Multi Camera Production

you don’t you sync them when you bring them into the edit. You can even buy software to help you, but a good old fashioned handclap is all you need. I tend to do it at the end. As the audience are on the way out, I walk across the stage – turn to the cameras and do a big open handed clap. In the edit, just find this in every camera shot, and drag them so they perfectly align. I record sound separately, but the camera mics all hear the clap – so bring in the audio track too – then align the audio spikes. This works every time for me.

This won’t give you the audio information that Paul suggests, but I bought an old still camera flash unit from the 1990’s era ($5.00 on eBay) and trigger it toward the cameras. This gives you a single-frame of white. Add the Paul’s hand-clap to this and you have a foolproof method for syncing sound and image.

I have found over many years of shooting theatrical events that the most precise way of syncing multiple cameras is to a foot-fall, a moment where you can see the left foot of a dancer, for example, as it touches the stage floor. You can tweak from there as necessary.

The clap thing is just what clapperboards did for the movies. Your biggest problem will be when you chop the thing up and accidentally slide one of the timelines and you don’t notice.