be empty, why not shoot 'music video' style? Pre-record the song in studio. In the club shoot to playback without recording sound and have them play along with the music so the video looks real. That way you can get multiple takes and coverage without worry about the performance being different in each shot.

[Craig Hume]

That's an interesting idea Steve. I suppose we could do that.

How would we get around the sync issues? Presumably we would run the playback each time we shoot, meaning that when we come to edit, we have one master audio track, and in theory each clip (if cued correctly) would by in sync with the audio? Am I on the right track there?

Thanks
Craig.

[Bob Hart]

This clip was shot with two Z1P ( same as Z1E ) and a roving PD150. Mix desk audio was fed to the wide view camera, the second wide view camera on side of stage and the roving camera recorded via onboard mikes, however I found I did not need to use supplemental audio from them.

KILL DEVIL HILLS - NASTY BUSINESS - YouTube


This clip was recorded using four Z1P cameras to a playback track and several takes. Two cameras wore AGUS35 35mm adaptors. All cameras recorded onboard sound for sync tracks. Audio was from the playback track from the band's CD.

DARANGULAFILM's Channel - YouTube


One of the cameras itself had loose screws at the lens to case junction which allowed the 35mm adaptor to move offcentre on the front and cause a vignette which was not observed in the cropped viewfinder image.

There were no sync problems with both projects and edit systems have improved considerably since these clips were assembled. The first was edited on Premiere Pro 2 with cineform codec. The second was edited on the Notre Dame Uni's own Mac based editing system in Final Cut Pro.


Make sure that you camera is definitely switched to line-in. In the noise and general hubbub of a live venue, it is easy for ambient noise to confuse you as to whether the audio you are getting is from the on-camera mikes or the mix feed. A really good set of headphones which exclude acoustic ambience is desirable.

If you camera is on sticks, take care that you do not "double button" the run switch because of tripod bounce. Take care that your tripod is not accoustically coupled to loud speakers through a playwood floor, otherwise some weird interlace artifacts may occur due to rapid vibration passed to the camera. Same goes for avoiding a setup where pedestrian traffic is passing on the same plywood floor. Make sure your remote control is selected "off". I had the stage-side camera stop and start at the KDH gig in rthe first clip. It was not a dropout but a definite on-off-on cycle which lost me about 20 minutes.


If you are doing a live gig, two cameras are desirable with the startup times staggered so you can do a near seamless tape change if the continuous performance runs longer than say 58 minutes. If you are taking a live feed to one of the cameras, you will get a break in your audio at the change unless you chain the feed to a second camera. If there is a separate recording being taken from the mix, try to negotiate a copy from that as insurance against tape faults, failed batteries and the rest of the problem arsenal Murphy can throw at you. Most of all, listen to the advice of others in preference to mine.

[Craig Hume]

Hi Bob

Thanks for the information. Your videos look very pro.

I'll take a proper read of that and let you know if I have any questions. It seems to all make sense.

Thx again.
Craig.

[Steve House]

Originally Posted by Craig Hume

That's an interesting idea Steve. I suppose we could do that.

How would we get around the sync issues? Presumably we would run the playback each time we shoot, meaning that when we come to edit, we have one master audio track, and in theory each clip (if cued correctly) would by in sync with the audio? Am I on the right track there?

Thanks
Craig.

Yep, since they are "playing" to the music playback each time, their video will be in sync with the pre-recorded music track