The first step to organising an event is to hold a meeting with the people responsible for running the event. Work out exactly what your roles and responsibilities are. If they are providing a budget, make sure you define this thoroughly at an early stage.
The second meeting should be at the venue where the event will take place. Use this meeting to understand the space in which you will work. Determine who has technical responsibility for getting your streams set up in the space. Also ask questions regarding access to the space for testing and during the event and work out if there is a space in which you can store equipment or relax when you are not working.
The next meeting should be with the people you are going to run the streams with. Using all the information you gained in the first two meetings, sketch out two plans: the production plan and the technical plan.
The production plan is a flexible overview of your event's preproduction containing key dates and deadlines.
Using a calendar or spreadsheet, create a document that enables you clearly to see what must be achieved and when, in order for your event to take place.
Start by inputting the event itself onto a calendar and then work backwards, inputting deadlines for installation, arrival of equipment, finalising the event schedules, confirming the people who will run the event, booking the technical equipment and so on. This process will help you understand the complexities of the event.
You will see that some things are dependent on others (for instance you can't begin to organise transport to an event, before you have a venue for that event confirmed!). Certain deadlines are 'hard' deadlines (for instance when information about the event might need to be put in print), others are 'soft' and can be rearranged within a certain timescale.
The key aim for this document is to have a flexible overview of your event's preproduction.
The technical plan is a sketch or drawing of the possible technical configuration of your stream, including all hardware, cameras, etc. The technical configuration will be determined by several questions.
How many cameras do you need?
What signal will the cameras output? Analogue or digital?
Do you need to take a direct feed from a projector or other source?
Will your audio come directly from a sound desk or do you need microphones?
Do you need mix multiple signals using a video mixer?
Do you need to overlay text or graphical information (subtitles or logos)?
How many outgoing streams do you need and of what quality?
Is it necessary to monitor your streams?
This information will all be determined by the nature of the event, the type of venue, the required end product and the amount of money or equipment available to you.
For example, to stream a concert you might need more cameras, a direct audio feed, video mixer with multiple inputs, text overlays and multiple outgoing streams with varying resolutions. Your technical plan will look considerably different than if you are streaming a simple presentation direct from a projector.
Sketch out your ideal technical plan if you had all the resources you needed and then scale the plan down as appropriate, ensuring not to comprimise or lose anything essential.
Once you have the above plans completed, you need to create an event schedule, which is an overview or map of every event. This should include set-up times, event start and finish times and individual sections within an event.It will be used on the day to let your whole team know what is going on when.
For instance, if you need to overlay text credits, it is essential that your day schedules have the names of who is talking when, or of film presentations, live performances etc. This information should be obtained from someone central within the organisation of the event so that it is completely accurate and up-to-date.
If you have incoming streams (for instance a video link to be displayed during the event), it is important that this information is passed to the central event organiser and entered into the event schedule.
The event schedule is one of the last things you be able to do. Event structures change in the lead up to the event, so don't do this too early or you will end up re-doing everything several times. However, it is important to put a structure in place. Consider using a shared document with multiple editors so information can be added as it is confirmed by different members of the team.
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