| Taping Staged Productions by Bill Edmunds A staged production gives you complete control over the content of your video. How-to videos, interviews, and documentaries fit into this category. A staged production has the benefit that you can shoot retakes if you aren't satisfied with the way a scene goes. It also takes the most planning and most time to shoot. Here are some essential guidelines for producing a staged videotape: Observe the 5-second rule. Let's say you want to show what someone's farmyard looks like. Here's one of those situations where you might feel panning your camera is appropriate, even though you aren't following action. In such a case, the 5-second rule comes into play. This concept of rudimentary videography states that a stationary object in a picture must take at least}5 seconds to go from one side of the screen to the other. If, for example, you want to pan the camera from left to right to show the farmyard's layout. At the start of your pan, a tree is on the far right of your viewfinder's screen. As you pan from left to right, the tree will naturally "move" to the left side of the screen. If the tree moves from one side of the screen to the other in less than 5 seconds, you're panning too quickly. Slow it down (but not too much). The most important part of video is audio. That's right, sound is more important than video. Most viewers will forgive a slightly out-of-focus shot or an image that has poor color, but will never accept bad audio. If, for example, your host is giving details about verbal commands and you can't hear what they are, stop recording. Move closer to your subject, ask the person to speak up, move to a quieter location, wait for traffic to pass by, or whatever it takes. Any narration ideally should be done through a microphone, either held by the narrator (a hand-held mic) or better yet pinned on the narrator's shirt (a lavaliere or tie-clip mic). These microphones are available at virtually any electronics store and are relatively inexpensive. When shopping for a mic, bring your camera along to make sure the microphone can plug into it. Wireless microphones offer more flexibility, but often less reliable sound quality, than standard wired mics. Wireless mics range in price from $60 to more than $2,000. As with all things, you get what you pay for. Repeat that, please. If you interview someone, ask the person to answer all your questions in a way that reiterates the question. If you ask, "How big can a mini-mule grow?" the person answering the question should say "A mini-mule can grow to 48 inches." Since your voice won't be heard on the edited program (remember, the videographer's voice will always be cut out), if the person answers "48 inches," viewers won't have a clue what the comment refers to. One of the hardest things to remember when conducting a video interview is that you are not in a conversation, and must therefore avoid interjecting comments like, "Oh, really?" "That's interesting," and so forth. If you do happen to interrupt the speaker, ask the person to repeat what was just said.
Reframe, if necessary. Whenever your subject is illustrating a point, make sure you can see what it is. Any time you feel you are not adequately capturing the topic, try to reframe your shots. If your on-camera narrator points to a D-ring that's too far away, stop recording and move in closer where you can see it better. If the subject is a horse's hoof and you are framed on a wide shot of the entire animal, stop and move in to get that hoof up close. It's a simple matter to ask your narrator to stop speaking, move to a better vantage point, and then ask the presenter to resume speaking. Assume viewers are in the sixth grade. Don't laugh. And please don't consider it an insult. Just because you understand what you're taping doesn't mean everyone who watches will undertand. To keep our industry viable, we need to include beginners as well as old-timers. So, in producing your video, pretend the subject is being explained to someone in the sixth grade. Doing so will lend your production a degree of clarity that guarantees everyone watching will understand and enjoy it. If you would like to contribute to Rural Heritage on RFD-TV, we would like to see some of your video work. No editing is required. You provide the raw footage and, if it's suitable for broadcast, we'll turn it into television magic.
Bill Edmunds of Conway, New Hampshire, produces the Rural Heritage Video Series as well as Rural Heritage on RFD-TV, available weekly through satellite and many cable providers. If you have questions about submitting videotape for possible inclusion on the program, please contact . This article appeared in The Evener 2005 issue of Rural Heritage. | |||
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26 October 2011 last revision
