What do I need to shoot my first 'film'?

C

ChrisC

New member
Hi there, I have just joined this forum and hope to pick your brains :laugh:

Next year I will be going to Asia to film for 4 weeks in 4 different countries (1 week per country).

The intention is to produce a tv programme as well as a DVD.

I have no previous experience of producing films and as such I am confused by the wide range of gear available on the market.

We will be filming for about 8 hours a day. If we can get some underwater footage it will be excellent.

I would welcome some info on the following:

- Can anyone recommend a good setup to use (around £4,000 -5,000 or so?)
- What is the best way to store the footage at the end of every day in the form of a backup
- What quality does it need to be for tv / dvd?

Any help is appreciated

Thanks,
Chris
 
- Can anyone recommend a good setup to use (around £4,000 -5,000 or so?)
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Depends what you need. What do you already have?

I mean first there's a camera, a computer to load the footage, an editing program to edit this stuff, and then not sure where else htta budget is going. Are you going to have helping hands, is that money for food and travel as well (I'm assuming no?)

Do you need lights for interviews?

The bare minimum, seeing that 4000 pounds is about 6000 dollars American, seems you can afford to buy an HVX, which is always a good camera from what I hear. But then you may not have money left over for a good editing program, or computer if you need one. But if so, I would suggest a mac with final cut pro (if you really have no money, try for final cut express, but it has limitations). But you gotta learn these things to make full use of them.

Since you're new, maybe you'd want to start with something easier and less proffesional, but then it may not be the quality you want.

- What is the best way to store the footage at the end of every day in the form of a backup
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I'm not an expert in this, but usually on the hard drive is probably the best, or p2 cards, but others can fill in here.

- What quality does it need to be for tv / dvd?
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Well DVD is standard def (SD), but TV doesn't accept anything lower than High Def (HD)... usually. Of course if you shoot in HD than you can make a blue ray, or just down res to DVD.


Also what do you mean you've be making a TV program? As in you plan on submitting it to TV stations, or you already have a deal to do this? Cause if not, how are you planning on getting this on TV?

Cause from the sound of it you're expecting a lot out of your first film. I think everyone here can back me up in saying that everyone's first film is complete and utter crap. It takes a lot of practice to get to a level where you can even think about getting something good enough for TV.
 
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I would have to agree with Jon for the most part. Good camera and editing choices. However, I am currently employed at a Television production company and not only do we send in our shows in standard def. but we send them in on BETA tapes. Yeah... that's right... I said BETA tapes. Not only that but we submit them to a FOX station. So don't think we put out Public access, it's a major network.

So you can do standard def. but since that is on the way out I would go HD. Not only for that reason but it sounds like you may try to get a documentary out of this which would be way better with HD.

Jon brought up a good point. What does your budget need to cover? This will help us answer your questions better.
 
Brooksy said:
I would have to agree with Jon for the most part. Good camera and editing choices. However, I am currently employed at a Television production company and not only do we send in our shows in standard def. but we send them in on BETA tapes. Yeah... that's right... I said BETA tapes. Not only that but we submit them to a FOX station. So don't think we put out Public access, it's a major network.
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Interesting about the standard def. I'm not surprised about beta though, in fact it's still widely used by many people, and is very good quality. Super Beta is so common, and people are often surprised about this.

All I know is that when we were going to make a music video, we knew that they would need it on beta and shot on HD minimum. Needless to say the music video never got finished, but there are far more knowledgeable people on this forum than myself.

But let us know what you need and what exactly you plan on doing, or else it's hard to help.
 
I agree with Jon, we need a bit more info to make full recomendations.

But odds are the HVX will be a good choice as far as camera goes.

By the sound of things, you're starting from scratch, equipment-wise. So, bare minimum, you need to cover the following things besides a camera.

A tripod. If you're aiming for broadcast, all handheld is unlikely to be acceptable. There are some reasonably compact models around these days. A good fluid head is absolutely essential.

A microphone. If you plan to shoot interviews, an external microphone is essential. Interview audio recorded off the camera's built-in microphone will NOT be acceptable for broadcast. If you're going to be a one-man band, look at getting (at least) some kind of lavaliere (lapel) microphone.

Unless you'll definitely be shooting entirely outdoors, you'll need to look at some kind of lighting. Barest minimum would be an on-camera light like the Litepanels Micro.

As already mentioned, a laptop to download and process the footage. Full-blown editing software can probably wait until you get home, unless you plan to start editing while you're on the road. Get some small laptop harddrives for storage. Depending on which format you use, you should get about 1 hour of footage/15Gb of storage. So figure out how much you think you'll shoot, double it, and that should be just barely enough ;-)

In your budget range, underwater footage is extremely unlikely.

So, there's some food for thought to kick off with. Give a bit more info on the project, and there are plenty of people here who can't start getting more specific with you :-)
 
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