Lesson Description
Equipment Selection
9m 52s
Pick the right microphones, cameras, and make use of secondary cameras for your critical camera positions.
Transcript
Equipment Selection
9m 52s
00:06
So, the next thing to think about,
00:08
and hopefully, again,
00:09
this is what you thought about before you start designing
00:12
(which is why I haven't opened up my designer yet),
00:15
is your equipment selection.
00:17
What microphones are you using?
00:20
What cameras are you using?
00:22
This is stuff that you should be planning out ahead of time as well.
00:25
If you start changing them after you've built it,
00:28
it can get a little complicated.
00:29
Again, for microphones,
00:31
the first thing to think about is:
00:33
are you using ceiling-based mics or are you using discrete mics?
00:38
Ceiling-based mics are very good.
00:41
They have information on where the speakers are presenting in XY coordinates,
00:48
and we'll be using that data to cut from shot to shot.
00:51
There's a variety of different models.
00:53
I'm going to pull in my plugin already.
00:56
If you don't know,
00:56
it's located under the asset manager once you open up the software.
01:00
I've got version 3.1 right here, and in this version,
01:04
things may change in the future.
01:06
This is the 3.1 version.
01:07
If you're watching this from the future,
01:09
first of all, welcome!
01:10
Nice to see you.
01:11
Is the future cool?
01:12
I hear it's great.
01:14
If you're looking in the future,
01:15
maybe there are different models available, who knows?
01:17
But right now, in this version,
01:19
if I look in the mode,
01:20
you can see that we handle a couple of partner microphones,
01:23
a couple of Sennheiser microphones here,
01:25
Audio Technica,
01:26
and we also have our own Network microphones,
01:29
the NM series of network microphones,
01:32
and then discrete mics.
01:33
That's if you're going to be just bringing in some individual microphones.
01:36
It could be an analog input,
01:38
could be a Dante microphone input.
01:41
In that case, if every single possible presenter has their own microphone,
01:46
that's what you'll be using. But again, think about that ahead of time.
01:50
The next thing to think about is cameras.
01:52
There are a couple of cameras that we have that you should obviously be considering between.
01:57
If you're familiar with the older style of cameras,
02:00
the PTZ IP cameras that we have, that were our first cameras,
02:05
you can use those with ACPR, totally can.
02:09
The NC series are the newest version as of this recording.
02:13
Maybe we've got newer ones in the future, you never know.
02:15
But the NC series are the newer ones.
02:18
Those will work for ACPR as well.
02:20
One advantage that the NC Series has over the PTZ style,
02:26
and I maybe should clarify that the new ones,
02:28
the NC series, are PTZ, they are still pan tilt zoom,
02:32
whereas the old ones were just the model number was PTZ.
02:35
Those ones could only use one motor at a time,
02:39
so it could pan and then tilt,
02:42
whereas the NC series cameras can operate more multiple motors at once,
02:46
which means essentially they can move in diagonals.
02:50
Why is that important to you?
02:51
It's important because you can get to the shot that you're looking for faster.
02:56
If the camera has to move and then pan down on the old PTZ versions,
03:00
that will take a little bit longer than the NC series that can just cut straight across.
03:04
That means that when a new person is speaking in the room,
03:08
we can get to that person faster and cut to that shot a little bit faster.
03:12
So, a little advantage of the NC series, little plug it, why you should use those.
03:17
Also worth noting that the PTZ IP cameras don't support auto framing.
03:22
Auto framing is a feature that we have that allows the camera to crop in the shot
03:27
based on the faces that are detected in the shot.
03:29
Well, the NC series cameras do support auto framing.
03:33
We'll talk more about auto framing in just a little bit.
03:35
And then we also have the NC 110 cameras.
03:38
Those are a fixed lens EPZ camera.
03:41
Those ones do not have any motorized pan tilt and zoom,
03:45
but you can cut in on them within the 4K image to choose where you want to look in the room.
03:51
Now, those are really good for wide shots.
03:55
When we say a wide shot,
03:56
we're generally thinking about maybe the camera in the front of the room
03:59
that's watching all the participants at the desk.
04:03
You can use it to cut in a little bit.
04:05
You don't really want to use that as a way to punch in tight on people's faces
04:11
the way that you would with the PTZ cameras.
04:13
The NC cameras, those are really designed to move around,
04:16
find the target, zoom in, get a good shot.
04:19
The EPZ,
04:20
it's just not the right use case to use that to try to slice its image up into little squares.
04:25
So, generally speaking, the 110 is going to be used for more wide shots.
04:30
So, when you're thinking about those camera positions,
04:33
once again, that's going to come down to the layout of your room.
04:36
Where are the cameras going to be located?
04:38
Each camera position,
04:39
I keep talking about camera positions,
04:41
each camera position could be one camera or a primary and a secondary camera.
04:46
Now, in our room, we talked about how we're going to have a long conference room,
04:50
and so I'm going to have two positions on either end of the display.
04:53
That's at the far side.
04:54
That's going to work out great.
04:57
Some people, when they set up a room like that,
04:59
might think to themselves,
05:01
"Oh, well, maybe I want to get the people on the sides of the rooms."
05:04
I don't know why they talk like that, but they always do.
05:07
"I want to get the people on the sides of the room."
05:08
So, they're going to put the cameras in the middle of the room.
05:10
That's not a good option if you think about it.
05:14
I get why you think the cameras might belong in the middle of the room
05:17
because that way you get the best possible shot of seeing everyone along the edge of that table.
05:23
But at the same time,
05:24
once the meeting starts, where does everybody look?
05:28
They look to the display at the far end where they can see the other people, right?
05:33
That means that now your cameras that are on the sides of the room
05:36
are only seeing people's profiles and they're talking to someone over there.
05:39
And that's not nearly as engaging of a shot.
05:41
So, that's why we're putting our cameras on the sides but down by the displays
05:47
where the most people will be looking during the meeting.
05:50
That's going to make more sense.
05:52
Now, if you've got like a U shape or a V shape like we talked about for your room,
05:57
you might get away with just a single camera position in the front
06:00
because the majority of the people are already
06:02
facing the direction where you need to capture them.
06:06
And if you've got maybe a room that has a split display,
06:10
so you have two monitors,
06:11
you have the opportunity to maybe just move those monitors a little bit away from each other.
06:15
You've got a little bit of space in between them
06:17
- boom, that's where you want your cameras
06:19
because those cameras are really well positioned to be
06:23
in the eye sights of everyone who's looking at them, right?
06:26
That's going to be probably the most natural experience for the far-end caller,
06:30
the closest thing you're going to get to having them look like they're looking at the camera.
06:35
And with the NC10 as your wide shot,
06:38
you know that could be placed in the front of the room as well.
06:41
Try to avoid that being too high up in the space or too low in the space.
06:46
Again, if you're too far away from that monitor,
06:49
then you're not going to get the more intuitive,
06:51
natural experience of people kind of looking at the camera that we want.
06:56
Now, the next thing you want to think about cameras is:
06:59
are you using a single camera at each of your camera positions,
07:04
or are you using a redundant camera?
07:06
The answer is you should be using the redundant camera,
07:09
and if you're not, hopefully I can convince you why that's a better experience.
07:12
Right now,
07:13
redundant camera experience is definitely going to give
07:17
a lot of quality of life for that far-end caller.
07:21
It's really going to improve their experience.
07:23
If you've got two cameras in the front of the room looking at the various participants,
07:28
if one person starts speaking,
07:31
then one of those cameras will find that person, find that shot, and zoom in on them.
07:35
If the next person who starts speaking is also in a place in the room
07:40
that is covered by that camera position,
07:43
well, that camera is busy, right?
07:45
It's busy looking at this person who was talking last.
07:49
In order for it to cover the new person,
07:51
it would then have to move, find the new person,
07:53
and look at them,
07:54
which means that the far end is now watching that camera movement.
07:58
It's seeing this camera across the room.
08:01
That's not the best experience,
08:04
especially if you end up in a meeting that has a lot of people bouncing back and forth.
08:09
You're going to end up with a lot of camera movements,
08:12
and that can be - I mean, frankly, it can be a little nauseating.
08:17
I don't want to watch that for an hour if I'm in a meeting.
08:19
Now I'm throwing up all over my laptop.
08:22
Now I need to call it because there's vomit on my laptop. That's a bad thing.
08:26
What you want to do instead is have a redundant camera.
08:29
You've got one camera that's focused on this guy talking,
08:32
and then when the next person starts talking,
08:34
the second redundant camera can find,
08:37
locate that person, cut in on the camera preset that you wanted,
08:40
and then we change the camera angles so we're looking at this one.
08:44
That gives a much more cinematic experience.
08:46
So now you get to be Steven Spielberg –
08:48
I lied earlier, you get to be Steven Spielberg, congratulations.
08:51
And then we're cutting properly back and forth between shots
08:54
without seeing that movement back and forth.
08:56
That is a far better experience for the far end.
09:01
Now, I understand that doesn't mean that you always have the opportunity
09:05
to have a redundant camera.
09:08
Sometimes there are space ormonetary limitations.
09:11
Sometimes it's a takeover of a previous room,
09:13
and you just don't have the ability to add a
09:16
camera in there where there was previously one camera.
09:18
Whatever it is,
09:19
there are some options in the software that will allow you to
09:23
automatically cut to a wide shot while the camera is moving.
09:28
That is a kind of a good middle ground, right?
09:32
It's better than watching the camera pan across the audience,
09:35
but it's still not nearly as good as actually having a dedicated secondary camera
09:41
at each of those positions where you need them.
09:42
So, we've got an option to get you halfway there,
09:46
but a secondary camera –
09:47
do it, that's the way you want to go.