Unit 23

Multi-Camera Techniques

Jeremy Kyle Show

“The Jeremy Kyle Show is a British tabloid talk show, presented by Jeremy Kyle
and produced by ITV Studios. The show is based on confrontations in which
guests attempt to resolve issues with others that are significant in their lives,
with such issues often related to family relationships, romantic relationships,
sex, drugs and alcohol, among other issues.”

Britain’s Got Talent

“Britain's Got Talent is a televised British talent show competition, and part of
the global Got Talent franchise created by Simon Cowell. Presented by Ant &
Dec, it is produced by both Thames and Syco Entertainment, distributed by
Fremantle, and broadcast on ITV every year in late Spring to early Summer.
Every year, contestants of any age can audition for the televised contest with
whatever talent they wish to demonstrate. Auditionees seek to impress a
panel of judges.”

Big Brother
“Big Brother was the British version of the international reality television
franchise Big Brother created by producer John de Mol in 1997.[1] Originally
broadcast between 2000 and 2018, the show followed a number of
contestants, known as housemates, who are isolated from the outside world
for an extended period of time in a custom built house. Each week, one of the
housemates is evicted by a public vote, with the last housemate remaining
winning a cash prize. The series takes its name from the character in George
Orwell's 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.”

Demon Days: Live at the Manchester Opera House

“What band better represents an era rooted in digital information than virtual
band Gorillaz? Demon Days: Live at Manchester Opera House keeps with the
mysterious nature of the Damon Albarn’s music under the moniker, relying
much more heavily on lights and projected images than the actual visual
performance of the musicians. Some of the performers, particularly Albarn, are
silhouetted throughout the majority of the concert.”
Task 1: Reasons for Multi-Cam

Within a multi-cam setup, the different camera angles all recording the one
event, a crew can achieve many different angles, which when creating for
example highlight reels of the event (i.e. live football on Match of the Day) by
having so many different angles nothing is missed and in a live setting event
from the many angles that the cameras cover, live events have more cameras
depending on the event such as sports coverage (requiring many different
cameras for specific angles and shots, with a master shot of the whole event),
while studio events such as shows like Jeremy Kyle or Dr Phil, have multiple
cameras covering the main stage of the production. The people who create the
highlights reel have many different shots and angles of shots to make up the
best clips recorded over the event, the camera crew can get the best action
shots and tell what exactly happened in a slowed down replay (i.e. when
football replays action shots), meanwhile if an event is played live, the vision
mixer (the device that changes the sources of footage between each camera or
zooming/tracking i.e. players of a football match and the ball being passes
between them) controls what the viewer see’s and the effects applied that are
seen on the TV/smart device.
Task 2: Communicating Meaning to the Viewer

Communicating meaning to the viewer is more presented in films, however

multi-cam programmes present meaning to the viewer in other ways more
direct with the audience or by having a live studio audience to react to the live
events, creating an atmosphere to bring out a faster, natural response to
what’s going on, this helps reinforce what the viewer will think and helps
enforce the tone set.

Jeremy Kyle: The Jeremy Kyle Show was a factual programme on ITV 1, the
show involves Jeremy inviting guests onto help mediate arguments or events
going on in their life, for entertainment. The show has a high sense of drama
and has a live studio audience to react to the drama and thus are reinforcing
what is witnessed on stage as a sad, happy or disrespectful act. (i.e. when
guests are arguing on set and the audience cheers for Jeremy or the guest)
Typically the Jeremy Kyle Show is a show that involves a lot of family and
young people in crisis situations, tugging on maternal heart strings, making the
target audience typically parents, or older viewers interested in drama.
Big Brother: Big Brother is a reality TV programme about being trapped in the
Big Brother house, till only one remains and then the winner is decided, the
gimmick of Big Brother’s game show/reality show nature is that the cameras
are constantly observing them, and they have no privacy within the Big Brother
house. The show has live eliminations, drama and tension between
housemates and a live event to host the evictions. The show isn’t appropriate
for a younger audience and seems to aim for wide age range in viewers, and
seems targeted at young adults to middle aged adults.

Britain’s Got Talent: Britain’s Got Talent is a competition show around the
whole of the UK, with numerous stages as they narrow down the contestants
each week until a winner is decided, with celebrity judges like Simon Cowell
and David Walliams, and Ant & Dec hosting, the show brings in a lot of
viewership with families, tuning in each week and keeping it on somewhat
early in the night. The target audience is wide and fits more into the family
category of shows, something for people to watch with the family each week,
with amazing acts from singing, dancing, gymnastics, magic, comedy, etc.
Demon Days: The Demon Days, live at Manchester was a recorded live event,
edited and released on DVD after the live show, the film documents the entire
show and each song performed in a well edited cut of the entire live show,
adding special effects and impressive shots by the camera crew all edited
together in an enjoyable fashion. The DVD is primarily targeted at attendees of
the event and fans of the band, with the fan base being between the ages of
15 to late 40s.
Task 3: Visual Styles

Jeremy Kyle: The Jeremy Kyle Show uses many different angles and close up
shots of the guests and host Jeremy in intense moments where either are on
the opposing end and ready to snap, this tension provided by zoomed in shots
onto the faces of those enraged or crying, pushes the emotion from the
guests/host onto the viewer, which is reinforced by the live audience’s
reactions to the events on stage. The colour of the set is a calming blue, with a
lot of space for guests and the audience, the open feeling adds to the show not
wanting to upset or make guests feel claustrophobic talking about their
situations. The show has a slow pace of telling stories, getting to the route of
problems and figuring things out, camera’s switching from one to another for
different angles in intense moments on the show, as the tension is at peak.
Big Brother: Big Brother is a flashy show, with bright colours, lights and shines
off the décor, the visual style is meant to be high class and to have a classy,
modern vibe on set and in the live studio. Shots inside the house are all filmed
on the security cameras of the house, giving them a lot of free range with
shots, making for great conversations filmed with many different shots used to
show a private conversation (i.e. close up shots, whispering and no background
sound, or intense fights between housemates, with people in the background
talking and trying to stop the fight)
There is a room for confessionals called the diary room where guests can talk
with ‘Big Brother’ and address concerns, issues and whatever they need too,
talking into the camera ahead as the shot makes the housemate address the
viewer directly.
Britain’s Got Talent: Britain’s Got Talent has a focus on the talent on stage and
the reactions of the celebrity judges and hosts, with scenes of audience
reactions to show the viewer the reactions from the live set.
On the show, judges reactions are used almost like different categories of
judging, with the overly nice, the harsh, the neutral and funny judge. Each
providing different examples of how the viewer can react to the performance.
Then on stage, every important scene or movement on stage (i.e. gymnastics
tricks, dance moves, magic tricks or high points in singing) is carefully selected
on the vision mixer, putting the best angled shots available on screen for the
viewer to see.

Demon Days: The Demon Days: Live in the Manchester Opera House DVD used
shots and angles unlike any experience of a concert before, adding in their own
special effects and making the concert video a very unique viewing experience.
For anyone who seen the live show, the DVD feels like a different show, with
numerous angles from the audience, on stage and even from above and below
the stage.
Task 4: Constraints of Studio and Location Sets

When working on a studio set for multi-camera productions, a team must be

mindful of space, multi-cam setups require a lot of space for cameras, cables,
computers and vision mixer in order to operate the cameras, receive feed from
each of them and be able to select and arrange the best shots to display to the
viewer, the area is much smaller than that of an open location (i.e. comparing
the set of The Jeremy Kyle Show and the setup for recording Demon Days:
Live)
While a location setup may have more space and be accommodating crew and
those involved, the cost of renting a location may be more pricey than the cost
of renting a studio, however depending on what is being filmed, the needs
may be different (for example, recording Britain’s Got Talent outside on a
location would be too costly, having to set up a stage, seating and backstage)
Another constraint of location setups can be that if the set is outdoors and the
weather is bad, the shoot is cancelled as to not ruin the equipment, while if the
set was sheltered in a studio, the shoot would be able to continue.
If issues arise in a multi-cam setup, location sets have the benefit of not being
too far from one another, and being able to reach each other and solve issues
fast, while in studio, depending on the building, vision mixing and sound
management may all be separated by distance over a larger distance than on a
location where all the set is close together.