Hi A fellow content creator asked me about my uh setup and the techniques and stuff that I use to shoot videos and I don't think I've done this video in a long long time. Things have changed, so I'm going to take you into the Eev blog lab and show you almost every tool and technique I use to shoot videos. So let's go there. We go.

Yes, I got my Odyssey sticker as well. Follow me on Odyssey as well as Youtube and everything else. This will not be a lab tour, but anyway, this is the messy Eev blog lab. Now what I'm shooting this on at the moment is the Um.

Sony Zv1, which is my portable camera that I use as you've seen my kit. I'll link in the video if you haven't seen it. This is my field kit that I use and I just I take on holidays or I just take home if I want to shoot a video at home like one of you know, my solar power videos or something like that, just or a backup in the field. If I'm going on site to shoot videos or do interviews or anything like that, this is a completely self-contained kit with the camera I'm using at the moment, the Sony Zv one and I'm using the rode wireless go microphone thing at the moment for this video.

Anyway, that's what I'm shooting this with. Ordinarily, I wouldn't use this in the lab unless of course I'm shooting a mailbag video which would be on my mailbag bench here and I would actually use this camera because then I've got the Tv in the background, I can put the labs the other people's labs on the Uh Tv in the background and then I would. Yeah, I'd have this right here and I'd frame it properly and I would shoot my mailbag videos. I do this because uh, this Zv1 camera has an excellent um.

it's got like a product focus thing where the focus is just incredible. Like you hold something up to the camera and it just instantly focuses. It's absolutely incredible. So that's why I use uh, the Zv1 for my mailbag videos.

I used to use my Sony Nex Vg30 here. Yeah, that's the one with the broken microphone which I repaired. Looks a bit how you're doing, but don't know. I still use that um for you know, the occasional video or something like that.

It's got the interchangeable lenses so if I want like a really wide angle uh lens I have standardized on all Sony cameras so I can get um you know I've got various lenses and stuff like super wide angle to 10 millimeters and stuff like that. So yeah, I can shoot pretty much anything. And I've got another old camera here which is a Sony um Nx80. I got this uh used on ebay.

um like I'll use this out in the field and stuff. It's very nice. It's actually uh, waterproof and sealed. It's got a uh the proper audio interface on here.

I'll talk about this In a, minute, but uh yeah, it's got the shoddy and stuff. It's um, yeah, it's just a really nice Hd only camcorder. None of that 4k rubbish. But yeah, I use Manfrotto tripods.

I've got a Manfrotto 290 down there, which is a nicer smaller tripod that I use. But my main tripod and main camera for shooting videos is a Manfrotto 190. uh, tripod with one of these, uh, fluid, um, head things. I don't know what they're called.

Anyway, it's it's very nice. It's very smooth for like, you know, panning and tilting and stuff like that. Just a very nice. like heavy duty, uh, tripod.

Uh, for out in the field Because yes, my camera has actually fallen off my tripod back when I was using. uh, this smaller little manfrotto. which is great if you got like a little compact bag or something like that. I do like the gun grip and stuff like that, but it's not for heavy ones.

I've had my camera actually topple off that one. In fact, this one did actually topple off that at one point. Oops, but it survived. Anyway, my main camera for shooting uh videos is this, uh, Sony Nx80.

So this will do a 4k, but I only shoot 4k if I'm doing uh, like you know, a nice detailed teardown or something that would you know might benefit. uh, so that people can see detail on Pcb and stuff like that. Otherwise, I'm going to be shooting 1080p at, uh, 30 frames per second. I don't need 60 frames per second here in the lab.

That's just. you know, totally. uh, pointless. Anyway, I'm Sony Nx80.

It's a very nice camera. It does have as I showed before. It does have that same audio interface here with the dual Xlr connectors over here. So my microphone solutions that I use I don't use the built-in mic I used to.

Um, and if you're going to have a built-in mic, make sure it's on the top and not on the front by the way. Otherwise, you know it just won't sound that good. The key is proximity, uh, to the mic. So as long as I'm like, you know, half a meter away from this mic, um, it's going to work fairly well.

Anyway, what I've got here is a Rode Nt 55 mic with the Omni directional capsule. I do have another capsule with it which is the cardoid pattern. but when you're standing behind a camera because I I have my camera like this and it's down on the bench like this, I always I like to shoot at 45 degrees like this so it looks more realistic. I hate like overhead directly overhead camera shots, it just doesn't seem natural.

normal. Um, you know it's I like my videos to look like what it would look like if you're standing at my bench actually working on something. So that's why. like I stand behind my camera and I do it that way anyway.

So the microphone is pointing backwards of course, and I have the omnidirectional capsule because it doesn't matter if I move to this side of the camera or I move to this side of the camera over here, it's going to get a fairly even pickup. And if I'm leaning over the front of the camera, you know, looking, You know, working on gear and stuff like that, it's still going to sound pretty good. whereas a cardoid capsule, it'll unless you're directly behind it and the audio is more variable. Yes, I use an omnidirectional capsule there and then if I need wireless, I've got my Sennheiser Ew 100 G3 series wireless mic.

Very good. I don't recommend anything but a top quality high-end brand name wireless mic. A cheap wireless mic is just garbage and no, you will regret it. So pay serious coin for a wireless solution.

So I just have that uh, plugged into uh, channel two. but if I'm out in the uh field, normally I wouldn't use this unless I'm doing a whiteboard, uh, video or something. So um, yeah, I just leave it plugged in. but I don't actually record from it.

But out in the field I might actually record channel one for example, coming from the wireless mic and I might record the shoddy mic as a backup audio for example. And it varies depending on like if I'm shooting interviews and stuff like that, it's all. It gets. A little bit more, uh, complicated.

but here in the lab it's all done with this rode mic on top. Now people wonder how I get my close-up macro shots. Well, if I have to get close up on the board, I've just got one of these Opteca Times 10 lenses. So these are cheap.

They come in different thread widths. I've got various thread widths from my camera over the years and I've been using these for like a decade. Well, not quite eight years or something to get my macro shots. So these are just cheap and simple times.

10 macro lenses. They're not, you know, absolutely stellar. You might see or the you know, a bit of distortion on the outside lens or something like that but allows me to get decent up close shots. And because I shoot everything in sequence.

so if I'm shooting this tear down video, it'll all be in sequence. Like I won't shoot the end in first or anything like that because when I go drop it in my timeline, I want it all to be in sequence. So if I have to screw and unscrew this lens on the front, if I have to do that 10 times in a video because I'm you know, looking at a new component on a Pcb, I will take it. I'll screw it on and off 10 times.

because if I go and shoot all my macro shots later, then it's just a mess in the timeline. I don't know where to drop them in and it's just. ah. It takes more time to edit the videos, so the less time I spend editing video, the better.

That's why, by the way, on the microphones, I get everything my audio set up in camera so you can see down here. For example, that I've got it set permanently to peak right where exactly I want it so I don't have to adjust any audio in my edit whatsoever. That goes for the white balance as well. You can see, I've got 5000 Kelvin here.

All of my studio lights are set up for 5000 Kelvin. I'll show you those in a minute. Um, and I also shoot with fixed aperture here. I've got a fixed aperture of F 5.2 and what that gives me is a greater depth of field.

Because I'm shooting at an angle like this, I want uh, the components like at the front of the board, uh to be in focus with the back of the board and the higher um, fixed aperture you go, then the more depth of field you're going to have and the more in focus your components. I don't want to shoot those you know, blurry bouquet artifady videos? that's not my style. I want to show you everything in focus so I might take that up a bit. The problem is look, the gain is, quite high there because I haven't turned on my studio.

Uh, one of my I used two studio lights here. My overhead lights aren't enough. So these I use um, amaran, um Aputure amaran hr 672 C uh lights and I've got two of these and I can adjust the color balance. I've got them set for about five thousand kelvin and I can just switch those on So and I typically might have it Fifty percent something like that and you'll notice with the light off I'm at 12 db gain.

But if I turn that light one light on, oh, it should. it did. Yeah, it drops down to 9 db. Turn another one and it might go down to 6 or something like that because the higher the gain, the more noise you're going to have on your video.

So yeah, I don't like, I just don't have. Even though I've got a lot of light in the studio, it's still not enough to get a decent depth of field. And you've seen these in our previous videos. These are my overhead studio lights here and normally if I'm just in the office I actually turn them all off like this.

It's only got the one there, but I can turn on the position of the lights like if I'm shooting just at the bench here. I'll turn on like these overhead ones like this. but if I'm say sitting at my chair over there, that'll give me glare off my forehead so I want to turn those off. Oop! I want to turn those off and I want to turn one just in front of me on.

So that gets lights up when I'm sitting on the chair and I'll show you that in a minute or if I'm shooting a video over on my microscope my my Tagano bench over there, the Atem live streaming thing which I'll also show you stick around. then I can specifically, um, turn that one off and on at the end like that and then that lights up. My face, lights up the bench and everything else. And once again, as I've shown in previous videos, I have to link in.

these uh panels are all Kelvin High color rendering index as are these amaran lights. They're high Cri color rendering index so I get lots of accurate colors and they're anti-glare as well. So if I want to shoot a whiteboard video over there, I'll set up my Nx80 camera here and I'll use my wireless mic and then I will actually set. I'll actually zoom in here.

This isn't set up perfectly, but it gives you an example. I will uh, set up fixed, uh, focus so it focuses on the whiteboard and then the depth of field will be enough to get my head um in there standing that far away as well. So and I just don't have any like focus hunting or anything like that and then I'll expose it. I'll set a fixed exposure as well.

I've got a little Ev button programmed here and I will then adjust my exposure for the whiteboard because whiteboards are tricky because they're white. Um, so yeah, they like tend to overexpose. So I'll overexpose the whiteboard because if I'm exposing automatically on the whiteboard then I'll be too dark in the shot. So yeah, just something.

uh to be aware of there. So I will expose fixed on the whiteboard and then I will move into a shot. So that's all set up manually and fixed. So this is my Um edit and also uh, desktop recording station.

As you can see, I've got three monitors here. It's still not set up optimum. Anyway, I've got a three different size monitors and this is very deliberate. I've got a 1080p monitor here and this is what I do all my screen captures on.

So I've got a screen capture at 1080p. because my final video has got to be at 1080p. I capture on a 1080p monitor and then I've got a 2k monitor. This is where I'll do all my video editing and I am using Uh Davinci Resolve these days.

I've only recently, like in the last six months, switched over to Davinci Resolve. But I still do use um Vegas. What was Sony Vegas? Now it's just Uh Vegas I was using. I still use Vegas for my thumbnails and other stuff occasionally, so I'm still sort of like getting into grips with davinci resolve.

But I am using it and it works reasonably well. And then I've got a 4k monitor over here which allows me to put big stuff up. and if I want to shoot any 4k screen captures which I've done very occasionally, or if I want to actually preview 4k material, then yeah, I can do that on my 4k monitor. Hi! So what I use for screen capture is Xsplit.

Yeah, I know, or you Obs fanboys, it's exactly the same thing. But I've been using Xsplit since before Obs was crap. so I'm just sticking with Xsplit. Okay, and that as you can see, it's doing my screen capture of my 1080p at the moment with my camera, which is my old one I used to shoot my videos on.

So if you remember back in the old days, I used to use the Canon Hf G30 camcorder, so I now use that as a webcam because these are way better than a like a C920 webcam. Even like the best webcam, this thing is going to beat the pants off it. So I've got a Hdmi output here and that goes into a Hdmi capture card on my Pc. so I can just choose that as a video source and I've got it set up.

I think it's in green screen at the moment. So on the floor here I've got an elgato. uh, green screen. It's what all the gamer kitties use and it's quite nice.

Highly recommended. So if I pull that up, you'll see I vanish and that's how I do. Uh, the talking Dave head thing. So that's all set up in Xsplit, no wakkas, and just a little pro tip: I actually set this up as a mirror image so that my eyes actually look into the screen when I'm actually recording because my camera is up in this corner here.

and uh, yeah, so I've got a look. Um, so if I didn't flip it, then if I'm looking at the screen in the video you watch my eyes would be looking over in this direction so I don't want that so I just flip that. In fact, this is one of the annoying things about shooting. I would love to have like a proper like 1080p monitor as a teleprompter with the camera actually directly behind the screen because I I would like to have the ability to like when I'm doing a talking headshot of looking right at you rather than looking down at the screen.

But anyway, this is a reasonable compromise. So the closer the camera gets to you and the further it is, the more offset you're going to have and the more your eyes tend to not be looking um at the audience when you're shooting uh, Talking Head videos. and then for my voiceover audio because I want to match uh, the tone of the audio that I've shooting from behind my camera because often I'll mix bench footage with my voice over footage. I've got another rode microphone.

I should have an identical microphone, but this one's better. This is the Rode Ntr180. It's a one-inch uh capsule jobby, but as far as Like Tone goes, they both sound identical. So I match my uh rode mics as well as i uh, can there.

so that's just on a stand that I just move in. Can be a bit annoying because you've got to be really close to these things to get the proximity effect of the microphone. But anyway, so it interferes with the keyboard sometimes and it's kind of annoying. But anyway, that's my audio and that goes into all Focusrite.

Scarlet Solo down here and you've seen these bad boys before. Focal are professional Cmsr40 monitor uh speakers so they're really schmick and I've got the occasional acoustic treatment around the uh lab. You can see that, uh, there it It kind of sort of helps. Anyway, I've done videos on that.

Yeah. so normally I'd have two studio lights here, but the other one at the moment is just behind here to light up my face. So when I'm actually sitting here shooting a Talking Head overlay video, I've got light coming from there and I've also got light coming from just those two. As I said, I turn off these lights here so I don't get any reflections off my forehead so you know that's just important.

But I I keep having to move that light so I'm going to get some extra lights like permanently set up here. Um, it's not ideal yet. I want to like optimize my lighting for my face when I'm doing the uh, Talking Head videos. And if I'm doing macro photography, I'll link in the video for my do-it-yourself light box here.

And I've got another Sony Alpha 6300 with a macro lens here. And this is how I get all of my gorgeous uh Pcb photos so I can shoot those in high resolution. and occasionally I'll put those in the edit and then do like a Talking Head version over those high res photos. But anyway, I'll link that video in.

so let's go over to my live streaming bench over here. I've got more acoustic treatment here, but anyway, this is where I do my streaming show every Saturday and I'll record any Togano microscope stuff down here. Now I'll have to link in. I do actually go through all the bells and whistles um of this.

but I've got um. my blackmagic, uh, Aussie? uh product awesome. My A10 mini, uh, extreme. I used to have the smaller one, but they, um, they took pity on me and actually sent me this one.

which is overkill. but I I do actually have up to five sources that I do actually use anyway. This is a Hdmi video production studio system and then I use an external um, solid state uh drive here which I actually uh recorded that. So I've got this all set up um so that I can simply if I want to.

If I'm shooting a video like you know, I did a tear down of a product, I want to put this under the microscope. I can simply walk up to this and I can press record here and it's all set up so that I'm going to get my like picture in picture. you can see there's the program output. There's my head coming from this camera over here which is one of my old B cam ones that's a Canon Hfm400 and that works really well as once again, Hdmi output.

it doesn't go in the capture card, it goes into the Atem switcher down here and I've got the Hdmi output of my Tagano microscope here so you can see that on the screen there so I can. I've got my little control down here so I can. I can zoom in and out of my Tagano microscope so that's got an absolute massive range. I can go like all the way in, go all the way in like that, right? It's really impressive.

Um stuff. So yeah. and then I've got uh, if this is the second camera, I can have a B camera which I sometimes uh, mount over here. That will be that other uh, Sony that you uh, saw and that can come in and that'll be a B camera I can switch if I want to.

you know, have a camera that looks down on this setup as I work. but I don't use that uh very often these days. And for the audio side of things, I've once again, I've got a rode shotgun mic. That's the Ntg one.

I might often not take that on site like if I need a shotgun, uh, camera. a shotgun mic on site. Uh, but otherwise it just sits here on the desktop and that actually goes into a Tascam. This is overkill.

Um, but because it's an Xlr, mic goes into this Tascam. Uh, jobby here which does, uh, the Phantom power and gives the audio out. but this can actually do Sd card recording as well. It's got built-in mic so I could do backup recording if I really wanted to.

But anyway, that's an overkill bit of kit. but I bought that for another use and I'm just using it for this. so that goes. So the audio goes into the Atem switcher up here and that's what you're seeing up here.

The program audio is coming from the shotgun here. So um, yeah, I can simply press record or I can stream. I can actually hit the stream button and go on air like this. And I can stream a live show that'll go straight to Youtube.

It'll or I don't need a computer which I've got down here. an old dumpster computer which is running over here. I'll show you that in a sec but I don't need any of that. I can just press on air like that and I am live on Youtube With this whole multi-camera setup and I can, you know I can switch my uh cameras.

I can switch uh, I've got a Pc screen so this is the screen up the top here so I can actually uh, switch between the screen capture. I can switch between my Tagano microscope, I can switch between my um, like two different cameras or more. or I've also got the ability uh to switch in my fleur uh, infrared uh, desktop camera as well. So if I want to do any infrared stuff, the output of this can actually go into the system as well.

or I can use my Olympus microscope over here. I don't have the camera set up at the moment, but I can put that as another Hdmi source so I can switch all this stuff and actually produce videos Live Completely Live. I can do all the live switching and everything so I don't do that very often like go live and switch in all this, but I can. So I mainly do this uh for recording which I'll then edit in my videos later so I'll record to the solid state uh drive like this which I'll then uh use.

Uh, sneakernet over to my Pc, my editing Pc over there. But yeah, I can simply press record like this and then it's already set up with my picture in picture and stuff like that. and I can do my tagano up to Ghana microscope so I can switch to my microscope and stuff like that. and or I can switch to the Pc screen.

or so you know, if I'm doing a data sheet. if I'm looking at a data sheet, I can switch over to that or the microscope. Whatever. And that records the solid state drive.

which then I can edit into my video or stream live. Now streaming. Hi, There you go. That's the kit I'm using at the moment, the Sony Zv1, and so every Saturday or mostly every Saturday I do a live show.

If you're not aware, uh, just a couple hours. we just hang out and we just chat and everything right. To do this live show. I use uh, Streamyard, which is a web-based system.

It allows me to stream to many different platforms at once, so I stream to Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Twitter, Twitch, Odyssey, and and a couple of other oddball uh, ones and stuff. So anyway, yeah, I can stream to multiple locations. It pulls in the chat um, here so I can read the chat and then I use a C9 20 or is that a C930 uh, webcam up here just so that I'm looking at the screen. Otherwise, my camera's over here and you, you know it's just very impersonal.

You just see the side of my face and my giant nose and yeah, no, it's it's not good. So for my live streaming, I'll switch that. but I can simply go down here and I can switch my camera source and I can switch it over to my Blackmagic, which is coming streaming via the Usb and I can switch into that and Bingo! There you go, I'm in. I can now stream my live show which then comes from all of my Atem switching so I can actually so doing my live show.

I can then switch in my microscope if I have to and my audio is coming through here because you don't want your audio coming through this crap thing. So I'll have my audio set up so that it's actually coming from the Blackmagic input here. and that just sounds way better than the crappy microphone built into the webcams. And also behind here.

here's a Sennheiser a matching Sennheiser desktop receiver for that transmitter I showed you before, or I've got an additional transmitter. I don't think I've actually used this yet. Maybe once. But yeah, this goes up to another road Reporter microphone so that I can then transmit into my camera or I can receive into here and this goes into my Atem as well.

so I can actually use my wireless mic. So technically, while I'm streaming here, I can get up from my chair and walk around the lab and I can actually, you know, show you different stuff and I can potentially also use my phone as a camera and walk around the lab and that's tight. I can get that tied into Xsplit or Vcan, Xsplit, Vcam or whatever it's called. And I can.

Technically, I can walk around the lab with a camera which is my phone. So there you go. Um, that is my like, live streaming and uh, microscope recording system. Pretty cool, huh? Technically, I do have a camera in the mantis microscope as well, but um, yeah, that is the camera in that is.

This is gorgeous optically, but the camera in it's absolute garbage, so I don't even bother. But technically that's possible as well. So there you have it. I think that is it in terms of how I shoot video and um, yeah, as I said, I do most of my uh, work on the uh, bench here behind the camera and like I will stand behind the camera and by the way, I will.

Actually, if you're wondering why I like miss things, um, like you know, obvious Dave, why didn't you see that thing or something? Well, it's because when I'm shooting a video, I'm looking through the camcorder because I'm very careful about framing. I think framing is a very important thing, so I'm always conscious of how I'm framing the shot in the camera. So you know, if I'm talking about a part, I will. I will zoom in.

You know, to get reasonable detail on that part, or I'll zoom out to get the entire product or whatever. or the front panel or whatever part of a front panel that I'm using and stuff like that. So I'm always framing stuff. So I'm always looking through this tiny camcorder screen and I can't read details on the top of chips that you guys can watching it or me watching it when I edit it back later.

Like, so if I, if I've got my shot like that, I can't read those bloody part numbers on those chips like you know it's uh, actually, if I look past the screen, I can't actually read them. But yeah, if I'm looking through the camcorder, then yeah, I can't read that stuff. But and I've done a whole video on how I actually edit videos and as I said, I simply have all of my Um clips shot in sequence like this. Um, and then I just drop them into the timeline and I just trim, uh, the start and the end and I overlay a few things and that's it.

I don't have to touch my audio, you can see. I do all my editing based based on the audio waveform. Very rarely would I have to get in there and adjust an audio level like that because all of my audio is done in camera, all of my lighting, all of my color balancing, everything else. I don't have to spend one second of my editing time doing any of that rubbish.

I'm not producing a Hollywood video, I just want to edit this thing as quickly and simply as possible. So if you get it all right in camera audio, you know, exposure, color, balance, framing, everything else. You don't have to worry about that. So I rarely do anything in the edit in that regards.

only if I happen to be you know, a fair way away from the microphone at that point and I couldn't be bothered. You know, getting a wireless mic on or something that I would raise the level up and it's going to be good enough and like, yeah, I don't do any color balancing, color grading. any of that professional rubbish is just not needed for Youtube videos. So there you go.

I hope you enjoyed that. uh, behind the scenes look at how I shoot my videos, the tools I use, and stuff like that. There's probably a few other things like. if I go on site, it's different.

I've got, like some of those flight cases I've got up uh there. like. I've got extra cables and and microphone solutions and stuff like that. If I'm going on site and I'm like recording an interview or something like that, I'll take multiple cameras.

I've got other recorded audio recording uh, devices and stuff like that I can use like a zoom h uh for in and stuff like that and other backup sort of stuff that I'll use um, on site. And there's probably like a few other like little things I do here and there, but that's hopefully the main tools, the main processes and main cameras and settings and everything else that I use when I'm shooting videos. so I hope you found that useful If you did, give it a big thumbs up. As always, discuss down below.

And yes, every video creator has their own unique uh, requirements and stuff like that. I've just set up this sort of stuff that suits me and my requirements and my environment, my style of content, and my style of production, my style of shooting, and everything else. So yeah, it's like you don't just go out and buy all the stuff I've got because you know Dave has it. and Dave's kind of mildly successful on Youtube.

No, you've got to tailor it to your particular needs, but hopefully that's given you, uh, some food for thought if you're a creator wanting to make videos. But after having produced like probably over 2 000 videos over the last 12 years, the key is just spending as little time fussing around as possible. Although I do spend a bit more time now editing my videos, I've done a video talking about my two pass editing process. I'll have to link that in.

so I do spend a bit more time editing now, but I still try and get everything right in camera. That is absolute key. And then I don't have to dick around. if I shoot a whole video.

I might spend an hour or two tops editing a video and then it's done and that's it. So yeah, it doesn't take me a huge amount of time to edit videos because I go to the effort to sort of like get everything right in camera. It's important. Anyway, I've waffled on enough.

catch me all on my other platforms as well. I'm going to be promoting those more Patreon locals as well. I'm on now. And uh, Odyssey of course is my big alternative platform.

65 000 subscribers Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it. Catch you next time you.