Ishango – taking audiences ‘live’ from home
Published:Sunday | April 26, 2020 | 12:00 AMShereita Grizzle - Staff Reporter
Ishango is a name synonymous with photography and videography in Jamaica. With a career spanning a decade, the artist, real name Ishaka Abu Shango, has worked with a number of local celebrities, including Usain Bolt, Christopher Martin, and Romain Virgo, earning himself a reputation as the go-to man when it comes to capturing moments that matter. As a videographer, Ishango is usually contracted to handle live production for some of the biggest entertainment shows across the island, but as the COVID-19 pandemic continues its stranglehold on the entertainment sector, Ishango, like many others in his line of work, has been directly impacted. In order to stay afloat in these extraordinary times, the artist has been forced to make some adjustments to his execution of various projects. Now working remotely from the comfort of his home, Ishango has been able to deliver live streaming feeds for several entertainment events, including last week’s online carnival event by Xaymaca.
‘ROLL WITH THE PUNCHES’
In an interview with The Sunday Gleaner, Ishango explained that with no way of predicting how much the COVID-19 outbreak would have affected his work, he had to learn how to ‘roll with the punches’ or get left behind in a world that is now being run virtually.
“COVID-19 has really affected my line of work, especially when it comes on to doing actual live production. You can no longer go to a venue to set up multiple cameras and execute a proper production because, of course, no shows are being held,” he said. “But many promoters/event planners have been shifting their focus online and have been trying to offer their events in a digital version, and so I had to make the necessary adjustments. It wasn’t difficult, but it did require me to learn a little bit more about the remote side of live-streaming.”
Ishango explained that being the consummate professional who likes to set himself apart from the competition, he decided to treat live-streaming events he was contracted to execute, via his UBQT Studios – a live production company transitioned into remote live production – in the same way he would an actual live show.
“It’s not just about taking up your phone and going live for me because I still treat it like any live production. So I still have the graphics and all of that because I still want it to look and feel like you’re at the actual event. The tagline of my company is ‘Moments Shared, Audience Engaged’, so it’s very important that any live-streaming I do in this time is very engaging, and so I go all out,” he said, pointing to his execution of the recent Xaymaca carnival experience.
“On what would have been carnival road march day last Sunday, Xaymaca went live with a couple of deejays, some from Jamaica, Barbados, and Trinidad, and the stream was done differently from everybody else. While everybody else sent their IG (Instagram) password to the various deejays, and they basically connected to the page, Xaymaca Live was me controlling the production. So what I did was take the deejays through Zoom or Skype and connect them to the live. It was also a graphical live, so while watching it, you felt the difference. It felt like the deejays were on the actual carnival truck on the road, and I did all that from my home,” he said.
The content creator told The Sunday Gleaner that in a time when it is uncertain how long physical entertainment events will be halted, it is important that persons in his field level up on their live-streaming expertise.
“I would encourage anybody in my line of work to learn a little bit more so they can do live-streaming with a certain level of quality and class. The way the market is going, should there only be live-streaming productions being held for a while, the persons with the best quality productions will stand out,” he shared. “Since this COVID-19, and more people are going live, I have had a lot of people come to me to ask about the software that I use, so people want to learn. You have to now make sure that as the professional, you stand out, and the only way to do that is to always give more. There are levels to live-streaming, and your class will set you apart.”