Thinking Like...

Having gotten past my technical issues and shot reasonable masters of two casts worth of a youth musical, I was now intent upon using my long developed multi-camera skills to make the recordings more than just reasonable masters. I mean, how many years did I spend in a control room, encouraging directors to keep the shots coming, because it was just more interesting that way?

I knew that there were moments I wanted to shoot tighter. What I didn't realize, until I was in the moment of shooting, was how instinctual thinking like an AD or an Editor had become. You see, I wasn't just shooting tight shots. I was shooting inserts and shots to bridge between parts and between casts. I wasn't just watching the show. I was watching the things that would make it come together on video. In that moment, I suddenly realized that, technical savvy or not, I had a skill set that was different from others who might have been in my shoes. While the recording might be just for the archives, in my eyes, it wouldn't--couldn't--be just archival. It had to be multi-camera, even if I didn't have a multi-camera setup, and it had to be editable, even if I didn't have that much footage with which to edit.
 
Sometimes we forget how ingrained our skill set or our training has become. And sometimes, we are reminded that the skills we have acquired can be pretty useful. They can have us--no matter where we go--thinking like...like the sum of everywhere we've been.