Part 3 of this series will focus on the production aspect of remote video production.
I have already shared one of the techniques we used last summer to socially distance our crew and client. Elephant Productions did a live stream from the output of the camera and used Zoom to communicate with our client. Our video production house was located just outside Austin, TX and most of our clients were In Dallas. It’s an easy concept, and while there will be some lag between what happens on the set and when the client sees it, that lag can be dealt with.
Depending on your internet connection, the client internet connection, and the video production service and type of delivery you are using, that lag can be a couple of seconds or thirty to forty-five seconds. In our case, it was thirty seconds, but that didn’t cause any issues for our production. However, in the future, I would want to bring that way down.
While it depends on how often you are using it, I think hiring a vendor to provide this service is a good idea, and in our case, we used ME Suite (mesuite.ai). If you are supplying remote video production quite a bit, then maybe it makes sense to buy the encoder, pay for the LTE data service from at least one or two providers, set up the streaming service, and provide support. My preference is to have one provider do it all so when shoot day comes you have one contact for support.
Test the system out, preferably at the actual location, at least the day before if not a few days. This gives you time to get a replacement part or accessory or new data service if something isn’t working. If you have wired internet access available that’s terrific, Wi-Fi would be my second choice depending on the signal strength and then mobile LTE data.
On our production, we only had wi-fi availability since the cell signal would not penetrate the building. If that was not working, I was prepared to move our encoder outside. Thankfully, I didn’t have to. I am a technical person, and we do live webcasts regularly for one of our clients, so I feel comfortable investing in the equipment for remote production viewing if we were using it quite a bit, but even then, I’d prefer a well-tested solution. Teradek is a well-known encoder that has ethernet, wi-fi, and LTE service built in. The provider we used, ME Suite, sent us one of their products on our production. A lot of third-party providers use their encoders as well. There are plenty of other encoders out there, but Teradek seems to be the most popular because of its ability to stream from almost anywhere. In terms of providers, we used ME Suite’s Direct ME product. It worked well and their support was great. There are other providers out there, so I don’t want to suggest one over another without having experience with all of them.
Another possibility I’ve considered trying is to send the video signal directly to Zoom. With a USB capture device, such as the Blackmagic Web Presenter, the video signal will show up as a webcam on Zoom. I’ve only tested this and haven’t tried it in a real scenario, but I suspect many of the live online tutorials I’ve been attending have been using this same technique, and it works. This may not be ideal when picture quality and color accuracy are ideal, but if it’s for viewing content, such as an interview for a corporate video production, sending the video through Zoom is an easy solution. If you consider this method, check and see which type of Zoom account you have and what the picture resolution is. In addition to Zoom, I believe this will work for Teams, but I don’t have any personal experience.
Finally, I’ll touch on one other thing briefly. Remote video production techniques can also allow for people to spread out within the same production area. For instance, the clients are in another room or building and they need to be able to converse without interrupting the shoot. Art direction, set design, producers, previsualization, etc. can be spread in different areas enabling them to work and watch. This might be done through wireless video, local intranet solutions, or even over the internet. If those people need access to the set or talent, it can happen, but most of the time they are in separate areas.
For the next and final section, I’ll discuss how we accomplish remote post-production at Elephant Productions.