Show of hands, how many people’s favorite part of making videos is lugging around huge amounts of gear to the shoot?…
No one?
Same!
I’ve spent hours and hours scouring B&H and dreaming of the large elaborate setups that I could buy. And then I think about how often I might actually want to drag all of that equipment out into the field if I’m the one shooting.
Don’t get me wrong, you absolutely will need all the bells and whistles of production if you want to crush every single shot. But if I’m shooting a basic interview with some easy B-Roll, what’s the most barebones set up I can use and take the least amount of time to set up?
At my last shoot, I knew I was filming an interview that didn’t need to look spectacular as the dialogue of my subject was a lot more important. I decided that instead of lugging everything out with me, I would take as little gear as possible. At the end of the day, you really only need three things -
Light, a camera, and audio.
All this fits into a single bag!… well, not the tripod and light stand, but that’s what arms are for!
Light
The easiest solution for this would be to use the sun or the available light on location. This is great if you the location works and a nightmare if it doesn’t. Thankfully, I’ve got two super small LED panels that fit in my bag. They’re bi-color and operate off of Sony batteries, perfect to place anywhere and start using immediately.
I stacked these together so that my source was just a little bit larger in size and brought a single stand to mount them on. Super easy set up and quick to adjust if need be.
Camera
My workhorse for the last year and a half. GH5 is a helluva camera.
I’ve been a huge fan of Panasonic for a while now and the GH5 has been one of the most solid workhorse cameras for corporate and doc work. Battery life is great, IBIS means I can move quickly getting b-roll without a giant rig, and the codec options are fantastic.
I also brought a tripod with me for the interview but went handheld for all the b-roll. Having a gimbal or slider or another piece of gear could have opened up my options in terms of shots, but I knew I wasn’t going for anything fancy and that 60fps handheld footage would be more than acceptable for my application. Paired with a 12-35mm and I’m ready to rock.
Audio
The camera has a mic built in, duh….
Ok, I definitely need an improvement over the camera audio. I ended up using the Rode SmartLav+ with a 3.5mm extension cable and converter to connect to the GH5. I will say, this is not always going to be a great solution as these types of cables are usually unprotected. BUT, this has worked just fine for me without issue more often than not. Lav mic straight into GH5 is the most straightforward solution to me and I don’t have to deal with syncing audio in post either. I could have boomed a shotgun mic but doing this myself would mean I’d have to bring an extra stand to mount it on.
Conclusion
All in all, the shoot was a success! Here’s what my interview shot looked like with no adjustments:
I only had each light dialed into about 7-10% power before I was happy with the exposure. I wouldn’t mind the light source being a bit softer
I’m pretty happy with the look! It’s more than acceptable for the piece I’m working on and it was good to focus on getting the content I needed in the timeframe I had. I still think I could have done better, specifically by positioning the subject with a stronger backlight using the available sunlight. This would have helped with background separation a little more, but I’m not sweating it too much.
Of course, the major con with a set up like this is the lack of flexibility. In this case I was sacrificing options for the sake of speed. However, I think limitations like this can push you to be more creative with the tools that you have. Getting the best shot possible with limited gear can sometimes be better than a complicated shot that’s not executed as well as it could be.
My next step is to come up with a way to soften the light a bit more if I want to. I’ve seen a few DIY builds on YouTube, but nothing that is quite simple or fast enough for my tastes. Stay tuned to see what I come up with!