I’ve been doing YouTube mix videos for some time now, and still get many positive feedback from other DJ’s! I like that!
I’m not trying to be the illest DJ with the sickest skills, but I like being a good DJ who can make a fine statement in 10 minutes.
There’s no magic or cheating going on in my mixes, just some organizing, marking and visual reference.

The gear I use for recording a mix video are:
-pc for recording and editing
-2 or 3 digital photocameras with video option
-recording software, like Soundforge or Windows sound recorder
-video software for mixing audio and video to a movie, like Ulead Video or windows moviemaker
-some DJ gear for mixing tracks

1) Make a playlist
YouTube limits the lenght of their videos to 10 minutes each, so if you’re a regular DJ, like in a club, you’ll play 2-3 records in 10 minutes. That’s not much and I find it pretty boring for online viewers to hear only 3 songs in a single video. So what I like to do is making minimixes with lots of crazy tracks that match a certain genre or style. The first thing to start with is looking for music that matches a groove, speed or style. Just trying to find some records that go really well with each other. This can take ages sometimes. I keep on collecting until I have enough records for my minimix.
Then it’s organizing time..

2) Organizing
An average track has a duration of a few minutes each, so putting a lot of songs in a 10 minute video is gonna be tricky.
Well, the key to this is to leave out the unnecessary and boring parts of the song, usually the very beginning and the outro. I Just strip it down to the songs main part. The way I do this is by placing cue points in my tracks. Most Cd-players and DJ systems have this option.
I cut out the unwanted sections of the song by putting a cue marker at the point were I want to start the record, let’s say after 2.10 min..
After another minute from there, say 3.01 min, the structure of this song starts to change and that’s exactly the right spot for me to put the next record in. I put another cue marker to highlight this position so I can see when this moment comes along during a mix.

So for every track in my mix I set up the crucial positions. This is a very handy visual tool while mixing fast.

3) Be Quick
Yeah about speed, I try to save a lot of time during a mix, like searching for records or parts within a song. Nowadays much time is saved by the software I use along with my turntables. My music is stored on my notebook, which is connected to my turntables. When I spin the record the music in my notebook will do exactly the same. Traktor scratch is developed for turntable DJ’s and has tons of good features except for one..
There’s no automatic syncing !
Master Tempo, pitchlock, autosync or whatever bull shit is NOT to be found within the scratch edition of Traktor, remember that shit.. no sync button..

But, there are quite a few features and options that made my DJ life better..
A very helpful feature for example is the load next track on record flip option: I flip over the record and start playing the other side, the program loads the next song from my playlist and makes it playable right away. And, this is a real timesaver, Traktor also automatically goes to the first marker in the song, meaning it will go to to main part I selected earlier. This way, when I turn over the record, the next song is instantly playing at my selected part!
The biggest benefit are my digital pitch displays on my turntables, telling me the exact speed. Yes, I know the right setting for each track, but were does preparation in this mission stops?
You see I get a lot of benefit from the tools I use without cheating or syncing. I still have to mix, sync, cue and move as a DJ would with regular turntables or cd-players.

4) Rehearsal
After I’m done with collecting and marking, it’s time to practice my mix.
I like to practice a lot untill I get it right, at least a few times.
I also make some recording shots to make sure everything sounds and looks just right. Making sure I’m really down with the playlist and the mix, because once recorded it can’t be undone..

5) Tune my gear
I connect my DJ gear to my PC’ s soundcard and start up a recording program. Checking the input en output levels firmly is an important job here.Then, after positioning my cams and have them recording, it’s time to play!

6) Record!
Well, I just push a few buttons on my cameras and PC and we’re live! Time to start mixing at my best abillity…
After capturing, I save my audio and video to my computer.  Then I use the video editor to import the music recording and the video caption and put them in a storyboard.
I cut out the blank scenes at the beginning and ending, maybe add some effects here and there. When I use 2 or more cams I make a selection from the scenes and have them changed in a way.
Then when I save the whole project to a .mpg file, I’m having my own mixvideo!

Peace, Beau

Filed under: DJ Talk
by Beau