3 Busking Videos Jan 2020 Melbourne
Category:Video Making BlogI have made three fun videos in the first 3 weeks of my visit to Australia where my family live. The bush fires were on everyone’s minds at the time of filming and the burning continues as I write this. In inner city Melbourne were all three videos were produced, the smoke hangs in the air hundreds of kilometres from where it formed. My sense of the collective consciousness of Melbourne right now is that we are united in feeling fragmented. Helplessness and guilt tug at our souls and some are better equipped at dulling those sensibilities than others.
Poppy WS was busking and provided the perfect respite to my Xmas shopping. I was surprised to be so impressed by the first busker I saw. Her peddle work was masterful and her husky sexy feminine voice was utterly captivating for me and many others. I asked if I could come back next time she played and film her catchiest tune from a few different angles and she obliged. We have now made tentative plans to shoot a proper music video for her even better song On The Shore.
Once Poppy stopped, another busker began about 50 meters away. That is when I learnt that the permit that buskers must audition for, requires them to play for 30 minutes and rest for 30 minutes so as to stagger the music and give better opportunity for each busker to gather a real audience. Such regulation has filled the Melbourne streets with a charm and aesthetic that honours the creatives and makes art accessible to the masses. When I lived here in the mid nineties the city was tumbleweed dead on a Sunday, now it is a vibrant fun place to be with a chilled out pace that is so utterly civilised it makes me wish with all my heart and soul that geographically it was not located on the butt end of the world.
The other busker was Tim Scanlan and yet again, twice in one hour I was impressed with the band sound he formed with his peddles and talent.
My friend Stormy is a rigger/stage manager who knows dozens of performers. She told me about the Busking for Bushfire Victims fundraiser and yet again I went with my kit and made the above.
For Filmmakers:
I filmed with my humble Sony FS100 (2013 model!) using the kit lens and the Canon 50mm. The sound was directly extracted from the mini audio desks both buskers utilised. I used a manually operated slider by Neweer. The slider does take some getting used…. and if I could afford one I would use a motorised one.. but then again that would be heavier and more of faff to set up. I edit in Adobe Premier Pro and used After Effects for the titles. I find Premier Pro to be really glitchy ever since it became cloud based. I wish they would make it more robust so that the Workspaces (at least) can be saved!
That is all folks!
