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Cam setup recording keys?


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Hi,

 

I wonder if some of you have experience setting up cam or multiple cams for recording yourself playing keyboard/digital piano nowadays?

My idea: multiple cams -> for recording multiple angle video, then post-edit the content, switching between them. The goal is to show video of my performances. Audio could run through the computer (either produced by VST or audio input), but it's nice if the cam can pick up on my voice with quality, without it sounding overly thin. I know many cams don't have good quality audio. Another option I'd like to have is use a stand/tripod to do keys-overhead, but its not a must. For that I heard a wide angle cam is important.

 

Any pitfalls I should watch out for? Any recommendations in regard to cam models? Or would you go for a certain phone model instead? Can combine phone with cam at the same time setups? Wide angle lens? 1080p? DSLR?

I'm a rookie with this so some pointers into the right direction would be appreciated. I was hoping I could get things going for beneath $400.

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Experiment with your phone. You can get a tripod adapter on Amazon for $15 or so. You can certainly buy GoPro style action cams under $400, but give your phone a try and figure out what angles work, and how many you think you need.

 

Ideally you would record the audio some other way and then sync it to the camera audio in your video editing software. The camera recording will be poor, especially on a noisy stage. There's no such thing as a in-camera mic that is going to make your voice sound "ok". You have to record the audio well on its own and then combine them if you want it to be credible. If you want it "right". You'll record everything, do a full audio mix, export that, then sync that mixed audio to the raw video and then edit the multiple video takes into a cohesive whole. It is a lot of work, but can be rewarding.

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I haven't done anything professional, so I haven't actually done this, but I've thought a lot about it. If I were to do it the way I want, I would do the following:

 

One camera on a tripod on one side and slightly above showing the full length of the keyboard (my preference would be from the high notes end of the piano shooting down to the low notes at the far side). Second camera directly above shooting straight down showing the top of my hands over the keyboard.

 

I would record audio totally separately. If we're talking real acoustic piano, I would probably drop a mic in the piano and have a second in the room nearby and pan it slightly to give it some space. I would use the audio track as essentially the timeline for the video and cut between the 2 camera angles as desired. The audio tracks on the cameras can be used to help line them up time-wise with the audio track but I wouldn't use the camera audio.

Dan

 

Acoustic/Electric stringed instruments ranging from 4 to 230 strings, hammered, picked, fingered, slapped, and plucked. Analog and Digital Electronic instruments, reeds, and throat/mouth.

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There are some YouTubes on this so worth searching. What I've seen some do I might try is they get a stand for a "green screen" so wide bar with horizontal bar on top that normally you'd hang a green screen from, but they put a smartphone or camera mount on it. You could probably make something with PVC pipe and lighting clamps to handle whatever you want overhead.

 

 

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There are some YouTubes on this so worth searching.

There's a cat that goes by Thortschman on YouTube that uploads a lot of this kind of stuff-- although he doesn't sing, and usually only has one camera angle per concert. Still, you might get some ideas from watching his videos. He's a good player, too!

 

https://www.youtube.com/user/Thortschman/videos

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I've done quite a bit of shooting piano, since I worked as both a videographer and musician most of my life. Generally, these days I say you can get some pretty good closeups with a recent smartphone or a GoPro with a clip. Particularly quick shots for music videos, nothing beats a micro video camera that you can clamp anywhere or even have someone handhold. Obviously you're going to get the best video quality with a DSLR, but depending on the shot and medium, I probably wouldn't bother. I would definitely shoot on angle or looking down the keys, straight on is going to not show a very large range of notes. I wouldn't opt for wide angled lenses so much as adjust the angle of the shot to get the range of keys you're looking for. Wide Angled lenses can help, but they can also make the far away keys look very small. If you can use a camera phone, then you're "clamp" possibilities are endless and easy. Want a complete overhead view? Clamp it to a mic boom raised up. These are things you can't quickly and easily get with a DSLR or Camcorder. I have a Panasonic G5s DSLR ($3500) and use it every day for work, but there are many things I grab my iPhone XS for instead.

 

Don't bother with an on-camera microphone. Even if the mic was fantastic, the camera will be in the wrong place to pick up your voice adequately. You should have a mic in front of you somehow. You COULD feed the audio into a pro-level camera, but I wouldn't bother. I tend to get audio on a separate device and "Clap Sync" the audio/video together. All you have to do is clap your hands in front of the camera, and then in post line up the frame and Bob's Your Uncle. Far easier/cheaper/cleaner than trying to feed mixed audio into your camera feed. You may already have a USB audio interface, just throw a mic on a stand and record it in the box.

 

Keep in mind pretty much all professionally done music videos are lip-sync'd. If you don't see a mic in front of their face, they're just miming. But if you're doing "live to video" as many YouTube bands are doing now, then you expect to see a mic in front of them, and that's part of the style.

Puck Funk! :)

 

Equipment: Laptop running lots of nerdy software, some keyboards, noise makersâ¦yada yada yadaâ¦maybe a cat?

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So this is on a related topic -

 

I've been playing around with cameras, video feeds, various software and hardware, etc. I am running OBS open source broadcaster software on my iMac, and it works great. Using three HD video cameras purchased at Best Buy (2 x $39 and 1 x $79) I am able to run and record several live cameras while playing/capturing a Sugarland video and runnjng all of the audio through a Mackie mixer, into my Steinberg 44, and then back into the iMac where OBS records everything into an HD video with CD quality stereo sound. It's a bit tricky how to wire it all up and route everything, but it works (and my iMac is certainly not the latest model). I have learned that I can have - and utilize - 13 USB ports simultaneously while playing back and recording audio. Very cool.

 

Happy to answer any questions - this may be kind of what you might be looking to do, but I cannot play out so I do it at home.

 

This was my first effort, and I didn't want my keys to be TOO intrusive in the mix... :)

 

[video:youtube]

 

 

 

 

Michael

Montage 8, Logic Pro X, Omnisphere, Diva, Zebra 2, etc.

 

 

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Ideally you would record the audio some other way and then sync it to the camera audio in your video editing software. The camera recording will be poor, especially on a noisy stage. There's no such thing as a in-camera mic that is going to make your voice sound "ok". You have to record the audio well on its own and then combine them if you want it to be credible. If you want it "right". You'll record everything, do a full audio mix, export that, then sync that mixed audio to the raw video and then edit the multiple video takes into a cohesive whole. It is a lot of work, but can be rewarding.

 

That's pretty much what I had to do. The audio quality of every consumer video recording device leaves much to be desired. I have yet to find an accessory that offers direct stereo recording into my iPhone while recording video.

 

If you want studio quality audio then you have to record the keys direct to another recorder while recording video, sync the audio later in your audio editor, edit the two, then drop the finished audio into the video. One thing that really helps with syncing is playing a percussive sound as a cue. More work, but it does yield good results.

 

Sometimes there is a need to fade in the video mic, check out my demo video of my restored Oberheim OBSX at 6:37

 

[video:youtube]

 

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Hi,

 

I wonder if some of you have experience setting up cam or multiple cams for recording yourself playing keyboard/digital piano nowadays?

........ I was hoping I could get things going for beneath $400.

 

 

Maybe you can buy two used GoPro cameras? or use your cell and one GoPro? The only thing with GoPro is that you need real good lighting. Here I use a DAW to capture audio and a GoPro for the shot above the keyboard. The shot from the side is a DSLR. I know nothing about color grading and video settings in general. This is plenty for my needs anyway.

 

 

 

I hardly ever say anything in my videos, so generally I don't have to worry about recording my voice...but when I go to trade shows (such as NAMM..etc), I use a wireless Sennheiser AVX lavalier mic. The receiver plugs directly into the camera so it's very convenient for recording a much better audio. It wasn't exactly cheap though. If you're only recording your own voice at home, you can just use a standard mic. You'll also need an audio interface that has enough I/O for your keyboard(s) and mic obviously.

www.youtube.com/c/InTheMixReviews
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I've been trying different ways of recording my keys and my band recently. At home I like using OBS with 3 different webcams and capturing the audio in OBS from my digital mixer. This gives me all my keys and my voice. I have never been satisfied with the audio being captured from a camera. OBS has been wonderful as I can program the scene switcher to automatically switch between cameras or I can split screen and get all of them at once. I have also recorded my band using action cameras ( cheap cameras $30 each at Microcenter) and recording the audio in my DAW. Then at home mix the audio recording and sync to the video in Windows Movie Maker. One thing I learned is render the audio in a .wav file not mp3. Mp3 compression seems to adjust time enough that I cannot keep the audio synced to the 1080p video for the duration of a song. Like another person posted I use webcams from BestBuy that are less than $50 each and get good results. I found inexpensive USB extension cables online so I can place the cameras in different positions. An old mic boomstand works great for mounting a camera overhead of my keyboard rig. I don't have much invested at all as it's mainly for my own enjoyment.
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I had an OB-SX once upon a time in the New Wave years in the 80's, put my Korg Poly-6 on it's top on the stand... hello old friend. Sorry I got sentimental for a second there!

 CP-50, YC 73,  FP-80, PX5-S, NE-5d61, Kurzweil SP6, XK-3, CX-3, Hammond XK-3, Yamaha YUX Upright, '66 B3/Leslie 145/122

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I downloaded OBS with the idea of doing online teaching. I have a camcorder (Canon Vixia HFR500) with HDMI outs, so I'll be researching which capture device will work best with my late-2013 MacBook Pro (with Thunderbolt 1 and USB3). I have also seen Mac software that lets you stream live video from an iPhone into the Mac, but I'm not sure if that can be routed into OBS. Ideally, I would want to stream two video feeds simultaneously. I also have an older DSLR that does video (Panasonic Lumix G3). It has a mini-HDMI output but that may only be for playing back recorded video, still looking into that.

 

I'll be watching this thread!

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It should not be hard to do a recording of some monitors and voice with a decent phone cam + microphone. Editing vifeo of moderate resolution and accuracy probably isn't all too far fetched to try, and there's no particular reason a few audio and video tracks couldn't be edited together and encoded to be used for YT or something.

 

That's one side. Making that all work with quality is another story, video shooting even at semi pro level isn't easy to get "right" and digital tools abound, but none of them easily give out wonderful results for no effort. So I'd search for a good phone cam and maybe a handycam, get some software installed on a computer with some power, ( graphics card accelerated is good) and learn the basics, which is a little work, depending on which solutions you chose.

 

Getting interesting footage to look allright on the web is not so easy. It's a lot of work to make good looking videos, so the basic tools will soon make clear what your limitations are, and getting better can be a steep learning curve, not recommended to take lightly.

 

Some from-the-cam-manufacturer video program, decent tools and realistic purposes will get there where the OP asked about, I think.

 

T.

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A few of the techie YouTube creator who make really nice video I am shocked when I see there setups or probably better put studios they have. Didn't realize how much money can be made being a YouTube content creator. Three of them have behind the scenes videos and they are shooting with 8K Red cameras and have a staff of video editors and content writers. Most have multiple studios with stages or one woman purchased a two story house and converted it to multiple studios and work areas. Scary what Youtube has grown into.

 

But at same time one of the keyboardists who does a lot of video does excellent videos with a iPhone and MBP combined. No fancy studio, but good content which in long run is what's most important at least to me.

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I have yet to find an accessory that offers direct stereo recording into my iPhone while recording video.
This does it:

Roland Go Mixer

It sells for around $80. It allows you to record line audio directly into the iPhone (via Lightning connector) using the iPhone's standard camera app. It saves me from the tedious task of syncing separate audio and video tracks. The line in audio quality of the Go Mixer is not pristine, but it is plenty good enough for me. It sounds like You Tube audio.

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Short answer: Final Cut Pro.

Explanation: Before getting the Roland Go mixer I would, for example, record myself playing piano on the iPhone video app (with the iPhone built in mic, for reference). Simultaneously, I would be recording the audio separately in the DAW. Then I'd load the iPhone audio/video track and the DAW audio track into Final Cut Pro and slide the tracks into sync, then muting the iPhone audio of course. Hope that makes sense.

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...Then I'd load the iPhone audio/video track and the DAW audio track into Final Cut Pro and slide the tracks into sync, then muting the iPhone audio of course. Hope that makes sense.

 

Slide the tracks into sync manually?

 

I did the same thing for a while, except I'm using Adobe Premiere Pro. One day a friend saw me struggling and trying to sync good audio with the camera audio manually...and he was like dude what are you doing? Just select the tracks, right click...select Synchronize and the software does it for you in seconds automatically! I'm sure a top notch editor like Final Cut Pro has even better features.

 

www.youtube.com/c/InTheMixReviews
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