Shooting film with live sound advice

[Stephen Perera]

Hi all, advice on the following please. I'm shooting a traditional luthier making a Spanish guitar on 16mm film (500T) with my Aaton XTR XC and I want to record the sounds as he works.

1. Is there any other way of synching sound other than manually (clapperboard) when shooting film?
My Aaton XTR only has a battery to run it. Nothing else on it literally, no monitor, nothing (only the physical footage counter on the magazine).

2. Here's how I plan to handle the audio
Camera - I have a basic 'sound blimp' to hopefully dampen down the rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr of the magazine. That being said the Aaton magazines are pretty silent.
Sound: I will be using a Røde NTG4+ mic on a boom over the 'frame' and recording onto a Zoom F3 recorder taped up to the pole.

Workshop isn't large (still to see it) and I will be lighting with my trusted Arri tungsten lamps - as we all know they also add sound to the ambience as the bulbs heat up!!!!!

Advice on the planned modus operandi please very welcome! Thank you.

Edited March 18 by Stephen Perera

[Mark Dunn]

Slating is the simplest way, but you don't necessarily need a board- back in the day a hand clap was sometimes used for documentary, and I've even seen a mic tapped with a pencil. Logging is easier with a slate and a spoken ident, but if you don't have a lot of takes you may be able to manage without.

More recently a marker light fogging a frame and a beep on the tape were used, but you don't have the kit for that. You also don't have any sync reference between sound and film, so you will have to line up by hand in post.

[Stephen Perera]

......thanks Mark yeah a handclap is what I was thinking of cos I don't have film to burn, I will prob shoot a ratio of 1:1 mostly and maybe 2:1 if I change angles for the same given the person is not 'acting' but Im shooting him doing his thing...the mic tapped with a pencil is a great idea haha

Edited March 18 by Stephen Perera

[Robin Phillips]

the old documentary hand clap with notes trick can work. but if it were me I'd just have a smart slate thats jammed to your audio device. so long as sound is rolling, you dont technically need to clap it you can just open the arm and let the TC run, and pan the camera briefly to see the slate. you can then match the timecode manually in post.

back in the day there were telecine machines that could actually take the timecode the Aaton would print onto the film and the tape audio and kind automatically jam the two in the transfer, but I dont think anyone is running a scanner anymore that can do that. 

[Mark Dunn]

I was assuming that Stephen is going with what he has.

Slating was essential when film and sound went from camera to sound transfer to syncing up/editing, all done by different people with no knowledge of the subject or what happened on the shoot. It was a standard to work to. Now all that infrastructure is gone, and it's just you, you can do what you like, you'll remember what you did. Maybe just tap the mic and call out the take number.

Edited March 18 by Mark Dunn

[Aapo Lettinen]

2 hours ago, Stephen Perera said:

Hi all, advice on the following please. I'm shooting a traditional luthier making a Spanish guitar on 16mm film (500T) with my Aaton XTR XC and I want to record the sounds as he works.

you have to know which take is which on the sound recorder. so you have to keep track of the files or alternatively announce the shot+take on the mic for each take.

You are shooting  a music performance but is it staged just for your film shoot or will there be an audience... meaning can you just ask the guitar player to make some kind of additional sound with the instrument before starting to play for each take and you can use that as a sync reference? tapping the body of the guitar to make a distinctive sound you can easily find, etc?

You could probably sync most of the takes without clapperboard or any other reference, it just takes tons more time so good to make it easier if in any way possible.

one thing which comes to mind is some kind of toy which has a button and when pressed it flashes light and creates sound at the same time. I have a seal pup key fob which does just that, you may be able to find something from local stores and it would make the shoot much funnier at least 😄

[Stephen Perera]

Thanks for all the advice....yes it's simply me all the way through so I will go for announcing the take before rolling that way I save film and don't have to shoot a slate. I'm shooting a luthier making a guitar not playing it til later prob at the very end when it's ready......

I'm having a guitar made by hand by a luthier as a family heirloom that I want to pass down hopefully to inspire a grandchild to play it and at the same time see ME in the process via this short film or whatever it turns out to be! The funny thing is I can't play for sh*t and my sons are too young (20 and 22) and don't even have girlfriends at the moment so it's hopefully still a long time away Hahaha.....

I met this luthier busking in Gibraltar some time ago and I invited him to play in my home in a get together with some friends and he played this guitar he made by hand which was beautiful and that sparked off the idea

Edited March 18 by Stephen Perera

[Stephen Perera]

This is him playing taken on my phone

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

16 minutes ago, Stephen Perera said:

Thanks for all the advice....yes it's simply me all the way through so I will go for announcing the take before rolling that way I save film and don't have to shoot a slate. I'm shooting a luthier making a guitar not playing it til later prob at the very end when it's ready......

sorry I misread the first post and did not realise it was about the guitarmaking process 🙂

You could have one of those tiny mini slates (or only the sticks) made for closeup shots and let the talent just slate the shots. Actors are fine with it on shoots where the set is restricted some way (car scenes, tiny corners, etc) so I am sure your subject would be happy to slate the shots for you if needed and tiny slate can be just hidden behind the guitar or put aside easily for each shot

[Giray Izcan]

It sounds like you're really right on budget.. I would shoot digital and have a better end product instead of relying on 1 take wonders just to shoot on film. 

Edited March 19 by Giray Izcan

[Tyler Purcell]

So what I'd do is wireless mic him and have him doing the work first on camera, forget sync. 

Then sit him down and go through the process in an interview. 

Like this: 
 

[Jon O'Brien]

A very exciting project and one I want to get around doing soon, too, on 16mm or S16. When it's art, or something traditional, hand made, hand painted, etc, that kind of thing, film is a wonderful medium that complements the subject. Yes, shooting digitally can be made to look beautiful too, but film has the natural edge and inclination towards giving the right artistic or traditional vibe to a project. So for this sort of short film I think real film is perfect, especially 16mm where you can see the grain but there's still enough quality in the image to make it look classy too.

I want to do the same thing but with a violin luthier/maker. I'm thinking of turning it into a short drama work, writing the script for it. it would need minimal acting skills, or just 'being oneself' and no acting at all. There's something fascinating about the work of the luthier, the shop, the natural materials, the music. Fantastic project to work on.

[Gautam Valluri]

Stephen, don't forget to record some room tone and if possible, also a few seconds of your Aaton running without any other sounds. This is so you can profile it in sound editing software to remove camera noise if needed.

Good luck with the shoot!

[Stephen Perera]

7 hours ago, Giray Izcan said:

It sounds like you're really right on budget.. I would shoot digital and have a better end product instead of relying on 1 take wonders just to shoot on film. 

My raison d'être is to shoot on film amigo.....36 years shooting film and counting (photographic mostly of course). Im shooting a guy who makes guitars for a living he's not an actor nor am I asking him to act so its a different set of rules I apply to this in my mind, I can do plenty of 1 takes for sure

Edited March 19 by Stephen Perera

[Stephen Perera]

29 minutes ago, Gautam Valluri said:

Stephen, don't forget to record some room tone and if possible, also a few seconds of your Aaton running without any other sounds. This is so you can profile it in sound editing software to remove camera noise if needed.

Good luck with the shoot!

excellent advice thank you, I had not thought about recording the Aaton only in the room to 'profile' it.....can you explain how this is done?

Edited March 19 by Stephen Perera

[Stephen Perera]

5 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

A very exciting project and one I want to get around doing soon, too, on 16mm or S16. When it's art, or something traditional, hand made, hand painted, etc, that kind of thing, film is a wonderful medium that complements the subject. Yes, shooting digitally can be made to look beautiful too, but film has the natural edge and inclination towards giving the right artistic or traditional vibe to a project. So for this sort of short film I think real film is perfect, especially 16mm where you can see the grain but there's still enough quality in the image to make it look classy too.

I want to do the same thing but with a violin luthier/maker. I'm thinking of turning it into a short drama work, writing the script for it. it would need minimal acting skills, or just 'being oneself' and no acting at all. There's something fascinating about the work of the luthier, the shop, the natural materials, the music. Fantastic project to work on.

Go for it Jon, film is king, always.....thanks for commenting

[Stephen Perera]

6 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

So what I'd do is wireless mic him and have him doing the work first on camera, forget sync. 

Then sit him down and go through the process in an interview. 

Like this: 
 

thanks Tyler will watch that piece as I did at the time when you first started helping me getting my Aaton back working with your battery adapter which you 3D printed, not forgetting the 'perfect loop' as well I got from you.

[Gautam Valluri]

51 minutes ago, Stephen Perera said:

excellent advice thank you, I had not thought about recording the Aaton only in the room to 'profile' it.....can you explain how this is done?

Once you have a sample of only the camera noise, you can feed it as a noise 'profile' in software like Adobe Audition. It's usually under the "noise reduction" menu. Once the software has the profile, you can remove it from the entire sound recording by doing "Apply profile to entire file" option.

[Stephen Perera]

6 minutes ago, Gautam Valluri said:

Once you have a sample of only the camera noise, you can feed it as a noise 'profile' in software like Adobe Audition. It's usually under the "noise reduction" menu. Once the software has the profile, you can remove it from the entire sound recording by doing "Apply profile to entire file" option.

ahh great I will look into that thank you very much

[Tyler Purcell]

6 hours ago, Gautam Valluri said:

Once you have a sample of only the camera noise, you can feed it as a noise 'profile' in software like Adobe Audition. It's usually under the "noise reduction" menu. Once the software has the profile, you can remove it from the entire sound recording by doing "Apply profile to entire file" option.

Yea resolve has that tool built in, it can be done on a track basis AND on a clip basis, called voice isolation. It works really great and has been a life saver. I had some clips with train engine noise behind the dialog and it removed it entirely. With bit of tweaking, it actually can sound pretty good, then I'll just add the engine sound back in on the mix in stereo, with a mono dialog track. It's all in real time as you're playing the file back in the timeline. 

[Stephen Perera]

Tyler, is that DaVinci Resolve full version or the free one can do that too?

[Justin Skrundz]

I don't know if I'm too late and you've shot already but I've done stateless doc sync sound stuff in a sort of funny way:

Recorder with a mic capturing the subject audio. At the same time I mount a lav mic onto the camera mag - since you're using a blimp/barney slip it in there. Let the recorder roll the entire duration of the shoot. The lav mounted on the mag will hear the purr of the camera rolling, meanwhile on a seperate track you have clean audio for the subject. Once you get the footage back it's easy to see on your two audio tracks when your camera was rolling. No need for a voice ID either - the bits of your recording that hear the camera purr will correspond exactly to the lengths of your shots, easy enough to organize. 

 

[Stephen Perera]

Not started yet thanks for the input appreciate all comments from everyone other than why shoot film haha as that is blasphemy to my ears hahaha come on sense of humour time please 

[Stephen Perera]

It's a great idea to record the camera rolling.....ingenious really for us down here at the one man band end of things!