Night club filming,

[Dave Gardener]

Hi there, Im pretty new around here so bare with me,
I am doing a job in a couple of weeks time which is creating a promotional DVD for some semi pro DJ's. The venue is onboard a Boat, which has a 6ft 8 roof, (hard for crowed shots) and is only around 40ft square. It will obviously be dark ambient light, with fast moving bright stage lighting.
Does anyone have any ideas how I can set up our XL1s, and also our MA200 with a direct feed out of the mixng desk.

Cheers Dave

[Andrew Petrie]

Ask if there's going to be any laser-fx type lighting equipment, there's been members here that have reported CCD damage as a result.

[Dave Gardener]

I know there's not at this one, but I have been asked to do others where there will be Lasers. Didn't know it could damage them, thanks for that.

[Karl Heiner]

i don't think you should have any problems just using your "on board" mic, since the location is very small.

greetings

[Andrew Petrie]

<<<-- Originally posted by Dave Gardener : I know there's not at this one, but I have been asked to do others where there will be Lasers. Didn't know it could damage them, thanks for that. -->>>

It only potentially does harm if the lasers are directed towards the lens. Someone who does shows regularily could chime in on the specifics.

[David Slingerland]

You can use the onboard mic no problem but be sure to use the attenator. If you pan from public to stage and back again you will hear that..(although only a little bit I think because of the small space) Get yourself a wideangle lens or adapter to get some wide shots. The standard lens wont give you that... Should you want to set up a connection with the dj equipment then it is import you do a check. Record and listen back.
I think it would be best to use wireless because you might not want a cable connection while moving around. The wireless would have to be a real good make, not the normal dv-used wireless of a couple hunderd bucks. They wont be able to handle the imput to well.

[Rick Bravo]

The XLs' audio is inherently hot. I would set my audio levels manually, while the music is thumping, especially if using your camera mic.

RB

[Karl Heiner]

<<<-- Originally posted by Dave Gardener : Hi there, Im pretty new around here so bare with me,
I am doing a job in a couple of weeks time which is creating a promotional DVD for some semi pro DJ's. The venue is onboard a Boat, which has a 6ft 8 roof, (hard for crowed shots) and is only around 40ft square. It will obviously be dark ambient light, with fast moving bright stage lighting.
Does anyone have any ideas how I can set up our XL1s, and also our MA200 with a direct feed out of the mixng desk.

Cheers Dave -->>>

hello dave,

i have a shoot this saturday, local..yea..no driving..at a restaurant/ bar. brit band, they don't want to be called irisch. is about the same situation like your's. very small, very dark, a lot of people, but i do not have a wide angel lense or adapter. at this point i don't know anything about the lighting, could not get hold of the band manager. well let's see.

let you know on sunday.

greetings

karl

[Dave Gardener]

Thanks for all of your inputs,

So far we have decided to take a direct line out of the mixing desk using an XLR lead, ( would do wireless but cant afford the kit just yet but is on the shopping list) then mixing this audio with that of the camera mic, to pick up atmosphere noise.
As we only have one camera, we have agreed with the DJ's that we will record 30 mins of thier set, with the camera static in front of them, this way the audio will not stop on the footage when the camera isn't rolling. I will then get crowd and stage footage whilst they are doing the rest of thier 2 hour set. This way I can edit the audio from the direct input over the rest of the footage.

Also what do people think about light meters? Ive been told in the past not to rely on the built in one on the XL1s, as this is a light reading at the cameras position, and you would be much better off getting a reading from where the subject is.
What types of light meter do people use, and what would you recomend to do?

Cheers guys
Dave

[David Slingerland]

I dont think you need a light meter. Never used one myself in these kind of conditions. I shot on may occasions in discotheques with all kinds of camera's. Canon lightmeter(auto irismeter) is pretty accurate. test while shooting the crowd, what does it say? check the bright spots(if there are any) average out....
Most likely you will shoot wide open, shoot with at least 12 db. The stage is a different matter, there will most likely be enough light if it is properly lit, check your settings while using the autoiris. Stop down a half from the automat and you will be pretty safe..Remember underexposure is not a real problem but overexposure is...
You will get overexposure in certain areas (close to lights) probably the stage... Always judge the total shot for exposure (like the autoiris would)
You can use the zebra settings on your viewfinder, put it to 90 procent and make sure only really bright areas get the zebra that should be a realistic and conservative way of judging your iris.

[Brad Tyrrell]

One of the best investments I ever made for xl1 audio is my little dbx over-easy compressor. Most often I feed a pre-amped pzm into it, but often I take the feed from a board at an event. A life saver for less than 200 bucks.

[Karl Heiner]

hello david,

well, my event is over, lastet from 6pm -12:30 am. good irisch music, but no light. dark like a basement. around the ceilings/ corners and bar, they had chrismas lights, some red recest lights pointing at the stage. oh well.
sound was exellent. (on borad mic)
how did your event go?

greetings

[Dave Gardener]

Its not until Feb12th, so we are just preparing for it at the moment, mainly learning the MA200, which we havn't used before.
But I will let you all know how it went after the 12th.

[Dave Gardener]

Hi guys

well, the event went down really well, the XL1s performed upto its normal excellent standards.
We managed to set the camera to the left of the dj's pointing down on them, so that you could see all 6 of thier decks and mixer, as well as them. we set up one of our dichroic 3x 500w flood lights on them, which enabled us to get around f3,
We then took a line out of the mixing desk, directly into audio2 (line) and then set up 3 x ambient mic's into a seperate mixer and recorded to DAT (for crowd reaction and dj noise)

Now the trouble we are finding is that we use pinnacle studio to edit(basic I know) ,
but studio cant seem to find audio2 track from the camera, i.e we have no sound when captured,

anyone got any ideas?
we can capture via analog, but seems a shame to risk losing quality, or we could record audio from camera, to DAT, and then put it into studio, trouble is although this would still be digital, we would then have to try and match 2x audio tracks to one film track.

[Brad Tyrrell]

I use scenalyzer for capturing primarily to get the second audio channels from my Xl1. You can capture either set and the other as a wav file. Well worth the 39 bucks and you can download it instantly. There's a trial version.

www.scenalyzer.com

Brad