The two-camera interview is the shoot we support most: an executive, a customer, or a founder, framed in a medium and a tight, usually in an office that was never designed for filming. Here's the package we'd pull from our gear list for that day, and why each piece is there.
Camera
- Two Canon EOS C80 kits with SmallHD 7" monitors. Matching bodies means matching color, which saves your editor a grading pass.
- Lenses: the Canon RF zoom kit covers both angles, the 24–70mm on the medium and the 70–200mm on the tight. If the look calls for primes, the ZEISS Otus ML set (35, 50, and 85mm).
- Two Sachtler Flowtech tripods.
- A diffusion filter such as Black Pro-Mist or Glimmer Glass, if you want to take the digital edge off skin.
Lighting
- Key: an Aputure STORM 700x through a Light Dome 150. Big, soft, and bi-color, so it can match whatever the office windows are doing.
- Fill: often the room already gives you plenty. We bring a 4×4 or 6×6 frame to take fill away instead.
- Hair or edge light: an Amaran Ray 360c with a grid.
- Background: Nanlite RGB tubes or PavoSlim panels to pull the subject off a flat office wall.
Grip
- C-stands and baby stands, with a sandbag on every one.
- Flags and a 40×40 flag kit to control spill off white walls.
- Stingers for house power. Most interview setups run fine on wall power when the load is spread across circuits.
Sound
From our production sound package: a lavalier on the subject plus an overhead shotgun, a Schoeps CMIT 5U or Sennheiser MKH 50, recorded to a Sound Devices 633. Tentacle Sync keeps timecode matched to both cameras, so syncing in the edit takes seconds. The shotgun is the safety net if a lav rustles against a collar.
Keeping the client comfortable
If your client wants to watch, a SmallHD 2400 24" studio monitor or the 13" production monitor on a wireless feed keeps them out of the shot and off the operator's shoulder. Comtek receivers let them hear the interview too. If they're remote, our Blackmagic remote video kit puts a live feed into a Zoom call.
Optional extras
- A Prompter People 17" teleprompter for scripted sections
- A third camera, a Canon C50 or RED Komodo, on a slider for b-roll with movement
Everything above fits on our ½-ton grip truck. Send us your setup and we'll confirm it for your dates.
