Recommend me a camera for Music to record their A Level recitals

[kennysarmy]

Our Head of Music wants to be able to record all their A Level recitals and is looking for ideas for a suitable camera.

 

Budget is obviously a major concern.

[IRL]

https://www.productchart.co.uk/cameras/ Give this website a go.

[geohanson]

I’d definitely look at something that’s orientated towards decent audio capture. Lots of built in camera mics might not be sufficient for A-Level recitals. (That’s my experience of it anyway)

 

https://zoomcorp.com/en/gb/video-recorders/

 

I haven’t used any of the Zoom video recorders, but their audio recorders work really well.

[Chaniel]

Are you recording audio separately?

 

For our drama exam recordings we use a Panasonic HC-VX980 with a rode videomic pro (plugged into the camera). I'd imagine audio quality was more important than video for a music recording, so might be worth looking more into those.

[psydii]

If you've got one already, it might be worth trying a modern iPad on a tripod.

 

Also provided you can make a special case with the safeguarding team and your DPO, a high-end phone might also produce good results. You can get external mics too.

[DaveTheTech]

If using external audio, I would consider getting a clapboard - makes it much easier to align the audio and the sound is sharp.

[SamanthaD]

I would definitely be looking to prioritise audio over video on this. There may be a performance element that needs to be captured on film, or technique, but surely capturing clean audio should be the key?

 

If performances are always going to be less than 30 minutes most entry level DSLR cameras are likely to be fine. Most have an audio input that you could put an external audio source into, a good condenser mic with a small mixer etc would work well for individual performances, or you can increase the channel count easily and still use the same camera. Definitely put the audio into the camera rather than recording both separately then combining in post as it's going to be a lot easier (no need to sync up anything), and means you have an unedited complete file that you can send to examination boards.

 

Whatever make sure it's easy to use unless you want to be supporting it every ten minutes!

[Davit2005]

Defo for either a DLSR or CamCorder with an external MIC. Personally if the recordings are going to be less than 30mins I'd go DLSR. I think budget for around £600 to £900 for a DLSR with a Rode VideoMic Pro. If you can get a DLSR with audio output like a Canon 80D you can record additionally to a external recorder or at least monitor the sound whilst recording.

[dhicks]

Defo for either a DLSR or CamCorder with an external MIC.

 

My guess would be the camcorder option is going to be best - no time limit on recording, so you can set it up well beforehand and simply leave it running. I've got a setup for our hall ready for live streaming with the camera, external mic and computer and monitor all mounted in one mic stand, you just carry it in, make sure there's power and turn it on. We use £200-ish Panasonic camcorders which can be powered from a 5v USB power supply and can provide a clean HDMI output that works well with a cheap (£20) HDMI-to-USB adaptor, so if you want you can have the vidoe stream go straight into your PC's video package.

[SamanthaD]

My guess would be the camcorder option is going to be best - no time limit on recording, so you can set it up well beforehand and simply leave it running. I've got a setup for our hall ready for live streaming with the camera, external mic and computer and monitor all mounted in one mic stand, you just carry it in, make sure there's power and turn it on. We use £200-ish Panasonic camcorders which can be powered from a 5v USB power supply and can provide a clean HDMI output that works well with a cheap (£20) HDMI-to-USB adaptor, so if you want you can have the vidoe stream go straight into your PC's video package.

 

Yes there's time limits - file sizes and SD cards become your limiting factor. Also you then need to go through the video and cut into individual performances, and what happens if that card gets corrupted? At least doing individual recordings you could swap out SD cards between recordings to prevent 1 card being corrupted wrecking a whole groups recordings. Also 1 huge video file will take a lot longer to process than several smaller ones, and you can delete bad takes etc (on a large recording you'd have to watch all of it to find the good one - what happens if you submit the wrong recording?)

 

I think your all in one solution is a different requirement to this - live streaming an assembly and providing a good quality recording (possibly for exam submission I'm guessing?) are 2 completely different things.

[Davit2005]

Yes there's time limits - file sizes and SD cards become your limiting factor. Also you then need to go through the video and cut into individual performances, and what happens if that card gets corrupted? At least doing individual recordings you could swap out SD cards between recordings to prevent 1 card being corrupted wrecking a whole groups recordings. Also 1 huge video file will take a lot longer to process than several smaller ones, and you can delete bad takes etc (on a large recording you'd have to watch all of it to find the good one - what happens if you submit the wrong recording?)

 

I think your all in one solution is a different requirement to this - live streaming an assembly and providing a good quality recording (possibly for exam submission I'm guessing?) are 2 completely different things.

 

DSLRs have 30min time limits on Video which is pretty crazy and not a limitation of the storage.

Edited November 18, 2020 by Davit2005

[SamanthaD]

DSLRs have 30min time limits on Video which is pretty crazy and not a limitation of the storage.

I believe it was something to do with taxation of different classification of camera - they put the 30 min limit on DSLR's so they weren't classified as an actual video camera, more a stills camera with video functionality.

[Reverend_Dan]

Got our head of music a Go Pro clone with an external mic attachment which he can plug his Roland recorder into. Gets a good wide angle shot of the choir and nice sound from his conductors pedestal.

[dhicks]

Got our head of music a Go Pro clone with an external mic attachment which he can plug his Roland recorder into. Gets a good wide angle shot of the choir and nice sound from his conductors pedestal.

 

Ooh - we've got choir to record tomorrow, standing in a (of course) largly empty, echoing church. The music departmewnt should have a Roland recorder somewhere, maybe we can get that hooked up to an audio input on the camera. The other option is that they lip-sync to a recording they've already done in somewhere less echoy. Has anyone tried an "echo cancelling" conference mic such as:

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Conference-Microphone-Anker-PowerConf-Compatible/dp/B0899S421T/ref=redir_mobile_desktop

 

for recording groups?

[SamanthaD]

Echo cancelling is more for video conferencing, it uses the incoming audio as a reference to remove from the audio going back. Not going to work for removing echo from a room I'm afraid.

[Andrew_C]

The only way to remove the reverb from a room is to remove a wall (or add A LOT of sound absorbent material, (not egg boxes))