Hi Robert,
Maybe this could also be a question for next livestream if it’s too in depth for simple answers 
I’m playing around with filming my finger drumming in OBS. I’ve got a setup with a top mounted webcam (Logitech Brio) and a DSLR on a tripod. I’m having a bad time getting good quality video out of this setup. I was wondering your views on this (as well as any other readers’ input ofcourse)
One issue is flickering lights, which I can eliminate quite well by playing with exposure on the DSLR, but the overhead webcam is tougher. While I have manual control over exposure time, there are no millisecond values so I’m just guessing. And right now my experience is: slider left = sharp movement but flickering, slider right = no flickering but washy hand movement.
The other dimension I’m not getting right is lightness (or contrast maybe?). I would like the controller to be visible, surroundings not too dark, but still see the pads light up. Can’t get this balance right at the moment. Also, the pad lights show up pretty ugly, as circles, instead of lit up square pads.
An impression of what I have now: Dropbox Link
(the audio sync is also still off in this video, but I’ll fix that one next)
This looks way better in your videos… any tips?
Bas
First of all, I think your top down cam looks pretty good! Am I correct that that’s the only angle in the video you linked to?
That said… filming finger drumming with multiple camera’s is kinda an art on its own. I tried a webcam but fairly quickly gave up because of the unreliable framerate which gave me trouble with syncing.
I then used my samsung galaxy phone as the top down camera. Which is easy to mount since it’s not that heavy. And a Panasonic dslr on a tripod from the front. That worked, although still not super perfectly. I shot my Grooving & Improving course that way. Both my phone and the Panasonic supported 60fps so that was pretty nice.
In 2019 I invested some serious money and bought two Blackmagic pocket 4k camera’s and a year or so later also a Blackmagic atem mini pro. That’s the moment I finally could record in a comfortable way without surprises afterwards and stable footage from two camera’s that seem to always be nicely in sync.
Also the Blackmagic camera’s shoot in RAW, which means you have a large dynamic range and in post you can crank up the contrast, then select the part with the pads and just correct that part, making those pads a little less contrasty, therefore eliminating the ugly circles. I have a whole standard preset thing made (which took me quite some time) and I film with the blinds closed and a bunch of LED mats as lights that I always set to the exact same settings, so I can easily apply the exact same color grading (and then I still have to tweak it, but it isn’t as much of a hassle).
Mounting a heavy camera like that also takes a heavy c-stand and some other tricks to keep everything perfectly aligned while also not filming the microphone or the side of the lights… it was a huge puzzle.
My advice would be: use a modern phone to get adequate results. If you use 2 camera’s, first of all consider if this is actually needed. If so use a phone + dslr but test if they go out of sync.
If you get something acceptable without annoying flickering, I would in all honesty be pretty happy already.
Hey Robert, thanks for the in depth reply.
You are right, this is only the top down. Here’s both together (although it’s not the configuration I plan on using the two angles): Dropbox - 2023-08-30 12-52-25.mp4 - Simplify your life
(I shot this video to nail audio and video sync)
It seems like your solution is geared towards editing afterwards, which I want to bypass - I just want to hit record on OBS, and record camera and audio for a shareable video. As such, quality is less of an issue than in your use case - however it does give me a lot of context for why your videos look that good. The light sensitivity and sensor quality of a system camera like the blackmagic would help a lot with my issues I think. Shooting in RAW would make that even better… but I can’t even imagine the harddisk space I would need when I just hit record for a few hours 
Also - color correcting the pads differently from the surroundings makes a lot of sense, wouldn’t have thought to do that.
I have an older sony system camera lying around that I might be able to use for this, and it’s light enough to mount as well. Will keep the C-stand tip in mind, if the mic-stand I use now is too light still.
(Also, sync-drift is not an issue since I record all sources straight into OBS. )
Thanks again, this helps a lot!
Ah great to hear! I’m rocking a Synology NAS with 4 8tb harddrives over here, so I can keep the footage of all the lessons I shot (since 2019). It’s not cheap or easy or convenient to do things my way
Good luck! I actually like your dual screen setup. Looks nice and real and great for live.
Short update - I ended up picking up a sony a5100 for very cheap, and I’m now using that. It’s not as light as the webcam was, but the mic stand I use still works fine for it (the charger actually balances it nicely, I tied that to the back of the mic stand). Image quality and control is so much better than the Brio webcam I used before!
Happy with the result so far. I ended up not color correcting the pads separately, especially since the position of the Maschine is going to change. This is good enough for what I want:
video link
(dropbox video starts playback a little low res, should get better when rewinding)
Another neat thing I found out - you can adjust Maschine pad brightness in the Maschine 2 software preferences - and that brightness carries over to Midi Mode. Taking the brightness back a little helped with the “ugly circles” inside the pads.
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