Six Tips for Planning a Professional-Looking Live-Streamed Event

6. Use Best Practices for Setup of Lights, Cameras, and Microphones

Lights

Do not underestimate the power of lighting. The quality of the lighting can greatly enhance your entire show. Good lighting can make an amateur video look professional and a professional video look fabulous. It’s important to not only plan the number of lights, but the exact placement of these lights as well. For professionals, lighting is viewed as an artistic task. Many people make their living controlling lighting, so there is a lot to it.

Here are a few suggestions to help you obtain effective lighting:

• Diffuse the light. If you are using only one lighting source, do not shine it directly on your subject.
• Avoid deep shadows. Make sure you fill all areas of your subject with light. Sometimes this requires adjusting the light to bounce off a different wall.To light your subject evenly, try placing one light low and the other one high.
• Do not light too evenly. If you do this, you may actually be worse off than not lighting the set at all.Take a sample shot and see if it looks natural.Good lighting usually has a little more light coming from above than any other direction.You should very rarely light your subject just from below.
• Beware of having too much light on your subject. If you must use a lot of light, have your subjects wear make-up to compensate for the overly bright lighting. If your lighting balance is excellent, you can avoid putting make-up on your subjects. The key in adjusting the lighting is to look at your subject and make sure they do not look washed out.
• Watch professional events and learn from them. As you watch, notice the lighting instead of watching the program. Notice how they employ the lighting tips listed above.

If you must bring lights to the venue or remote site, consider using LED fixtures, which are portable, easily plug into any outlet, and in many cases are very affordable. Since they do not heat up, they pose less fire hazard, and they are more energy efficient.

When positioning any lighting or gaffer equipment overhead, make sure the fixtures are properly secured to avoid having them fall and injure anyone. And before setting up your own lights, make sure that additional bright lights won’t adversely impact the venue, event, or performance—such as blowing electrical circuits.

Running cables

Determine the best location for your production switcher, cameras, and other audio/video gear. If your production involves one person giving a talk from behind a desk, your cameras can be set up about six to eight feet away from the subject.

In this instance, you can use HDMI cables, which are limited to distances of 10 meters (without needing a signal boost via a hardware repeater). But 10 meters is ample distance for this particular scenario.

If your event is streaming a musical or dance performance taking place on a large stage, or a sporting event in a high school gym, you’ll need to position your cameras at various locations in the venue. In this case, consider running coaxial (coax) SDI cable, which can run 100 meters before the signal begins to degrade. AJA, Blackmagic Design, and other vendors offer a variety of SDI/HDMI signal adapters and converters.

The distance between hard-wired cameras, mics, switchers, and other gear—as well as their distance to power sources and outlets, impacts the amount of cable you need to run. And truthfully, bring twice as much cable and wires as you think you’ll need.You’ll find a use for them, even if it’s to string up like police tape to keep people out of your production space.

Also, be sure you’ve put gaffers tape and cable wraps and ties into your equipment bag. They can help with cable positioning and safety at your production location. If you need long cable runs, say under the bleachers or down the center aisle, tape the cables down securely in public areas. Be resourceful and run the cables along rafters, beams, or other relative high vantage points to prevent tripping. Or better yet, consider wireless signal transmission from your cameras, and if possible, remote control of pan/tilt/zoom and focus.

Positioning cameras on location

The right camera for your streaming event is the one that fits your budget and produces sufficient picture quality in your particular production and lighting conditions.

Cameras can range from cheap, simple Webcams; to prosumer HD video cameras costing hundreds of dollars; to expensive high-end HD-SDI cameras, such as XDCAM camcorders.

Remember to give thought to the type of connections your camera choice will require, for example, USB, FireWire, HDMI, BNC connectors for HD-SDI, etc.

Another possibility is to use adapters that turn any HDMI or HD/SD-SDI video source into an IP source that can be carried over a Wi-Fi router, or via Ethernet cable, which can be used in longer distances but at a lower cost than coax.

If your crew includes camera operators or production managers, use walkie-talkies so the director can talk to the crew and talent to give directions, such as how to set up the next shot.This is especially helpful when the venue is very large or noisy, or the crew hasn’t yet jelled into a tight-knit team.