Sometimes, it’s best to record as something happens. For instance, during a cooking class, or as students talk about Veggies vs Hot Cheetoes. Here are some tips about that.
- Get permission from the person in charge to record the event.
- If it’s super noisy, find a quieter spot. For instance, if many people are talking VERY loud, find a corner of the room where people aren’t talking so loud. If music or a movie is playing, move away from the speakers. If you’re near a noisy mountain stream, move back to a quieter place, a little away from the stream. If you’re near traffic that’s noisy, move a little bit back from the traffic. And so on . . . and so on . . .
- If it’s still a little noisy, hold your microphone very close to the person you’re talking with
- If you’re taking pictures, get some pictures close up of people’s faces, and also get pictures of the whole event!
- If your friends are recording at this event as well, then GO TO DIFFERENT PEOPLE AND DIFFERENT PLACES at the event. If you’re too close together, you’ll just get a jumble of the same sound, with the other person’s talk as part of it. It’s better to record things AWAY from each other.
- After you get the live sound or video, you can go back and add in the narration and other details so that it all comes together as a story. You can write scripts to do this, or prompt students to fill in the blanks. But the live on-the-scene sound and pictures are a great way to start.