sound for video/short film

[fire.is.real]

Anyone have any experience doing sound for video/short film? I have a commercial studio and some friends of mine are doing a short film. Next thing I know I'm the audio engineer. It will be shot on a fairly high-end DV camera and all editing will be done on computer.

I really have no experience doing on-location sound for video. I'm wondering how much specialized equipment is necessary. I have some ADATs lying around the studio and was thinking about racking one w/ a little mixer to bring out there.

I don't have any shotgun mics or anything like that. I have a pretty standard arsenal of studio mics, though. Any ideas as to what would be appropriate? What about syncing with the video gear?

Any firsthand experience or weblinks or anything would be a great help...

Thanks

 

[chessrock]

I have some ADATs lying around the studio and was thinking about racking one w/ a little mixer to bring out there.

That should work just fine. You'll want to use a slate so that you can easily sync the audio in your DAW editor at a later time. I wouldn't worry about syncing to time code and what not for now. That stuff can get pretty complicated and expensive. Try and keep it simple to start out with.

You'll probably want to rent a boom (shotgun mic) . . . or use a bunch of lavaliers -- which can present a whole new set of problems as far as phasing is concerned. You'll be better off just renting a nice boom and record everything mono for now -- simple enough.

 

[fenix]

be prepared for tons of ADR.

 

[Son of Mixerman]

Oh boy does this sound familiar.

It can get complicated like Chessrock said. My best advice is to figure out what the film needs. Typically what a boom mic does is pick up the ambience of the scene and enough of the speaking parts to do overdubs. Alot of the recording gear depends on how remote you are. Im in preproduction right now with Vaceart Entertainment and the short film were going to be working on is a war film and because of the remoteness were relying on alot of battery packs and portable recording gear. Minidisc recorders sometimes work but I prefer portable 20 bit dat recorders. Be prepared to be best friends with the video editing team.

SoMm

 

[chessrock]

Be prepared to be best friends with the video editing team.

Or worst enemies.

 

[fire.is.real]

Thanks for the help.

I thought about renting a shotgun mic + boom until i saw some pretty inexpensive ones on ebay. Does anyone have any recommendations on particular mics? I see AKG D900s for incredibly cheap.

Be prepared to be best friends with the video editing team.

I already am, hence my automatic position as the audio engineer/editing team.

Thanks again