Shooting first sporting event tonite

[Jeff Harper]

Hi all, I'm shooting a soccer match tonite. This will clearly be baptism by fire, as this will be my first videotaping of a sporting event ever.

I'm shooting with two FX1000s, I might throw in a HV30 for good measure.

Any tips? I am clueless.

I am an experienced wedding videographer, so I do at least know how to turn the camera on.

I'm particularly interested in method of getting adequate audio. I'm planning on using a rode videomic on one camera, onboard audio on other cams.

[David Schuurman]

Hey Jeff,

my suggestion is to shoot with the two fx1000 one at or around each defensive line, and get the cameras high, if you can get them at th top of the bleachers without being too far from the action then that's good. If the top of the bleachers means youre shooting pretty far away then put that cam in the centre and keep it on wides and then stand on the edge of the pitch with the second camera and roam handheld. I'd also (if you have 2) set up the hv20s as net cams. either directly behind the net or 3 or 4 feet to the left of the net (if all your other cams are on the left that is) and just either leave them on a wde with sandbags on the tripods or with operators if you have them.

as for audio I think that shotgun mics are the only way to go in your situation, unless you want to mic the nets also. and you could always mic the ref too but Im not sure how necessary that'd be.

Good luck!

[Jeff Harper]

David, thanks for the advice, I appreciate it. I'll use two shotguns.

I just got off the telephone with an acquaintance who does stuff for ESPN and he gave me some ideas too.

[Aaron J. Yates]

Jeff,

I shoot football for a high school in Texas with two XH-A1s on field level, two cameras in the press box, and one on a telescoping support through the uprights. The two up high are mounted on the same tripod, and one shoots a wide shot of about half the playing field, and the other shoots a lot tighter, maybe observing about 10-20% of the field. The two A1s on the sidelines are roamers, and they move up and down the field with the ball. All the cameras capture audio with on-board or shotgun mics, and it works out very well.

Football and soccer are a lot different as far as the movement on the field. If I were you, I'd put the two better cameras on the field level, either catty-corner or on the same side of the field as your higher cameras at each penalty shot area or so. Most of your interesting action is probably going to happen nearer the goals, so that's where I'd want to be. Then, as suggested previously, put the two HV30s up high in the center of the field, but make sure this camera operator really knows what he's doing. It's kinda like your fail-safe shot.

Out of curiosity, how many camera operators will you have? I'd love to know how you decide to shoot it after it's all over.

EDIT: Here's a link to show what our footage looks like...
http://www.vimeo.com/2357509

[Travis Cossel]

One word of caution with filming from the bleachers .. you might have issues with vibration from the crowd. I filmed a state soccer semi-final last year and the crowd got crazy with jumping up and down and stomping on the bleachers, etc. That made life really difficult for me because you can't stop the vibrations when 200-300 people are stomping on metal bleachers.

[Joe Sonnenburg]

I shoot soccer for a local stadium and have seen it covered a couple different ways. The stadium uses 3 cameras: 1 wide shot (around midfield) and 2 handheld cameras, each covering one side of the field.

The networks usually have a high camera for the wide-shot (around midfield up in the press box), a camera on the field on a riser at midfield (for iso and close-up shots), and a camera slightly off to the side on one of the goal lines. They'll sometimes also have a handheld camera covering the sideline.

As for audio, they usually have a couple shotgun mics on little stands (probably 6 inches off the ground) pointed at about a 45 degree angle at each of the corners. I believe they also have mics on the cameras as well.

Hope this helps.

[Jeff Harper]

Thanks for the input guys, this is what I did: Two cameras from about same midfield position up high, one wide and one for following action. third cam was on sidelines (unmanned) with a diagonal shot of field.

I only had on assistant, and she stayed wide panning back and forth while I did closeup.

Next time I will use a fourth camera on the sidelines to creat an X pattern, the one I had was perfect. Four cameras would seem to be a good number.

[Jon Omiatek]

I'm sure they are not paying you to use 4 cameras. I don't shoot sports anymore and used one camera, maybe two depending on the pay. Remember, you have to edit it and that will take much longer with each camera angle.

I usually shot in the press box/mid field. You should get sufficent coverage from that point. If you don't have a press box or mid field watch out if you shoot from the stands!! You will notice camera shake when the fans walk by, jump up and down or stand in front of you. Remember, they don't care that you're filming.

Also, don't film to tight, you will miss the ball when it's kicked if you do. Filming soccer is difficult compared to football, baseball and basketball.

[Jeff Harper]

Thanks Jon, I know you have shot tons of sports. I did follow too closely and got burned a few times last night. Very tough to follow the action in soccer. Eventually I went to a kind of mid-wide shot that seemed to work ok.

If and when I do more of these I will likely go ahead and shoot multiple cameras until I get the hang of it, it is really tricky stuff. Football would be a piece of cake it would seem to me, at least compared to soccer.

[Wayne Faulkner]

I've only ever filmed Rugby Union, and some Rugby League (different rules, less players), and Rugby Sevens (a lot faster paced but at least its only 7 or 10 minutes each way).

I seem to catch basic Referee Audio sufficiently with just the camera and no boom mic, unless the crowd is noisy, the wind and rain gets too much, or the referee is facing away. I think we'll at some stage be requesting a number of RFU supplied Ref Mic Sets, a body worn radio mic, for the three officials, which can be plugged into one of the cameras. The problem with this will be subtitles, as my audience includes the deaf, apart from referee hand signals, and the whilstle, if I provide a merged Referee Audio with Stadium Audio, I'll have to subtitle the entire game with closed captions.

I try not to include any interview with a game, since that would also require first editing for the game and interview, second green screen filming and editing of a BSL Interpreter, and a final addition of closed caption subtitles.

[David Stoneburner]

Jeff,
We do all of Wright State University sports on ESPN3. Since you are just down the road, let me know if you would ever want to come up to watch a game.

David

[Noa Put]

Do you guys realize this is a 7 year old thread you are responding to? :)

[David Stoneburner]

Nice. Guess I should have looked at the date before the last date. I'm pretty sure he has figured it all out by now. ;)

[Jeff Harper]

One can only hope!