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Marshall CV503: Why This Should Be Your Church's First Drum Camera

Uncategorized Feb 01, 2023

 

Get your wide shot first. Then get a closer shot of whoever's leading or preaching. Those two angles carry a stream.

Once you've got them, the next camera I'd add is a drum cam. And the Marshall CV503 is what I'd buy.

The price

About $400.

That matters because a DSLR or mirrorless body alone costs more than that before you've bought a lens. For a fixed angle pointed at one thing forever, you're paying for capability you'll never use.

It's small enough to actually put where you want it

Roughly GoPro sized, so you can tuck it into the kit instead of parking a full camera body on a tripod behind the drummer.

Unlike a GoPro, it's got a standard thread built in. No mounting accessories to buy. It goes on a tripod or a clamp straight out of the box.

SDI out

This is the real reason to pick it over a cheaper camera.

It puts out SDI, which runs directly to your switcher. No converter, no adapter, no HDMI cable that only works when it's sitting at the right angle. One long cable across the room and it just holds.

Every converter you remove is one less thing that can fail on a Sunday.

Setup

Plug in power, run the SDI, done.

It defaults to 30fps with auto white balance and auto exposure. Those defaults are fine and I mostly left them alone. If you stream at 24fps, change the frame rate in the menu so it matches everything else. Mismatched frame rates are the number one reason a camera doesn't show up on your switcher.

The shot

It's wide. That's what you want on a kit, because you can mount it close and still get the whole thing plus the drummer.

A longer lens from across the room would look nicer and be a much bigger hassle to place.

Who this is for

Get one if you've got your main angles handled and you want a fourth look that adds energy during worship.

Don't buy it as your first or second camera. A drum cam is a nice-to-have, and a stream with two solid angles beats a stream with four badly placed ones.

Related reading

Cameras are the easy part. Getting a good image out of them is where teams get stuck. Church Video Made Simple walks your team through exposure, white balance, composition and audio.

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