Shooting with one cam advice?

John

John

Well-known member
I hate having to switch positions with the camcorder.. The only way I've found to give a consistant flow of speech is to shoot an entire dialogue and the reshoot the scene twice focusing on each individual characters. This way I have three angles to work with but sometimes it doesn't come across as smooth.. I know I could really do with another dvx but funds are low..

Any tips, ideas?
 
dont make things to dificult when you can accomplsih what you need by doing that routine. if you make it more complex then you might be hurt your production in the long run. just make sure you have enough tapes.
 
I agree, buying another camera is not the answer. Movies have been shot with one camera for a whole century, and they all came out just fine. I think the key to shooting a film with one camera is primarily rehearsal, blocking, a lean script, and pre-lighting. All an actor wants is more takes, so if she can do 4 takes off-camera, helping her co-actor, and then finally get 2-3 takes on-camera, that makes it all the best. Very few actors like to stick with the first take. There is also the prospect of renting a second cam for a particularly important scene, or something that can only take place once (car crash, etc.)
 
ok....we'll in regards to using one camera.....here's my question being that I'm just a mouthy DVX virgin. How are you *supposed* to shoot coverage with one camera while recording audio through the DVX XLR inputs. For instance, background noises like sirens, bugs, etc. When doing multiple takes back and forth between the actors.....won't this throw the sound (Dialogue & Background) off somehow. When you edit the takes in posts....the sound won't be continous and match up? I've wondered how others deal with this? ~reservoir~
 
As far as sound goes you just have to try and control your environment as much as possible for drama shooting. If a siren is in the background you cut, and do it again. Another very important thing to do on location is record a minute of room tone to use to fill in audio holes, or match two different angles. We do that in drama and docs.
Sound people come across as odd folks most of the time. But there is a very good reason for this. Turn off whatever you can, make the room as silent as possible, it is good for your sound, and your actors.
 
What I used to do is use a sound effect of a low noise background of a crowded room for crowded enviroments.. It worked a treat but I think your way of gathering the actual scene background noise and using that as a background would be far more suiting to the actual shoot.

Thanks.
 
Another method to match sound continuity between two or more shots is to record five or more seconds at the beginning and end of each take, before and after the dialogue is spoken, then overlap (fading in and out) the audio on seperate timelines when editing. So, the sounds of a siren, say, in Shot A continues into Shot B.
 
Like Reservoir, I've also been worried about this. I haven't started production yet, but I've been dreading a time where I do a bunch of takes to get good coverage on a conversation; only to be sitting there editing the footage and having jarring differences in the audio as you cut back and forth. This has been great advice, and I'll definitely be using it. I keep thinking, though, that I'll have to cammo the edits with continuous room tone, background noise, and music; or be forced to dub in post... freaky.
 
yeah i recently was shooting a quiet horror film, and helicopters were flying in for like an hour we had to shoot inbetween the quiet moments.
 
borderlinefilms said:
Another method to match sound continuity between two or more shots is to record five or more seconds at the beginning and end of each take, before and after the dialogue is spoken, then overlap (fading in and out) the audio on seperate timelines when editing. So, the sounds of a siren, say, in Shot A continues into Shot B.
Click to expand...

That is superb advice! How did I miss that one???
J.P.
 
jpbankesmercer said:
That is superb advice! How did I miss that one???
J.P.
Click to expand...

Same! I can't believe I never thought of that! That will help with shooting and continuity with sound a crapload! All excellent ideas!
 
Ummm.....I guess I'm either an extreme newbie or a complete dumbass.....cause I don't understand WTF he's talking about!! I was saying recording ambience LIVE. For instance....you characters are talking back and forth. You are going to cut back and forth as well. Lets say character #1 speaks and a siren goes by in the background then cut to character #2 speaking. If you are using only one camera once you cut and setup to record character #2 the siren will have passed already so you won't be able to continue the siren continuity between the shot. But the siren could be ANYTHING.....insects chirping, birds, sirens, airplanes, etc.

When you watch a hollywood movie there is never a break in the ambience even when cutting multiple times to different shots...it is always continuous which leads me to believe that it is recorded seperately then added in during post in a seperate timeline.

But maybe I am a dumbass and just can't see the light.....feel free to help me out here!! ~reservoir~
 
Lets say character #1 speaks and a siren goes by in the background then cut to character #2 speaking. If you are using only one camera once you cut and setup to record character #2 the siren will have passed already so you won't be able to continue the siren continuity between the shot.

Well, see, you don't cut at the end of #1's line...you record a little of the background first. You also record a little before each actor's lines. Then, in post, you overlap everything.

OK. Little letters are background sounds, caps are dialog for actors A and B.:

aaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAaaaaaa
bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbBBBBBBBBBBbbbbbbbbBBBBBBBBBBbbbbbbb


Any clearer?

Dan
 
I guess I'm just a more visual person. Some demonstrate by making a 30 second clip!! I think were talking about two seperate things. I am talking about constant ambience. I think you mean changing ambience. For example....the siren.....ambulance coming down the street.....we'll hear the sound fade in then fade out when the ambulance passes. I think I could handle doing that....but I was referring to stuff that is more constant like birds, and insect noise when shooting outdoors. It would seem to me that having either two cameras or recording a seperate ambience track would be the only way to keep the flow going and not having to cut the sound. It would be obvious if the ambience is skipping everytime the camera cuts to a new shot? Am I still not getting it? ~reservoir~
 
You’re also not stuck with the dialogue you recorded on set. This is where ADR, or “looping,” comes in – re-recording the dialogue only in an optimal setting.
 
yeah but looping sucks and it looks bad most of the time. I can just about ALWAYS tell when movies are using natural sound or when they're being looped. Just one of the drawbacks to shooting in anything other than a quiet room I guess. ~reservoir~
 
Consistent mic placement....

For example, I just shot a diner table scene in which the main character, who is delivering a monolouge, is first revealed after a slow, off angle, dolly shot (tracking). We then move to various shots of the protagonist, an OTS shot, a low angle shot, a MCU shot and ECU shot, you get the idea). There would be no way (no good way, at least) of matching up all of those takes if the mic were constantly in a different position - even the room tone changes as soon as you reorient the mic. So... What I did, being alone and not having anyone to sling a boom, was to rig the mic above the actor just out of shot. I ran a long XLR cable to the camera. Now you can shoot the actor from as many set-ups as you would like, shoot as many takes as you would like, and audio will cut well because it is the same (differences in acting aside).

This is why you want a mike on a boom, handled by someone who knows what they're doing. Think of it as audio continuity. Also, make sure you use the same mic you use for dialog to capture room tone - at least one minute. You can use that to help hide bad cuts somewhat, but audio is still pretty much a garbage in garbage out sort of thing. Make capturing good consistent audio a priority and your life, and your movie, will be much easier.

Matt
 
That's a little much to say *MOST* of the dialogue is looped. That would depend on what type of movie it is. I'm sure action movies with their explosions and what not will have considerably more looping that a drama. ~reservoir~

And yes it is very noticable ALOT of the time. The lips might be just a *hair* off from the dialogue or it might just not match the scene properly. This always bugs me when dialogue is spoken outside and they loop it.....then it sounds louder and doesn't have the feel of outdoors. I guess I'm such a dork I notice how sound waves transverse differently from indoors to outdoors. Also it sounds very "CLEAN" alot of the time. Who cares anyway. My 18 cents!! ~reservoir~
 
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