MultiCamera Work!!! XD

For my report I have to analyse two multi-camera productions as live! One of these shows has to be in a studio like question time or something along the genera lines of that so im going to do “Mock the Week”, also I have decided to do another show in a studio so im going to do “Maury” the marital problems show that bears a similarity to “the Jerry Springer Show”. The other however, can be anything we want as long as its recorder as live. This means I am going to talk about the bits done live on “Im a Celebrity get me out of here!”

Maury- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEP-j-IqqQg&feature=related

For my first Live Multi-camera production I sampled a piece of Maury’s show and it was about a mother trying to convince a man that her child was his but fails miserably.
The studio in which Maury hosts his shows is very large due to the fact he has a very large set and he is able to seat a large audience. Maury uses a backstage approach to introduce his guests and has a warmly sort of set backstage before it leads outside. You can blatantly see the enormous size of his studio from the fact that his audience is enormous. If we compare this to the audience we are going to have in our TV studio, that’s quite a jump because the capacity for our audience is 10-15 people. The studio itself is a very warm sort of studio, which works very well with the set because the set is very warmly lit and is set in a warm sort of way which contrasts with the show due to the fact that the people are always shouting and screaming at each other. The set allows many flexible camera angles such as the cameras can get into the action by walking on stage. I think there are roughly 8 cameras out on the front and 2 out the back taking back stage footage. I believe this because I have seen the safety shots from behind the audience used when the cameras are sometimes being moved. Maury’s show doesn’t have some of the best cameramen because they move the cameras at the wrong moments and make the shots look ugly. I believe that the safety cameras are fixed in position so that if things go horribly wrong then at least they know they can fall back on them, but I believe that the pole cameras and stage cameras are moveable purely because I have seen in some of the ugly shots that, by accident, they have caught the other cameras in shot and 2 of which are on camera men’s shoulders.

The lighting doesn’t change much through the show to be honest. The only thing that particularly changes is the lighting backstage. They only really use house lights behind there unless it’s in the part where the guests wait before they come onstage. The lighting there is set for the person who is going to be standing there before they come onstage so that the recording of them is good quality because if the person is (for loss of words) bald then the light will reflect off the skin. The background is lit by special coloured spotlights which shine a shape onto the background. I also noticed while watching the show that people ARE wearing black, but this because the background is of a nice brickwork texture instead of blacks. This means that the talent do not need to worry about colours apart from white, however, people do come onto the stage with white on but this is countered because either the whites are tested when the talent arrive, or, the lights are adjusted to suit it and keep the shine and reflection under control. Due to the massive size of the studio, there are some safety issues which would have to be taken into account. Firstly, the studio would have too have enough fire exits to support the audience and staff evacuating the building should such a catastrophe occur. Secondly, there would have to be fire extinguishers because it is common law (and common sense!) to have one in the studio, or too be honest, where ever you are.

This production is made in a studio with a live audience and is recorded as Live! However, I do not believe there is an OB (outside broadcast) Truck used outside the studio. This is because the show would not need to be broadcasted anywhere around the studio because the show is already broadcasted globally.
The shots that were used varied from safety wide shots (5 shots) to a lot of MCUs (Medium Close Up) and CUs (Close Ups). MCUs were mostly used to show Maury and the man named Terrance. CUs were used on the woman, they showed her facial detail when she was sitting down talking to Maury. Wide shots were used to show all of the talent when they were standing up having a yelling spree. Over shoulder shots of Maury are taken over Terrance's shoulder. The pole camera positioned near Maury follows the talent when they run of stage. Also once they have run off stage, there are 2 cameras, as said before, behind the stage that usually film the talent when they are crying or distressing.
The overall format and genre of the show is a live Chat show, discussing relationship problems and occasionally make over problems. I believe the show follows a very rough outlined script because Maury needs to know what to ask his guests otherwise he doesn’t know anything about them. However, the talent themselves do not follow any script, they have to tell Maury what they feel and of course the arguments are NOT scripted. But I think they need to happen otherwise people are going to think it’s boring and will not want to watch the show. This will decrease viewers and officially make the show fail.
Maury's tone in his show seems as if he shows contempt and dislike for his guests because of their rowdy behaviour but when they run backstage he puts on a caring kindly side and offers help to any of his guests no matter how horrible they are, sometimes he even arranges former guests who’s lives have been greatly affected to come on stage to try and change the people who have been acting wrong.

Titles and graphics are used a lot throughout the entire show, it has titles about the guests and their partners appear when shots are taken of them. The show opens up with a title of the shows name and in the clip Im using, the slogan of the “episode” shall we say, is scrolled across the bottom of the screen along with Maury’s logo which is an M in lower case.
Music plays very quietly throughout the show and when Maury uses GVs of previous shows the music gets ever so slightly louder and mixes with the speech and noises of the audience in the studio. Also, the GVs are edited together so that the reminiscence is brief, this is achieved not only with the quick cutting and editing but with the sounds they use to move from shot to shot, this sound is like a whooshing sound and when it sounds, the shots fade to white then from white to the next shot. The GVs are done in an olden time way so that the effect of memory shows. The shows tension is built up as Maury goes along. He interviews the person whose life he is trying to help first, then he brings out the new guest and the two usually argue while Maury sits back and watches with surprised contempt on his face. This technique makes the audience and the watchers think about the situation and wonder who is right and who they are going to side with. the show is a variation of a well used theme show, I know this because I have watched many shows similar to its design, such as “the Jerry Springer Show” and “the Jeremy Kyle Show” which use many of the same factors, codes and conventions as Maury. Maury's show however is slightly different because not once have I seem one of the other shows do a makeover show. This makes Maury's show more original plus it means Maury's ratings and viewers will go up and the show will become more popular.

The audience for this programme in particular are not only the general audience in the studio. I believe the audience, who the show is aimed for, are people who are suffering the same sort of problems as the people who actually attend the shows. I believe this because Maury, and many others to be honest, put an advert at the end of their shows offering help and guidance for people like you and me sitting at home worrying about things related to the topics the programme describes. Also, I believe that the audience in the studio may be made up of people who have been through problems like that because they often stand up, not only in Maury but in other shows to, to give their opinions on the talents lives and tell them, sometimes, that they need to grow up and sort it out.

I’m a Celebrity get me out of Here!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FwfFJYPsSc

For my second Live TV Show I decided to do the small live bits of “im a celebrity get me out of here”. The pieces are small but this is due to the fact that they are there to fill in gaps while footage of the previous night is played after a night of editing. There is proof that the pieces are live because there is a symbol in the corner that looks like this:

The live bits are set in a large tree house thing suspended a long way off the ground so there isn’t really a studio as such, but there is still a lot of equipment in the tree house. I think the “studio” is medium sized because they don’t really too much equipment there because I believe the footage and audio is sent to an off sight control room where the vision mixer and audio mixer do their stuff. I believe this because I do not think they could possibly fit all the equipment they would need into the tree house. The characteristics that make the studio original and imaginative are the trees and bright sunshine that the shots capture. The basic shot that is most commonly used by them is Loose Mid Shot (LMS) and this displays Ant and Dec standing in that order and they describe what happened and what is going to happen and then the VX cuts to footage from the night before.
In the clip I watched, Ant and Dec were arguing over Katie Price and Ant was wearing a “Team Andre” T-shirt. When he unzipped his hoodie to reveal the t-shirt, the vision mixer cut to a second camera for a Close up (CU) on his t-shirt. The set is very simple, yet very effective, I believe that the trees provide an excellent background and there would be no need for any internal lighting because the lighting will have already been done. However, the lighting will have to be controlled which is very hard to do, I believe that the studio has been designed to only use a certain amount of light, and the cameras have been tweaked to harness the amount of light around them, this can be done by reducing or enlarging the aperture. The studio looks to me like it’s quite restrictive with its camera movements. The shots usually used to shoot the boys (Ant and Dec) are either stationary or use a giant crane from outside the studio which moves into the boys and they follow it. I think there are probably only 2-3 cameras, stationary sitting around the studio with shots ready for the director I think this because of the fact that the cameras are focused in two places constantly. I think that the microphones that were used were clip on radio microphones that take the nearest sound source possible. The size and complexity of the lighting rig, to me, looks quite low, and small. I think this because the filming usually takes place outside in the broad daylight which means lighting won’t really be needed. However, lighting will be on backup in case the sun either goes in or something bad happens and the light is taken away. (Weather and such).

The likely size of the crew used in the shoot probably consisted of about 5-6 people, I believe this because they would need the floor manager and 2 camera men on the floor at least, and then the director, VX and SX in the control rooms, which would be the minimum of the crew required for the shoot.
I think the shoot used an OB truck because the studio is outside which means the environment would not be suitable for the storage and use of the equipment. The types of shots, as said above, are a Loose Mid Shot (LMS) and a Close Up (CU) the LMS is just used to show both the presenters while they perform their piece, then the CU is just to show the t-shirt. The “studio” is in a tree house high off the ground and so would need to have a lot of safety measures taken to make sure the show goes ahead without any problems. Barriers and other such things would have to be built to make sure the talent (and crew for that matter!) are safe. I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here is a reality TV show and the format is as follows;
12 celebrities are confined to a jungle campsite and live together with nothing at their disposal apart from rats and spiders. They have to complete challenges and “bush tucker trials” to gain food and luxuries to “survive”. Slowly one by one the teammates get evicted until there are only 3 left which then skips to the final.

The show is very ad lib as because the camera work (which is live) is only used on Ant and Dec but the rest of the show is taken up with the footage of the day before. The role and tone of the presenters liven up the show somewhat by making the audience laugh before they play the footage, plus as said above, you an hear the crew laughing at some of their hilarious gags.
The graphics and titles are rather cool because when the massive diamond letters are being carried, each one shows a celebrity in the show. As you can see here it shows Martina Navratilova the music goes really well to the animation as well and uses a lot of sounds which sound like jungle animals or noises.
The music is a quite mysterious genre throughout the entire show which goes really well. The show is a more extreme kind of big brother, a reality TV show which confines roughly 10 celebs or usually normal people into a house with NO way out and constricting on what they are aloud to have which means that im a celeb is more of a variation rather than completely original.

Mock The Week!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2W5TjcDKdvc&feature=channel

For my third Live TV show I have decided to do my favourite TV show of all time, Mock the Week!
Mock the week is an informative quiz show to basically make fun of all the news during the week.
The studio is a very large location; this is obvious because there are two sections of the set both of which are large in size. The seating in the studio is very widely set. This is because the show is very popular so many people want to watch the show up close and personal.
The set is very carefully designed to look good and to work with the topics being asked. Most of the backdrops are actually screens with play the titles and occasionally video clips. I think the set is permanent because it’s always the same and has been built into the room rather than built out side and brought in. I think there’s roughly about 6 cameras used which are all look as if they are fixed in position because they seem to just have the same shots over and over again. The microphones used were directional microphones with probably some wireless mini microphones which means the sound will only be taken from the source its being recorded from. This will increase the quality of the recording. The cameras used took shots such as MCU’s and CU’s and a lot of wide shots to show the whole Talent. The show would mean that the studio would need a lot of safety measures taken due to the large size of the studio. These would include the fire escapes and extinguishers positioned over the building. The show is almost completely ad lib due to the fact that no one knows what’s going to happen the show is a question answer show which is very comical.

Multicamera production.

a camera is shown on a ploor plan as an equalteral triangle. the triangle will have a number inside it, 1,2,3,4 etc to show which camera it is. the reason cameras are number is becuase its quicker and more efficent for the director who is talking to them all to say "cutting to cam 1" rather than saying the name.

the cameras all feed into a large machine known as a vision mixer,(which is displayed as a large retangle) this machine allows the use of more than one camera so that a clean effective cut is produced. the controls on the vision mixer allow the cameras to have a clean cut or allow the cameras to fade into each other. however for our exercise we will be doing clean cuts.

the cameras are known as vision inputs into the mixer. the mixer can also take other inputs though, such as VTR (video tape recorder) DVD player, HDDR (hard disc drive recorder).

The output is known as the programme output.

audio works a little different to vison. the 2 tracks (audio and vision) are split up form each other and edited and programmed differently.

a mcrophone is displayed on the plan as a line with a circle at the end. and the audio mixer is shown (yet again) as a large rectangle. the microphones, like the cameras, are also known as audio inputs, and the mixer (like the vision mixer) can also take other inputs such as, CD player, PC itunes, IPOD, VTR, DVD, and HDDR.

studio terms

the black metal poles that line the ceiling in a studio are called the lighting grid. this suspends the studio lights and im now about to explain the different knids of lights.
the back lights are lights with floresent tubes in. these give off sumfin called soft light and they are used to fill the background in behind the talent. they have something called barn doors on them which limits or amplifies the amount of light given from the lights.

the spot lights provide concentrated light onto the talent and give off something called hardlight. this is used to light up the talent and make sure they are seen.

the flood lights are sometimes called the scenery lights. they light up the scenery and do a simerla job to the back lights.

the dimmerpack is a large box in which the power to the lights runs through. it can be used to turn the power off, but its not advised.

the STOB box is a large black box in the corner of the room which connects the sound sorces to the audio mixer. STOB stands for, Studio Termination Outlet Box.

the "Blacks" are the studio name given to the black curtains that surround the room. they absorb any unwanted light from outside the studio.

MIC level is weak, 1 volt

Line level is strong, millions of volts

the audio mixer has faders on it which are all seprated and assigned to each audio input. when the fader is up it means its taking one of the sound sources through, when the fader is down however it means that the sound is blocked.

there are 2 types of sound redcord.

Analogue- inefficient due to being difficult to copy and means that the quality suffers.
Digital- makes a perfect copy every single time.

most of the studio equipment is analogue but the fianl output is digital. the CD player is digital but is fitted with a device called a DAC, which means that when its putting through a signal its converting digital to analogue.

the mics are analogue.
the deskis analogue.

and the HDDR is fitted with a device which does the oposite to a CD player, ADC, analogue to digital converter.

analogue and digital signals are represented by 2 different shapes.

analogue is represented by a long wavey line.

digital is done by steps.

sound distortian

analogue can "handle a signal" louder than what it should. distortian is when the sound goes crappy due the signal being louder than what it should.

the picture to the right is of a "VU meter" which stands for Volume units meter. the meter measures the sound in decibels (dB) and goes down to infinnete. speech levels should be roughly about -18 too -9.

the levels are shown by colours. Green means the sound is in a good zone, amber means the sound is loud, and Red means the sound is way to loud and will distort. the top of red is marked with a zero, and this is where digital has to stop otherwise it distorts and goes crazy. analogue can have something called "head on room" which means it can go above zero and occasionally to +9!

camera terms

the director or floormanager has a number of phrases which mean that the camera has to move. if the director wants the camra to turn side ways, left or right, the director will say "cam 1 pan right" or "pan left" however from the talents POV the directions will be oposite. the floormanager allways gives instructions from the cameras POV.

if the director wants the camera to move right or left he will say, "cam 1 crab right" or "crab left" in the american big hollywood industry they have the railway tracks for cameras to move on so they say "cam 1 track right" or "track left".

when the director wants the camera to mover back and forwards he will say "cam 1 fall back" or "track forwards".

the red light on top of the camera is called the tally light. this means the camera has been selected by the mixer and is therefore online. the vision mixer has a corresponding light under the numbered button meaning that the director knows ehich camera he has got online.

the cameras all have 2 discs on them which control 2 things.

Focus control- controls the sharpness of the shot.

Exposure control- shrinks or largens the aperture to control the brightness.

MultiCamera Work!!! XD

Tuesday 5 January 2010

2879 word Analysis and report on Multi-Camera Production

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Thursday 5 November 2009

Info on Studio Cameras!

Intro The Duction XP

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