[George Burbano]

I think you are under pricing yourself, and arent going to help your business. Stop aiming for a low budget type of wedding. Remember that you are providing a service (assuming you can deliver) that records a special event. Make it important to the couple and people will pay. Make yourself look cheap, and not only are you not going to attract customers who really value the service and memories that you are providing, but you are going to earn little money for alot of work. Even in the most streamlined wedding videography business, you are looking at anywhere from 6-10hrs of shooting, followed by another 3-5 hrs of editing and fine tuning, followed by another 2-6hrs of compressing, and making the dvds. Approx. 22hrs of work, not to mention the sales part, and if you charge $1500 average, so between $40-70 per hr. Ok, but add in the cost of your cameras, lights, mikes, tripods, computer system, software and you have anywhere from $15-20,000 investment, which usually needs to be maintained and upgraded. Most people who are doing this seriously invest much more, because they have multiple systems, several cameras, wireless mikes, mixing boards, monitoring equipment etc… So the average investment is actually around $40-50,000.00 if not more.

Can you do it with less, of course, but you may run into problems. Cameras do fail, so you need a spare, so does mikes. Actually the computer you are using, especially macs are the most reliable of the bunch. Add in storage etc.. so you might want to rethink, thinking cheap, and concentrate on building a quality product, delivering quality service, at a reasonable price. People will pay for quality, dependability, and excellent service.
Also be careful of how you network, and who you recommend, and recommends you…many businesses in the Wedding and Event business fail, and sometimes they can you with them. Especially if you give them any controlling interest. If not, when they fail, people will turn to you when they cant turn to them. so build your business on your own.You are better off..

Just a thought, from someone who has been in the business for almost 22yrs now.

[George Burbano]

Maybe Im missing something, Im assuming you’re using FCP . When you import the clips, you can arrange them by name, Media start time, etc.. If you arrange them as media start time, then they will be in order shot.. Dont know other software, but that’s in FCP.

Hope this helps

George

[George Burbano]

Yeah some people have problems with this..
First make sure you have the P2 Drivers installed for the camera. Then make sure you have the updated drivers for the 16gb cards or greater, if that is what you are using..

I have found that you dont need to shut your computer off, but you do need to make sure that the camera is off when plugging in the FW cable to both the camera and the Computer port. Once plugged in, you turn the camera on, press the MCR button, once the thumbnails appear, then press and hold the MCR button to put the device into FW mode.

Also once you are done copying the cards or whatever workflow you are using, reformat the cards in the camera. Do not delete data either on the computer and try not to delete clips on the camera. When you delete clips on the camera, the thumbnails will remain. This can cause a problem when downloading data.

Hope this helps..

George

[George Burbano]

I get an occasional problem also connecting the camera with the computer. On my powerbook though I use the PCMCIA port, but Im assuming you are using one of the newer mac-pros.. which use expresscard slot. You can purchase an express card PCMCIA card reader by the way, I know some guys who use them and bought them for $60..

I would reinstall the P2 Driver for the camera, reboot the computer, then turn the powerbook off, camera off, plug the fw cable to both, turn the camera on first, hit the MCR button, the thumbnails appear, then turn the computer on, once booted, press and hold the MCR button, see if it connects then.. Before you do all this though, plug another FW device in, and see if it works.. then you can rule out any problems with the port itself. It sounds like a software issue. Also make sure you have the new drivers installed if you are using the 16gb cards or greater. There are different drivers for the newer cards..

Hope that helps,

George

[George Burbano]

Buying from an out of state mac reseller will save you money in sales tax. But…. sometimes not always this can be offset by, shipping costs, and the cost of returns in the event there is a problem.

Also save yourself more money by not buying the top of the line…For instance both tekserve and apple offer lower prices on computers that have recently been discontinued. You can save yourself money by purchasing a 2.66 quad core rather than a 3.2 8 core. The increase in performance is not that tremendous. Purchasing a 2.66 and using the savings to purchase additional ram, is better than getting an 8 core, with lower ram. Just a thought..

[George Burbano]

Im trying to understand what it is your trying to do. Im assuming that you are trying to assign a timecode to each clip.

In FCP you can assign new timecode using aux tC. By opening the clip in the viewer, you can use the Modify>TC feature. Check off the aux tc line, dont touch the original TC. Assign a new timecode, click ok.

Then ctrl click on the timecode window on the upper right corner of the viewer window. then check off view aux tc. You have to do that for each clip. Now you can edit easier. I hope this helps a bit.

Remember that the TC of the clip and the timeline TC dont have to do with eachother. You can alter the timecode of the timeline also, as in cases where video cameras dont output tc to recorders or vice versa and you want to match the timecode of the audio to that of the video.

Please check this out to see if this will help your situation. Remember dont touch the original tc, which I think you mentioned that you dont have.

George

[George Burbano]

Hi Rod,

If you are setting up a FCP suite, I would recomend you set it up right from the beginning. Of-course this means laying out money but doing it right from the beginning will save you time and money later on..

So I would recommend you get yourself a good firewire mixer, 2 channels ok, 4 channels better. Alesis makes some really good mixer/audio interfaces in Firewire and USB. Their popular ones are the 8 and 12 channel. This device gets hooked up to your computer via firewire, and is set up to be your input/output device for sound. Very easy to setup and very easy to use.

You should have a good set of monitors,again I use the KRKs studio monitors, but have recently bought a pair of BX8A from M-audio. They are phenomenal and have a tremendous amount of power. Those get hooked up to the main out from the mixer.

For Mikes, I use the AKG perception 200, and I built a small 6×6 sound booth myself, cause my macs, crank up some noise, when recording.

Setting up a system like this will probably cost you about $1200 USD, you can purchase these things from any of the common stores, B&H in NYC, Gotham, or Guitar Center, shop around for best prices.

For portable I was using the M-Audio FW 410 interface, I was using this on my powerbook, and it works great, it’s bus powered, and have recorded directly into FCP, garageband, and Soundtrack, with no problem.

Hope this helps,

George

[George Burbano]

The best for that money is pretty much the Sennheiser G2 system. I have the original system, and have purchased an additional newer G2 ones. They are backward compatible, and you may be able to find the original system, for much less, just buy it from a reputable seller. If not you can get the G2 transmitter, receiver and plug on transmitter for your price range, in the US you can try B&H in NYC or Gotham also in NYC.

The newer system has a couple of added features like RF confirmation. They are rarely interfered with I use mine in NYC all the time, which is probably the RF capitol of the world and never have any problems.

They had announced a dual receiver, dont know if it has come out yet, that is definately a great feature..

hope that helps

George

[George Burbano]

Hi Chris,

Wow, while the days, of having huge lights at weddings, when we were using 3 Tube cameras, in the late 80s to mid 90s have pretty much gone, you still need an on camera light or have an assistant carry a light maybe with a small softbox. There is no getting around that, especially for any interviews and for parts of a wedding where in many halls they drop the lights, such as parent/dances etc.. When we shoot weddings, which we try and keep to less and less nowadays, we like the frezzis with a soft box. I have a few of the dimmable 100watt units, and they are great. I also have a varilux, older style which I like cause it”s broader light, 100 watt dimmable, and softer without a softbox. but…it is bigger. You do need light, there is no way around this.. even with cams like the Pd-150/170s which are known to work well in low light. We are using HVX 200 now and they definately require lights. I know some guys who are shooting Weddings with Z1U s and while many stay away from lights throughout the day, they use lights at the halls, which are notoriously low light…

Keep in mind that with lights come the need for power. So this brings up the need for battery packs. Again there are several popular battery packs with different capacities. The bescor battery packs, will give you alot of power for your money, but they are still expensive, and some can be quite heavy. The smaller packs, can give you anywhere from 30-120 minutes for lights from 20watts – 100 watts. The newer LED lights are great and have very little power draw, but some need to be warmed up abit (color gels) and they are relatively more expensive.

Hope that helps..
George

[George Burbano]

NO fight here, you are disagreeing with me, on advise that I provided to a person who was seeking advise on a recorder, and is obviously not a pro-cinematographer or audio engineer.

The advise to use pre-striped tapes was to avoid timecode breaks, when you pre-record on a tape a base timecode is placed by the recorder. If you accidentally stop, review and then dont find the exact place of the last clip, if you didnt prestripe, your camera would place a new timecode, and you get a timecode break. This was advise to novices, and yes this happens with pros, even the most seasoned..

The advise on recording ahead of time, was again directed at someone who is not a seasoned pro, to allow him/herself plenty of time and ensure a good timecode reference. That is all , this advise is not for seasoned pros- cause many of us who shoot, know when to cue the camera, the audio and call for action, with no problem.

Besides, when people use crap cameras that cannot even set a proper TC

Wait in many of these forums people are using cams, in the range of $4000-9000 USD, that puts many people here in the Sony Z1U, Pan HVX- Sony PD-170, FX1, V1U, etc… These arent crap cams like you said, these are cams that are perfectly suitable for the things that these people are using. While there are many people here who have a variety of higher end, sony’s, varis etc… as well as some arri’s my advise was for someone who perhaps doesnt own a Varicam, and still wants to make it work.

(Bouke)Your suggestions are quite helpfull for those who have no budget but want to put in a lot of effort to get the best results.
Perhaps there are some old farts around that do not know any better and are willing to pay for lack of equipment, but i have never met them in my world.

That is exactly what my advise was for, people who want to do the best they can, with what they have. Not everyone here, is working on Million dollar films, commercials, or movies. Many are just trying to get into the industry.

Old farts arent the ones who dont know better, They should know better, it’s the young guys who are just starting, that dont know better, and that is why many visit here. The cow is a great source of info for many, but quite often some info is wrong. I dont know everything, Im far from perfect but what I said does work, I have used it and so have many others.

In my world, “NYC world” I have met people who are willing to pay for lack of equipment, they do it well with what they have, they work hard and as they get better and make money they can pay for more equipment. If you havent met them in your world, either you are living with people born with a silver spoon, or just havent visited the world outside your block.That is fine, but I dont say I speak for anyone other than myself. You seem to be speaking for many.

Im not fighting with you either, but all this person wanted was some advise on a recorder and timecode. When I searched for this advise years ago, I didnt get anyone telling me that Im too cheap to buy anything, or Im in a different world..

I got good advise, from people who were willing to help, and teach. I practiced, and when I made mistakes, I learned from them.

Anyway I think we both occupied way too much writing time and effort on the Cow, for this subject. I wish you well, as well as Tom, whose head is probably spinning. I know mine is getting there.

be well

George