[Mark Suszko]

Monopods are great for wedding reception shots, where you have to move fast in and around people and obstacles, and grab a candid shot and go on to the next one. A Fig Rig or one of the active stabilizers derived from drone photography is also useful.

GoPros and their knock-offs are so ubiquitous now, you should have a number of them with custom mounts ready to deploy all over the venue in hidden spots for b-roll, cover, and cut-away shots.

Adjustable LED light panel for the cameras.

A Bounce card with silver on one side, black on the other.

Agree about tiny digital audio recorders. Essential, and not expensive.

Connect two mic clamps together; attaches your wireless stick mic to the same mic stand as the MC’s.

Gaff tape and narrow carpet runners to cover cables with.

[Mark Suszko]

For thirty bucks, if you’re doing this effect on a regular basis, it’s a smart buy. If you’re doing this effect as a “one-off”, you could certainly build it yourself in Apple Motion, using the “behaviors”, to help automate it, or just keyframe it.

[Mark Suszko]

You charge hourly time and materials to set up the camera, a nice dedicated light for it, and any coding you need to feed it from a server in the camera to the facebook page or whatever.

Tell him to think of it functioning like the rotating cabinet near the Maitre’d station or cashier station, that shows off cakes, pies, and other desserts – only it’s showing off hot entrees in real time, close-up like when people instagram what they’re having. You could store a couple of “perfect” examples as image files and rotate them in when the feed is off, overnight, or on closed days.

[Mark Suszko]

Well, at least you’re honest.

[Mark Suszko]

I’m sure you could mount the go-pros on the roof of any car; you have to extrapolate what I say a little. Use those links as a start and do some more homework on your own… I feel that if I give you any more advice, I’d need to start invoicing you.

[Mark Suszko]

In addition to what Todd says, the entire concept of pre-shooting a year’s worth of daily shots for “social media” feeds is ridiculous because social media demands an immediacy and context the “canned” stuff can’t deliver. Does this guy serve his customers pre-packed pasta, or does he make it himself? The whole thing will quickly fall apart in a week’s time, when facebook and other watchers notice the clothes, hairstyles, and other features on the people never change or evolve. Then they’ll be angry you tried to fool them – the result is horrible bad publicity.

Instead, I would propose you set up a live webcam, updating every five minutes, centered on a small area the size of a plate, and the chef plates up one of the daily specials and lays it out under the camera/heatlamp for an hour or two. Even easier, place the camera on the area where the waitstaff picks up the orders, and the view of what people are ordering becomes an ever-changing display from minute to minute. You could brand it: “what folks are having here right now!” or something like that. It would keep the cooks on their toes making sure the presentation quality and portion sizes were always consistent.

[Mark Suszko]

Billing hourly is what we do. The rest is just details. Your only question is: can you justify the extra time taken by what you consider an essential part of your process, or not?

You also say you’re too busy for this and that the old rate was artificially low. This is definitely a time to put on the big-boy pants, declare your current rate, and either see them go elsewhere, saving you the hassle and low returns, or pay up the proper rate, making the extra work worth it.

Don’t you DARE let them talk your new rate down. That way line not just madness, but bankruptcy.

Last 2 cents; if these guys were good to you, forget your “new way” and just crank out their changes on the old system, but at your new hourly rate. That’s the fairest deal, IMO.

[Mark Suszko]

Q:WHY ARE THREE GO-PROS NECESSARY HERE?
A: each one will be “mapped” to a corresponding side or rear window view in post, that’s why the blue screens. I suppose you could make do with one, and drive the same area of street three times at the same speed, accelerating and slowing and stopping the same exact way, but gopros are cheap to own and cheaper still to rent in quantity.

Q; I WAS A LITTLE CONFUSED HERE. DID YOU MEAN PROJECT THIS FOOTAGE INTO THE CAR DURING THE SHOOT, OR SUPERIMPOSE THIS ON THE BLUE CHROMAKEY PORTIONS IN POST?
A: I meant that you project live motion video on the set, playing it off the interior and their bodies and faces as if they were disco lights at a dance club….only not as vivid. Todd terry gives an example of placing a huge high def flat TV screen up against the car window and just playing captured driving POV video into the interior shot while shooting. it *can* work! In your case, if you can’t get the video projector, put lights on a piece of wood or plastic pipe, and physically move it across the window, over and over, with some variations in how it is held, and variations in timing. it will create the effect of the outside world’s lights coming in. Another way this used to be done was a hand-held pair of spotlights to simulate car headlights passing.

Watch how this kid does it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cavbSR3igkA
or this guy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMr2UsBLZxA
or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWDe3Ubt9lE
or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FF08MU-R2k
or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FF08MU-R2k
or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w638djAPyA
or… you get the idea.

Most of this isn’t hard, or even all that expensive: just time-consuming and demanding in detail of execution. Don’t try to keep it all in just your head; document everything out on paper with drawings. Being able to show the cast and crew storyboard shots of every angle will help everybody share and execute your particular vision. Taking some stills into photoshop and playing with layering and opacity effects on the windows will help you figure out some things for effects. Even more so in AfterEffects or Apple Motion, either of which is fine for this job.

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[Mark Suszko]

You wanna do this right? Step one: cut the car into a rear and front half. Next buy a second car, cut that one in longitudinal halves. Light your scenes as you like.

I’m basing what I’m describing on the script ideas I presented earlier; regarding a morph shot from comfy luxury airplane seats, to the same couple, now in the back seat of the armored transport. Then there’s a shot looking forward to the driver, one from ahead of the driver looking back at the couple, as he’s adjusting his rear view mirror, one shot of the female passenger admiring passing scenery, looking up thru the side window. All this will be inter-cut with go pro shots of the car exterior while it drives, later.

I think what I’d do in this situation, (car in the garage but looking like driving), would take several steps.

I’d put blue screen material on the inside of the side and back windows. You’re going to add outside traffic shot from a pickup truck bed with 3 go-pros a night or two before this shoot. Blue screen the front window when shooting POV from rear passenger seat to the driver. I prefer blue to green in this case due to spill color issues, and the blue chromakey may work in a dark nighttime shot where a green would be more easily spotted.

The interior of this thing is NOT as big/wide as a limo, so I’d choose a wide lens with a little bit of fish-eye to make the interior feel larger.

I’m going to shoot the front-facing rear seat shot first, from the front, looking back between the two front seats in a short slow zoom or dolly/slider shot of about a foot… and the setup is all about that. Front seats will be pressed forward to the limit, to make the rear compartment look bigger.

What they wear inside will have a great influence on the lighting: an all-white suit and dress will bounce a lot of light around, and reflect on the glass, where a black suit and dress will suck up light and make it hard to define contours and shapes. Aim for something in-between, some autumnal colors would be nice against black leather, and maybe moderately shiny fabric can help.

Blue screen the rear window with flat matte paper on the inside of the glass. Outside is easier but doesn’t treat interior reflections. Also have on hand several yards of the most useful yet undervalued tool in the world: flat black cloth. Cover the outside of the windows with the cloth if you lack chromakey materials. Cut a hole in the cloth for the lens to shoot at glass windows without leaving outside reflections. An adjustable polarizer on the lens is also important. Black cinefoil and black foam core are also good friends to have.

I’d take the real driving footage from the pickup truck, and play it on a video projector, out of focus, shining it into the car from a window that’s out of shot, over the shoulder of the camera POV. Alternately, some multicolored and white party bulbs on a stick could be waved past the window to cast the fleeting lights of passing storefronts, ads, headlights, street lighting, etc. Be sure the direction of the light sweep is correct based on travel direction and camera angle… don’t make a continuity error here.

For a base light, the LED panel, practically sitting on the male passenger’s knees, with a lot of diffusion on it, and the adjustable output dialed down to a very low setting. What still photogs call a “butterfly or book setup”. A reflector card clipped to the ceiling bounces that lap light to fill the front of the face. Angle of the lap light will need to be adjusted. If there’s room between the seats, the lap light can go there. You will set an f-stop and scope levels for the faces, lock the iris, then adjust lighting until the shot looks good. Tube lighting vertically on the front door pillars or the front headrests with diffusion and “squeezers” to adjust levels.

A stagehand or two will ever so very gently bounce the car bumpers up and down, randomly. Make it subtle: you don’t want to slosh their drinks or whatever, and the car is supposed to have a fancy suspension.

The newbie mistake to make when shooting people with dark skin is to throw additional light on them. What you want instead is to shine a light that glances off the skin, revealing texture and dimension with highlights and darker shaded areas revealing contour. You also want the light to penetrate the outer skin layers and bounce back out. You can try a gold or silver foil reflector card on the window side and bounce light to the face from the foil.

A shot from outside the “moving” car, window up, passenger staring up and out at the city: Shoot this with a large black “tent” of cloth enclosing the window and camera lens. Add the go-pro footage as a reflection layer at low opacity with some blur, afterward, and you can control the opacity of the window, almost like doing a rack-focus shot, to convey security within, adventures outside. Same deal on the front windshield outside on the hood shot. Don’t forget to flip the reflected background when you composite it.

Use one of the go pros with a macro lens and do some close up “flying” shots over interior details of the car: nice upholstery, wood paneling, etc. to inter-cut later. A tracking shot of an arm on the armrest, perhaps wearing an expensive watch and cuff links…? CU Shot of woman’s calves and her expensive designer shoe, “stepping into security and luxury”….? And the door closes on the shot as a cut or wipe, with a solid thunk sound effect of the armored door. You’re showing images and using sound to convey the message, not just words.

You may have to remove a side door to get lighting and camera into the profile shot area… this is not usually so hard to do, if you check the manuals first. You’ll have to disconnect an electrical harness and the hinge pins. Maybe bring an auto body guy with tools for this.

Put the go-pro wide angle cam on a short stalk clamped to the front bumper, low-angle, about three feet ahead of the bumper. Drive on a controlled non-traffic area like a parking lot or airport taxiway.

Put it all in a blender, wait for the CLIO invitation.

[Mark Suszko]

It might be that you *think* you converted to MP4 but it’s still in their proprietary codec… A quick look thru their instructions shows this:

Convert a recording

Note: The recording may take some time to process and convert, depending on which recording media format you chose. If you didn’t choose a location to save your recording to before the session started, the recording file is located in the My Documents folder by default.

1. Open the Recording Manager.

2. Under “Recordings you need to convert”, any unconverted files will be listed (both the most recent session and any past sessions that were not yet converted). Use the check boxes to select the files that you wish to convert.

Note: If you do not see the session recording you are looking for, simply locate it on your computer and move it to the specified Recordings folder. It will then automatically appear in the “Recordings you need to convert” section.

3. Use the “Choose a file format” drop-down menu to select the desired format:

.MP4 (Windows and Mac) Can be played on most Windows, Mac and mobile devices
.WMV (Windows only): Can be played on all Windows devices, as well as some Mac and mobile devices
.MOV (Mac only): Can be played on most Mac and mobile devices using Quicktime

Note: If you are converting a recording that was made in 2012 or earlier, then you must use .WMV format (.MP4 will not work correctly).

……So, maybe try the .mov extension instead?