Shooting News and Current Affairs Video in a Hire Studio

Online news video is often people talking. An expert is asked what a story means, the answer is cut down, and a caption goes underneath. The pictures are not the difficulty. The difficulty is making the same decisions again, quickly, for every contributor and every story, and ending up with something that looks as though one outlet made it on one day.

This guide is for producers and editors at news and current-affairs teams deciding whether a hire studio fits. It covers the look, the sound, eyelines, graphics and turnaround, and says plainly what a hire studio does not do.

What a hire studio is, and what it is not

A room booking is the room. Scope is not a broadcast gallery, it has no live link and it is not a sound stage with a lighting grid. No in-house kit list is published, so ask what is on site and bring or source anything else. Studio B is a small, sound-treated room; it is not a news studio.

That makes it a good fit for recorded work: expert interviews, explainers, a reporter's piece to camera, a two-person discussion for a package, the clip that will be cut and posted later the same day. It is the wrong tool for anything that has to leave the room live. A simple online stream is a different question from a broadcast link: there is high-speed Wi-Fi in the building, but connection speeds are not published, so send the platform and bitrate when you enquire and get the answer in writing before you rely on it.

A consistent look for expert contributors

Viewers notice when one guest looks like a different outlet from the last. The remedy is dull and it works: one chair, one camera height, one lens, one backdrop and one light, set once and left alone. Studio B helps because it blacks out, which takes daylight and the time of day out of the frame, and because its adjustable backdrop system and colour-washable cyclorama let the background be set once and held. A plain, neutral ground is a common convention for news; a colour wash belongs to a programme with its own identity.

Write the set-up down before the first guest sits. Photograph it from the camera position and from the side, and note the lens, the camera height, the distance to the chair and each light's position and level. The lighting patterns are in how to film an interview in a studio, and the case for matching contributors recorded on different dates is in documentary interviews in a studio. In every room but the DJ room, lights are charged separately from the room rate — please enquire about our lights and we will quote for what your shoot needs.

Sound decides whether the clip can be used

A soft shot is forgiven. A voice sitting in a room's echo is not, and that is why the room matters more than the camera on a news shoot. Studio B is built as a room within a room and is sound treated, so a voice comes back clean without a rescue job in post. The podcast room is acoustically treated and camera-ready, with professional microphones and audio interfaces, at a flat £40 an hour; it is the quicker answer for a seated conversation on camera where the frame is secondary. Studio A is not sound treated, so it is the wrong room for dialogue that has to be clean.

Mic every contributor twice, a lavalier on the body and a boom or second microphone as the back-up, and record room tone before anyone stands up. If you want a sound recordist rather than doing it yourself, Scope's production team can source one; that is quoted separately, and nothing is assumed to be included in a room booking. The method is in sound for video in a studio.

A news interview has done its job when nobody notices the room. The room's job is to look the same on Thursday as it did on Tuesday.

Eyelines, framing and room for graphics

Decide the eyeline before the contributor arrives. The usual news choice is off-axis: the contributor looks at the reporter, who sits just beside the lens at the contributor's eye height, so the viewer watches a conversation. Direct address, straight down the lens, suits a statement rather than an answer. Pick one for the whole series; a changed eyeline between two guests on the same story reads as a mistake.

Plan graphics in the frame, not on top of it. Two conventions, and they are conventions rather than rules: keep the lower part of the picture clear of chins, hands and cables so a name caption has somewhere to sit, and place the contributor off-centre if a headline, a chart or a second face will share the frame. Leave looking room on the side they face. Then check the two against the vertical version. 9:16 is the vertical frame, and an off-centre contributor does not survive a centre crop into it, so decide which version leads. Why social video looks worse covers what happens to the picture afterwards.

Same-day turnaround is decided before the shoot

What makes a fast shoot possible is mostly done by the time the contributor arrives. Lock the look before the first guest. Put the questions in the order the piece will be cut. Have one person log the best answers as they are given, with the take and the time. Ask contributors to answer in whole sentences that carry the question inside them, so an answer can stand without the reporter's voice.

Then the rooms. Studio B has a dedicated edit and playback area, so a producer can watch back and mark selects on site. The workshop seats up to twenty with ten iMac workstations and works as an edit suite or a production office; its specification and software are not published, so say what you cut on and ask what is installed. If the cut needs an editor, a grade or a sound mix, the production team can source and manage them, quoted separately.

A half day in Studio B is four hours, with set-up and pack-down inside it. Rig and test first, then contributors back to back with the same reset each time, then pack-down. Count the rig honestly against the number of contributors; if the sum is close, book the full day.

Looking after the contributor

An expert who is not a broadcaster is usually nervous and short of time. Studio B has make-up and styling zones, and the building has a dressing and prep room, a client lounge and a kitchen, so the contributor waits somewhere that is not the set. Tell them what the piece is, where it will run and roughly how it will be used before they sit down. Consent and fairness are the outlet's editorial duties, not the room's; for broadcast material, Ofcom's Broadcasting Code applies, and the current text is the one to check. Anyone under 18 must be accompanied by a responsible adult at all times.

Booking, and what is quoted

Studio B is £120 for two hours, £220 for a half day and £420 for a full day. The podcast room is £40 an hour, flat. Both have an online calendar and the calendar is the real answer on availability; nothing is held until it is booked and paid for. Cancellation needs 48 hours' notice, same-day cancellations and no-shows are non-refundable, and clients must hold appropriate insurance. If several contributors on a sensitive story must arrive without crossing anyone else's path, the whole building is from £1,500 a day with nobody else on site; the DJ room sits outside it.

The news video studio hire page covers hiring as a news team, and the agencies and production companies page covers the wider offer. The broadcast side is picked up in TV and broadcast interviews and links.