One Camera Live Music Recording

How BooneLive is working away from that static shot while still using one camera

When it comes to the one camera live music recording here in Boone by the BooneLive team of one, things have a dire danger of becomming bland. One shot, one angle, one camera. The image quality is good and the sounds are purdy, but damn if that southeast angle doesn’t get boring after a while (you all notice that a bit? I do tend to stand front right of the band a lot). Well, I’ve certainly noticed myself and, lacking another camera and camera operator, I’ve started to get tricky with what needs to be done.

From editing experimentations to tossing the tripod towards those proverbial winds and using my arm thingies to hold the camera uppansteady, BooneLive is moving away form the mundane and lazy tripod scene. More or less.

Below you’ll find the first glimpses of my attempts to shed the tripod and record this live music in Boone with what I have available. One camera, one man, and two hands (attached to arms and shoulders, among other body parts).

As you watch these vidjyas take note, keep heed, let me know your tips and tricks to getting the shot with limited operating equipment and personnel. What have you seen or done to make the interesting happen?

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Water Liars – This is similar to Katterwaul, it was shot at the same place from the same spot on the floor more or less. However, to mix it up I tried my 70-200mm lens and I think that things turned out well. This is actually a mix of hand-holding the camera, using a close-up lens (for better or worse), and zoom & adjust in post.

Takeaway: When panning (either on tripod or hand-holding) don’t pan too slowly over dead space. It’s important to pan steadily and slowly enough so that your audience can still follow the action (think that shitty movie “Cloverfield” for annoying, high speed pan and movement), but boring the viewer with that dead space between the lead singer and the drummer while you slowly pan is a bummer. Happy mediums, people, happy mediums.

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Naked Gods – For this show I just stood up on a table against the wall and held steady the camera (thank you Image Stabilization) and tried to move at a reasonably slow speed while also keeping interesting shots in tact.

Takeaway: 70-200mm is a bit long a range for most shows, though here at the Boone Saloon I was further away than normal and the venue was more suited for a long range lens.

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Meridian – I didn’t hand hold the camera for this one, but I did move the shot around while on the tripod. At Black Cat I stand up in an apart corner of the venue not directly attached, and a couple feet raised, from the crowd. It makes for a nice shot save for the speaker box nearly in my face towards the right.

Takeaway: A sub-quality tripod head (like mine) makes for chop and stutter, it kills smooth movement and fine control. Invest in a good tripod head for video. Also, pre-shots are great lead-ins to the video. I keep forgetting this, but defend myself by saying that pre-shots for every music video of a single set is… redundant.

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Katterwaul – This is a little different an approach to my one camera deficiency. The original footage is a static shot, no movement at all. However, with both Brittany and Ty in field, I could zoom and adjust in post (edting) to get a more desirable and dynamic feel for the song. It takes more effort, but in the end its worth it for the results.
Takeaway: It may not be necessary to use two cameras if you can achieve the same effect in post. However, zooming will decrease the quality of your image, so keep that in mind.

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