Hi - I am new to the forum so I am hoping this is the right place to post this question.

I am filming an indoor concert for the first time and wonder if anyone has any tips regarding exposure? I appreciate that every venue will be different so there cannot be any hard and fast answers, but any tips, rules of thumb would be useful.

For example, maybe the "spotlight" setting commonly available on cameras would do it (though I have my doubts). Or should I set the cameras to an auto setting but with a minus compensation. Or perhaps it is best to go with a manual setting with shutter around 1/50th and then set aperture? Anything below 1/50th is going to be too slow so some gain boost may be inevitable but I want to minimise this as much as possible to avoid adding excessive noise.

Audio capture should be fine as the sound desk has agreed to provide a full mix and I am going to have one static camera running at the back to give me a wide option, but any other tips you can give would also be appreciated.

So thanks in advance for any tips you can give on this.

Hi - Go for auto iris with the spotlight setting. I've got fast reactions, but can never keep up with the fast lighting changes in concerts. Keep the focus on manual, auto will never be fast enough. White balance both cams in the same light .
I've yet to meet a great sound mixer at concerts (only filmed about 50 though) so, yes, take a sound feed from the desk, but don't rely on this alone.

Many thanks for your reply Zero.

Unfortunately I left it too late to post my question and your answer came after the concert - completely my fault, but I do appreciate you taking the time to post and provide feedback on your experience on this subject.

I elected to not use the Spotlight setting as someone else said to me that he had found poor results using such a preset. I instead chose to use the auto exposure setting but with a minus two stop shift. In essence I think this was probably very similar to what the preset provides. As you said, the lighting conditions change so much so it seemed to work well.

Many thanks again for your help.