[Richard Herd]

This is just my opinion, and it’s free advice, so…do you what you think is best.

I would NOT tell the band, “they need to play as closely as possibly to the pre-recorded track” because that sounds bad, politically, like you can’t handle it. It’s live. There’s always variances. What if the guitarist hits a ripping solo, and you caught it on camera? That’s a very good thing. Way more important than the prerecorded track.

Keep in mind, if the whole show lasts 3 hours, like a working band plays, and you shoot with 3 cameras, then that’s 9 hours of footage to wade through. What are the expectations? Do they want a yearbook type thing where here’s what we did? Or do they want something else? Like one really sweet song? As an example, in order to deal with the variances, I would shoot at least one camera at 48 fps or 60 fps because that’ll create very cool slow motion and you can use cool slow mo from song “X” as b-roll for song “Y.”

The deliverable is supposed to make the band look good, get them more gigs, and more fans.

I would aim the 500 watt “home depot work lights” at the background.

I would say to the band, “yeah piece of cake. Me and some pals are going to shoot it and I’ll get you an assemble edit in two weeks. Just be yourselves and we’re there to document it. No problemo.”

[Richard Herd]

Budget and number of cameras come to mind, first, and from there managing expectations is key.
It’s music, so you might ask in the audio forum about how to get sound.
Do you plan to sync later?

The down and dirty (really cheap) thing to do is put your camera close enough to the sound board, and get a feed into the camera. Or can the audio engineer record? That frees you up to run and gun.

The really high end thing to do is have multiple cameras, wires, jibs, stedicam, and operators! All piped into a control room, where it can be switched.

Lighting…what about lighting?

[Richard Herd]

Jump cut!

[Richard Herd]

Some detail to consider: Depends what you mean by “copyrighted.” For example, some old pieces (classical, folk mostly) are public domain, so you’d have to buy the sheet music and record it. Then someone would hold the copyright to the arrangement and the recording.

[Richard Herd]

Thanks Mark.

Also, dude, my wife would’ve killed me if I hung black home depot cloth at our wedding! 🙂

[Richard Herd]

another idea…two cameras. Expose one for the highs, one for the lows, and composite.

‘nother cheat to ponder is get there early and record several minutes of background sky properly.

During the ceremony, expose for the faces, and then afterwards, use the blown highs for a key and matte in the properly exposed background.

(Add a little blur on the background too)

just a thought, hope it helps!

[Richard Herd]

What kind of video (miniDV, HD, XDCAM???) Each of these formats will present a unique thing.

Because the actual amount of footage is so low (although the ratio is drastic, imo), highly consider logging and capturing/transferring all of it, not with onefile=onetape, but something like 20 minute “chunks.” One file is “Tape 1 00:00:00 to 20:00:00” (for example) and another is “Tape 1 20:00:01 to 40:00:00”

A 10:1 ratio will generate about 100 minutes of footage. Here’s a nightmare scenario: You’ll spend 8 hours, carefully logging and capturing/transferring it all based on your script notes, and then when the director sees the assemble edit, she’ll ask, “Why did you use that take?”

And you’ll say, “Because that was the circle take.”

And the director will say, “Let’s see the other takes.”

“Here’s take 1.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 2.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 3.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 4.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 5.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 6.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 7.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 8.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 9.” You’ll watch it. “Here’s take 10.” You’ll watch it.

Guess what the director will ask! “Can we see ’em again?”

LOL! 🙂

Or I could be completely wrong. The director will see your cut and declare “PERFECT! There’s nothing else left to do!”

[Richard Herd]

Expose for the faces, don’t miss the kiss!

I’m 99% sure you won’t be able to expose for both the shade and the outside.

The 1% is about time of day. Sunset/sunrise you might be able to expose for both.

[Richard Herd]

How many pages?
How many locations?
What’s the shooting ratio?
How many actors?
What medium, film or video?

[Richard Herd]

A dude name Elijah https://forums.creativecow.net/profile/121216 posting in the Indie forum is really interested. (Please send my 10% agent’s fee to a charity of your choosing 🙂