Welcome AV Royalty... we bow before you.
This is a quick reference page for help with training / info as we get into the wonderful world of camera work and live service capture... it may seem overwhelming at first, but will be easy once you actually do it a couple of times - so fear not!
Here we go... and here is a picture of a sleeping dog:
Here we go... and here is a picture of a sleeping dog:
People say to let sleeping dogs lie. But at The Surge, we believe that all dogs should be committed to the truth!
Hardware Setup:
Chris Green did a wonderful job making this easy on us... just follow the labels for the most part.
STEP ONE: Unbox and setup the physical pieces. Undo the side latches on the cases, set them aside nearby, and remove the tripods from the soft canvas cases. Pull the cameras, monitor and switcher from the hardshell cases and set them where you want them to be for operation.
Set the tripods / camera about eye level for the speaker / musicians on the stage. One tripod by the sound booth, another front left for a closer shot in the room. The cameras will slide in, lens forward and there is an arrow on the tripod to guide direction, they slide in and click.
STEP ONE: Unbox and setup the physical pieces. Undo the side latches on the cases, set them aside nearby, and remove the tripods from the soft canvas cases. Pull the cameras, monitor and switcher from the hardshell cases and set them where you want them to be for operation.
Set the tripods / camera about eye level for the speaker / musicians on the stage. One tripod by the sound booth, another front left for a closer shot in the room. The cameras will slide in, lens forward and there is an arrow on the tripod to guide direction, they slide in and click.
STEP TWO: Connections!
OK, time to wire everything up. Run the network cables from the big box to the cameras, connecting camera one and two to the physical cameras.
OK, time to wire everything up. Run the network cables from the big box to the cameras, connecting camera one and two to the physical cameras.
Back of the big box. From left to right: power, network cables to cameras, hdmi cables to switcher, SDI to switcher, USB to laptop
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Back of the camera, network cable plugs in for connection / power.
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The CONNECTIONS (continued)...
Connect the blue Rack Power line to electricity (the yellow tab will pull back allowing you to twist the round connection, this allows you to insert twist and lock it in... or twist and remove it when packing up).
Connect the USB cable to the laptop. Password on the laptop is John1:1, if needed.
Connect the CAM1 and CAM2 red and blue cable to the switcher, in slots one and two.
Connect the SDI cable to the switcher (bottom port to the right, called, "PGM"). This stands for Program and is broadcast speak for main feed.
Plug the HDMI out on the switcher (called multi-view) to the monitor HDMI in. (not shown here), immediately to the right of the PGM slot.
Run two mic cables into the XLR slots (on the right) from the State Theatre equipment.
Run power to switcher, laptop, and monitor using power cables. The Switcher doesn't have an on / off switch, if the power cable is in and connected, it will be ON.
Power Up the main big box (switch on the front, upper right hand side).
Connect the blue Rack Power line to electricity (the yellow tab will pull back allowing you to twist the round connection, this allows you to insert twist and lock it in... or twist and remove it when packing up).
Connect the USB cable to the laptop. Password on the laptop is John1:1, if needed.
Connect the CAM1 and CAM2 red and blue cable to the switcher, in slots one and two.
Connect the SDI cable to the switcher (bottom port to the right, called, "PGM"). This stands for Program and is broadcast speak for main feed.
Plug the HDMI out on the switcher (called multi-view) to the monitor HDMI in. (not shown here), immediately to the right of the PGM slot.
Run two mic cables into the XLR slots (on the right) from the State Theatre equipment.
Run power to switcher, laptop, and monitor using power cables. The Switcher doesn't have an on / off switch, if the power cable is in and connected, it will be ON.
Power Up the main big box (switch on the front, upper right hand side).
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From left to right, power cable, red and blue hdmi camera connections, SDI connection to big box, multi-view HDMI out port (not shown with cable here) to monitor, XLR cables for sound.
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STEP THREE: Basic hardware moves.
Wait until the cameras cycle, then turn on the power supply behind the remote unit (pictured below).
Wait until the cameras cycle, then turn on the power supply behind the remote unit (pictured below).
It will take a minute to cycle. Once it does, you should have control of the active camera with the joystick, move it up / down / side to side to position your shot. Turn the knob right to zoom in, left to zoom out.
The important thing is to know which camera is live and which one is not. The ideal situation is to move and frame the shot BEFORE you switch that camera to the live shot.
To switch cameras, use the buttons on Control A (top row of white buttons in the middle). If 1 is selected (as above), simply push "3" and that should switch your active camera to the Controller.
Leave the autofocus ON, it's very good. If you ever need to for some reason, the focus knob on the left is available.
The Switcher:
Just make sure you have audio levels (little meters by the tiny monitor - upper right) and that you have a video signal, which should show the active camera feed.
In Broadcast stuff, RED is live (or program), Green is preview, so below, camera two is live and camera one is on preview and ready to switch to.
To switch, simply click the green button, OR more easily simply click the AUTO button and we have a nice transition to the other camera. The CUT button will do a hard cut to the next camera. AUTO will have a nice fade transition that is a little softer.
The important thing is to know which camera is live and which one is not. The ideal situation is to move and frame the shot BEFORE you switch that camera to the live shot.
To switch cameras, use the buttons on Control A (top row of white buttons in the middle). If 1 is selected (as above), simply push "3" and that should switch your active camera to the Controller.
Leave the autofocus ON, it's very good. If you ever need to for some reason, the focus knob on the left is available.
The Switcher:
Just make sure you have audio levels (little meters by the tiny monitor - upper right) and that you have a video signal, which should show the active camera feed.
In Broadcast stuff, RED is live (or program), Green is preview, so below, camera two is live and camera one is on preview and ready to switch to.
To switch, simply click the green button, OR more easily simply click the AUTO button and we have a nice transition to the other camera. The CUT button will do a hard cut to the next camera. AUTO will have a nice fade transition that is a little softer.
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The front of the big box will have the camera remote Controller, power, and three monitors. The two mid-sized monitors will show our two primary camera feeds... and the little one is the conversion box which will show the active camera feed and translate our signal to something a computer can record or livestream.
Software Setup...
STEP FOUR: Software Setup
Again, first time in, this may seem overwhelming... but we'll keep things simple and it will quickly make sense.
We will be using three pieces of software for video content, routing and capture.
1. ProPresenter - will have it's own laptop by the main soundboard. This will have slides, lyrics for songs, video and scripture for the main screen in the main room. ProPresenter will push two NDI feeds (will explain NDI in a moment) that we will capture in LiveStream (third software piece). We will want to make sure ProPresenter is up, running and talking to NDI and LiveStream properly before the service starts.
2. NDI - stands for Network Digital Interface and is VERY cool. It basically allows us to do virtual cameras and feeds to increase our capability and do more things. So ProPresenter can send one feed to the main screen, and using the same base information send ANOTHER feed to NDI. On the main screen lyrics will be at the top of the screen, on the NDI Lyric feed, they will be at the bottom.
We'll use NDI for two things at this point. First, to edit lyrics into song videos later. Second, to serve as a seperate screen for the SurgeOnline service that we can "share screen" from with zoom. We basically setup an NDI monitor, feed that monitor from ProPresenter, and share the NDI screen.
3. LiveStream (Vimeo) - We will try to have this setup and working so our tech team can simply jump in to operate the switches.
LiveStream will have 2 basic input pieces:
1) Active camera feed from the Vaddio cams.
2) Audio from the State Theatre board.
The critical thing is to make sure we have levels and are recording when the message happens.
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STEP FIVE: Running Software
There are two main software pieces, each running on a separate laptop. Make sure both laptops are connected to the State Theatre's wireless (pw: byebyebirdie) - they will probably pick this up automatically.
1) ProPresenter Laptop (Silver): Password is Godishere if needed.
2) LiveStream Studio Laptop (Black): Password is John1:1, if needed.
Terms:
LiveStream Studio - software used to collect and broadcast (or capture and record) camera inputs, remote inputs and NDI inputs from ProPresenter.
ProPresenter - Presentation software (used to be Proclaim for us).
ProPresenter Terms:
Playlist - collection of presentation elements (in blue), think of this like a computer folder with files inside
Presentation - This is a group of slides. Basically, these are the “files” inside a Playlist. So an individual song will be a “presentation.” Or the message slides will be a separate “presentation.” A presentation can also be a video, or a set of bible verses, etc…
Slide - This is the individual slide within a presentation.
NDI - Network Digital Interface - this allows ProPresenter to project a virtual screen onto the network that we can pick up alternate screens on a shared network. This is used in editing and SurgeOnline.
Trigger - You can navigate playlists and presentations without altering what is live on the screen to get to what’s next. To change content on the screen, double click on the slide / piece you want to see and it will appear and become live.
Advance - Spacebar will advance to the next slide, or you can click on what you want next.
Panic Button - On the upper right hand side, you’ll have a screen showing you what is live… below that on the right you see “Clear to Logo.” If something gets out of control, you can click this to stop everything and show a logo and figure out what is up.
Clear Buttons - To the right of the screen showing live content, there are 7 clear buttons. These can remove content from the live feed. When these are colored in (with red / burgundy) they are active and playing, black is off. From top to bottom you have audio, messages, props, announcements, slides, media, video input. If you have something appearing / playing that you don’t want, you can quickly turn it off here.
Running ProPresenter:
Turn on laptop, login and launch ProPresenter (Orange Icon).
Get the laptop connected to soundboard and projector, make sure we have content hitting the screen correctly.
IMPORTANT: Once you have the laptop picking up the projector, make sure "Audience" is green to send the "Main Screen" to the Projector.
You might test the videos just to double check all is well.
Make sure all is well for the service slides (they are present, and look OK).
Have a well deserved snack / coffee a safe distance away from all electronics :)
For the Service:
On the left hand column select the current date (ex: Aug 1 2021) and below that you should see the Presentation elements. The three things you’ll need to focus on are:
1) Pre and Post Service Playlist. This contains a countdown if you need one, and information slides about a few things going on. You can trigger audio to play over this by selecting Worship (or Switchfoot) lists in the bottom right hand corner section, then just clicking on a song.
If you get lost, remember the panic button to buy some time and allow you to pick up again.
2) Current Sunday (for songs and message). This will contain transitions for raising / lowering the screen, song slides, message slides, etc…
During the songs, trigger the next slide when the singer is singing the last word or phrase on the current slide.
For scripture, use the main screen shot, also use this for slides, leave this for a few seconds, then switch back to the speaker.
We'll be using less slides than before, so we'll try to sprinkle in some logos / sermon series slides to hold the screen while the speaker continues.
3) Communion. When we’re ready for Communion, if we're not doing that during worship, select this playlist and click on the slide to trigger the photo / audio. When Communion is done and we pray out, go back to Pre and Post playlist and those can play while we wrap up and tear down, giving cover to people leaving.
LiveStream Studio Terms:
Record - button at the top of screen to the left… this starts the capture of our video / other content. This is Crucial! Without this we don’t have content for the online service!
Inputs - You’ll be able to see your camera / NDI feeds in the middle of your screen. When you click on one of these it will change the live content being captured. You’ll want to make sure we have our camera feed in the inputs and looking good, as well as the Main NDI from ProPresenter available as a selectable input.
Audio - coming from State, make sure you have audio coming in and it sounds OK. You can do this by checking the levels on the switcher, and also in live stream. You’ll can listen via headphones from the laptop directly, there will be about a 1 second delay - but this will sync with the video fine.
GFX (1,2, etc…) - This is the “graphics” overlay and can put graphics (or content) on top of a live camera feed. We will use GFX1 to pull song lyrics from ProPresenter into LiveStream.
Push - Adds GFX content to the live feed. Once you push lyrics “on” you don’t have to do anything, the changes in words will come from ProPresenter.
Pull - Removes GFX content from the live feed. You’ll want to “pull” the GFX feed once the songs are done.
LiveStream Studio in the Service:
Turn on the laptop, connect it to the camera rig via USB, when the camera is on, you should have a shot of the active camera on the laptop, what you see here is what is recording.
IMPORTANT! Make sure we hit the “Record” button for the song service and let it run until the prayer after the message is complete.
For music, make sure you have the band framed well, with a closer shot capturing the vocalist(s) and a wider shot showing everyone (or other musicians).
For music, switching more often than for speakers is good and expected. Switching 4-5 times during a song is fine.
Don't worry about stopping the Recording for mid-service, we can edit things out. We normally do two recordings, one for music and one for message.
For the message, switch camera shots occasionally, but not as often as with the music. Probably look to switch every 4-5 minutes or so, wide shots for beginning and ending. You can also use the wide shot to capture slides for the video. The goal is to have some movement visually, but not enough to be distracting.
If something catastrophic happens, don’t panic, just reboot and do what you can. Grab E or Evangeline and we should be able to help.
STEP SIX: Tear Down
Make sure you turn off the power strip for the Camera Remote Controller.
When that completes, and the service is over, turn everything off. Unplug everything, roll the cables and put them back in the soft cable box and pack the cameras, switcher and monitor in the hardshell cases. Pack up the big box with the covers (blue power cord goes on the big box inside case). Tripods in the canvas cases and everything on the stage (or in E's vehicle...)
Be careful with everything but Especially the cameras and switcher, they are the most expensive pieces.
Let us know if anything gets bumped, broken or isn't working so we can fix / replace it as we go!
Good job! And thank you a TON for your help...
STEP SEVEN: Troubleshooting
IMPORTANT: The number one problem is the big box getting bumped hard enough to loosen a cable connection. For whatever isn't working, just make sure that cables feeding that piece of equipment are in and snug. This has fixed 99% of the "issues" to date.
1. Cameras aren't working. Make sure they are plugged in and follow the signal chain. From camera to Big Box, Big Box to Switcher, Switcher to Big Box (via SDI) and Big Box to laptop via USB.
Make sure you have power to the big box and to the other pieces. Unplugging and replugging the network cable to the cameras should reboot them. If they are on, they have a blue light ON the cameras themselves.
2. No sound. Make sure the audio feed from the State is on and plugged into the Switcher. Make sure you have an audio input in LiveStream, that it is "connected" and green.
Again, follow the signal chain.
State to Switcher, to Blackmagic conversion box to laptop.
Check connections, possibly reboot the PC.
3. Remote Controller isn't working. This has to cycle and connect AFTER the cameras power up. These have a power strip now, just click it off, then back on to reset.
4. The Internet is down.
Simplify. Don't worry about the NDI feeds or ProPresenter inputs, just capture the two cameras in LiveStream and record them without lyrics or slides. The important thing is the video capture, the rest we can edit in later if needed.
5. Power is out.
We're dead in the water at that point. Grab an acoustic guitar and if the weather is nice, we'll head outside.
And here is a picture of the sleeping dog again. We'll go over all of these details with her later...
IMPORTANT: The number one problem is the big box getting bumped hard enough to loosen a cable connection. For whatever isn't working, just make sure that cables feeding that piece of equipment are in and snug. This has fixed 99% of the "issues" to date.
1. Cameras aren't working. Make sure they are plugged in and follow the signal chain. From camera to Big Box, Big Box to Switcher, Switcher to Big Box (via SDI) and Big Box to laptop via USB.
Make sure you have power to the big box and to the other pieces. Unplugging and replugging the network cable to the cameras should reboot them. If they are on, they have a blue light ON the cameras themselves.
2. No sound. Make sure the audio feed from the State is on and plugged into the Switcher. Make sure you have an audio input in LiveStream, that it is "connected" and green.
Again, follow the signal chain.
State to Switcher, to Blackmagic conversion box to laptop.
Check connections, possibly reboot the PC.
3. Remote Controller isn't working. This has to cycle and connect AFTER the cameras power up. These have a power strip now, just click it off, then back on to reset.
4. The Internet is down.
Simplify. Don't worry about the NDI feeds or ProPresenter inputs, just capture the two cameras in LiveStream and record them without lyrics or slides. The important thing is the video capture, the rest we can edit in later if needed.
5. Power is out.
We're dead in the water at that point. Grab an acoustic guitar and if the weather is nice, we'll head outside.
And here is a picture of the sleeping dog again. We'll go over all of these details with her later...
My goal is to someday be this relaxed.
