While many TV viewers won’t give it a second thought, technology defines the end product they see on their television screens by determining the quality and the way the story is told. Over the next two pages, Linda Loubser explores the technology used on three South African TV productions – The Wild, Saktyd and Mzansi Love: Kasi Style.
An Apprentice-style reality series, Saktyd, started on Afrikaans pay-TV broadcaster kykNET on 17 July.
Says production manager Mark Veltman from Homebrew Films: “It’s about 13 aspiring or budding journalists vying for a contract to work at Media24 magazine Huisgenoot. In a way it’s also similar to Fair Lady’s 2010 series Style Intern,’ says Veltman. “We received over 1 000 entries and held auditions all over the country.’
The term “Saktyd’ refers to the deadline when a magazine or newspaper is sent to the printers.
Veltman notes that it is a synergy project between Homebrew, Huisgenoot and kykNET, conceived by the CEO of Media24. “What makes this series unique is having a print magazine as partner and subject. They publish weekly information on the contestants, their tasks and the outcomes.’
The series was shot at the Media24 building in Cape Town, and the contestants had to do tasks all over Cape Town, plus one in Johannesburg.
“We built a kind of studio in the Huisgenoot offices. It was very cleverly done to blend in with the environment by our art director Valerie Groenewald, who was also art director on MasterChef South Africa.’ He adds that the studio set-up consisted of a press room with the bustle of the Media24 offices in the background, separate work rooms for the teams and an elimination room which he describes as “tightly padded with very dramatic red lighting’.
They shot 13 episodes of 24 minutes each, which Veltman says is not a lot of time to tell the story. “We used a format where the contestants talk through the events on camera to get the full story across.’
Studio-like environment
Veltman explains that the set-up was similar to a studio environment with 80% of the lights mounted on the ceiling, mostly Kino Flos to “keep it quite natural’. “The Media24 building has glass walls with beautiful views of Cape Town, but we put up a lot of canvasses to block out the light and keep it consistent night and day.’
Five Sony PMW EX3s were used to capture the footage. “We went with these cameras because of budget, but they did what they needed to do,’ says Veltman.
They wanted the footage to be very slick and clean, with an almost “corporate’ feel to it. “In the studio set-up we shot with tripods, but once the tasks began we switched to a handheld style. We used one Steadicam, but the rest is completely handheld.’
The bulk of the cameras and camera equipment was hired from Camera Station in Cape Town. “We also had a fantastic technical engineer, Mo Marais, on set.’
According to Veltman they had a crew of about 45 people on set, and the director of photography was Amelia Henning.
“When you shoot in high definition (HD), the biggest challenge is to be selective and not to overshoot, because the footage needs a lot of data space. Making sure there is a good enough data flow was key for us. Another challenge was mixing and marrying the studio and handheld location footage,’ explains Veltman, “but with the use of Steadicam we managed to get it right.’
He notes that the three audio guys were “running around more than anyone’. “We could only lapel mic nine people in total, which often had to be the judges, so everyone else was recorded on boom microphones. All our microphones are Sennheiser, and we used a Sound Device 302 audio mixer.’
Editing was done in-house at Homebrew on Final Cut. “We had less than a tenth of the budget of the big reality shows like Survivor and MasterChef, but South African audiences are quite critical and expect the same quality. We had to call in many favours and work very hard to reach the same standard,’ says Veltman.
By Linda Loubser
Screen Africa magazine – August 2012
