Equipment

In this post, I’d like to share the equipment we used to capture video and audio for our documentary, in the hope that it might be helpful for similar projects.

My main requirements were:

• “Field-ready” – everything must work for at least one day powered by batteries, power banks or a mobile power unit
  • Chawasarira’s house in Chitungwiza is connected to the electricity grid, but there were regular power outages, especially during the day
• Continuous HD video recording for 8+ hours, outdoors in the sun
• High audio quality
• As inexpensive and portable as possible

Video

Choosing a suitable camera proved surprisingly difficult. Many affordable camcorders or DSLRs still have proprietary battery packs (that also cannot be changed while recording), or their maximum recording time is artificially limited (due to customs regulations).

The quality of today’s mobile phone cameras is more than sufficient for our purposes, but only few models still have SD card slots and can record HD directly to the memory card. External media on the USB port is no option because then you can’t connect a power bank. Some supposedly top models even stop recording after a while due to heat issues or file size limits.

After a long search and a bunch of tests, I landed on the Samsung Galaxy S20 FE 5G, which really ticked all the boxes: practically infinite HD recordings on a 1TB memory card (I once tried 48 hours), wide-angle, optical zoom, and not excessively expensive in 2023 (about €400).

We used two of them, one camera for the mbira or workbench, and one for the scenery. Both attached to microphone stands using phone mounts with tripod threads, plus two power banks for each.

I also bought some USB-powered LED lights with tripods that we never used because thanks to the favorable weather we were always able to shoot outside in daylight.

Audio

I originally planned to use a Tascam Portacapture X8 32-bit recorder as the main recording device, as I wasn’t sure if the local power supply situation would be sufficient to run the computer and the Audient evo 8 audio interface all day.

Luckily, Samora brought a “Gizzu” power station from South Africa, so we were able to record into, and edit with the laptop late into the night almost every day, and needed the X8 only once in a while.

This saved us additional file organization work, already handling so many videos wasn’t always easy. Every night, we aligned the video and audio files in the video editing software—if you don’t do this right away, it gets more confusing with each passing day.

We recorded the mbira in parallel with a pickup (Schaller Oyster D/S) and a close-up mic, and the conversation with a second microphone. The mics, a pair of Studio Electronics sE8 small-diaphragm condensers (they need phantom power), are small, sturdy, good sounding, extremely low-noise, and capable of handling high levels. Great devices!

I’ve never used the stereo mic pair included with the X8. Although they also sound good and are low-noise, they’re made entirely of plastic and feel like they’ll fall apart if you cough too hard.

The X8 recorder itself makes a rather sturdy impression, but I guess today I would go with one of the latest Zoom essential models. They’re also 32-bit, which I find invaluable for any kind of fieldwork, as it eliminates the risk of clipping. You can basically hand them to anyone and ask them to press the record button.

For a more balanced frequency response, we amplified the piezo pickup with a high-impedance L.R.Baggs Para Acoustic DI preamp. Although we mostly used the better sounding close mic signal in the videos, the pickup channel (which doesn’t include ambient noise) often saved us from having to re-record takes when Chawasarira played mbira.

The microphone windscreens I bought weren’t bad, but in retrospect, I think I should have invested in the best ones I could get.

What proved invaluable was my clapperboard: We had to activate the two phones and the audio recording for every take. Three initial claps were sufficient for Premiere Pro to automatically align the audio and video files (via the phone audio track).

The consistently low noise level of the audio equipment was also very helpful later for editing of the material. Especially in the Matepe Making videos, the extreme audio level differences (hammering on the anvil during the conversation) often required heavy compression and ambient noise reduction algorithms to achieve a pleasant soundtrack that still sounded decent even on mobile phones. More inherent noise in the recordings would certainly have made this more difficult.

Useful little things

• Gaffa tape without residue
• Plaster tape for labeling
• Multi-USB charger with enough ports to charge many devices simultaneously (once you have power, charging should be quick)
• Solar charger for the Gizzu, as a backup
• Enough backup cables and power banks
• Velcro cable ties
• Sufficient (and fast) backup media
• Closed headphones for making overdub recordings without feeding the playback into the mic