Jay-Z’s new album, The Blueprint 3 drops on September 11th. As part of the publicity blitz, Jay agreed to be interviewed by other celebrities on BET. Jon Marc Sandifer, a producer we work with on “Rising Icons,” wanted to get the crew from dv Depot.

We sent five camera operators, two audio ops and our ace utility Derek Edwards. Our DP, Alex Sierra, set up two cameras to cover the interviews in close up. He shot the close ups of Jay-Z while Christine Ka’aloa covered the interviewers. Jeremy Leach worked on steadicam, getting two shots and tracking shots. Meanwhile, Daniel McKeown was put on a roving camera, getting a wide range of shots to make for a more exciting edit. Ethan Goldberger handled the audio. Another crew rode in the cab with the interviewers as they headed out to meet Jay-Z. Chris Piazza and Gabriel Cyr were on this crew.

The interviews were great to watch. All of the celebrities were friends with Jay-Z and this worked to create a casual, intimate atmosphere. They were able to ask real questions that required real answers.

The first interviewer was Angie Martinez of Hot 97, the highest rated DJ in New York. She and Jay discussed fame, among other things. She found that Jay had a remarkable ability to live his life naturally in front of dozens of cameras (including ours).

Stephen A. Smith interviewed next. He’s most famous for his show “Quite Frankly” on ESPN. He talked at length with Jay about his part ownership of the New Jersey Nets and his long friendship with LeBron James. They also discussed personal branding and imaging, something that both have mastered.

Hip hop journalist Harry Allen presented Jay with the hardest questions of the day, asking questions about music and black culture and Jay’s place in it. The two Brooklyn natives also had a chance to discuss their love of the borough in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge.

It was a challenging day. We shot on Panasonic HVX200 cameras and the utility Derek was kept busy dumping the cards and wiping them, trying to keep ahead of the cameras needs. P2 memory cards on a multicam shoot can be challenging, but the reward is that you can start editing the next day, with all your footage already

digitized.

We’re always excited to work with BET. Jay-Z and the interviewers were also nice people and easy to work with. At the end of the day, everybody went home exhausted, but proud of the work we did. As he was leaving, Jay complimented Jon Marc on how well everything went. Nothing could have pleased us more.

You can see all of the pictures from the day at our flickr site.

Watch for the special to air on BET on Monday, September 7th.

Our clients came to us with a new idea: rap battles on mobile video. They wanted to shoot MCs battling each other, then give let mobile phone viewers the opportunity to vote for who advances on to the next round. The project was called “The Rap Game.”

We worked with them through preproduction and provided the shooting crew. We had five cameras, three on stick, one handheld and one Steadicam. Our crew lit the whole club. While the performances happened on the stage, we were also shooting the audience, wanting them to be as much a part of the

experience as the performers. Our audio crew had mics on the two battlings rappers, the host, the audience and a feed from the DJ. We also handled communications.

It was a fun experience for everybody and it went smoothly thanks to our awesome crew, which included DP Daniel McKeown, camera ops Matthew Kulvicki, Andreas Wagner, and Liz Rubin, steadicam op David George Ellis, audio supervisor Diana Milani, audio tech Gabriel

Cyr, utility Kara Haas and PAs Tory Clark and Mike Misslin.

The Rap Game was the first large shoot after I started working at dvDepot. It was great to go into the field and see our crew in action. It helped me to understand the ways they worked and in what situations they worked best. And nothing is more thrilling than taking on a challenge and succeeding.

You can see more pictures from the shoot at our flickr page