Filming at the PGA show in Orlando FL

Very recently we at Fusion Studios were involved in filming a client during the PGA Tour in Orlando Florida. We were working with a company called Virtual Golf, who sells golf clubs to the amateur and professional players in the industry.

During the two days of filming, we went out to a golf course in Winter Garden for a demo day and a showcasing of their clubs. The second day involved going to the Orlando convention center for some indoor showcasing of their products and an interview with golfer John Daly. We also had to gather b-roll of the Virtual Golf tent along with various on the go interviews. We used a Pansonic GH5, a monopod for quick on the go shots, and a tripod with a Rhino Slider for cinematic shots.

The company wanted video of people using the company’s golf clubs and also some slow-motion shots since they never had any shots like that in their video stock.

Technical aspects of the shoot

We used the slider to get very low angle shots of golfers using Virtual Golf’s products. We shot in front of the player but safe enough for us and the camera to not get hit. It was also important to get an establishing shot of the Virtual Golf tent. We also shot a big wide angle of the golf course showing all the tents at the location, and on the way out we got the main event sign and the entrance the golf course.

The last hour was dedicated to filming the interviews and other b-roll that could be missing in our shot list. It was a windy day and it was overcast which was great for golfing (but not necessarily good for video). We had to use a truck for cover from the wind to avoid noise during the interviews. The best thing about using the truck is that it was wrapped with the company’s logo so it was perfect to use it as the background.

We encountered a low light situation during this shoot. When we started setting up the lights for our first interview the portable batteries for our big lights went bad and we had no power outlet to plug our lights into. With less time, gear going bad, and having the interview move up ahead of schedule we had to think fast.

We decided to ditch the tripod and move with a monopod for quick use.We usually bring a small LED light that we can use in emergency cases; we put this light on top of the camera when are not able to use our bigger lights. We also used the small LED light for most of the slow-motion shots.

Shoot days don’t always go as plan and as a videographer, even with all the planning in the world, it’s important to think on your feet and prepare for the unexpected, because if something goes wrong you will have to troubleshoot it and come up with a good solution(that also included when someone hires a videographer). In our case, we had extra lights to make up for the lights going bad and at the end, the shoot went really well.