SamWatson

Ethan! Thanks so much for stopping by the thread & welcome to the board. Congrats to you and your team on a job well done. I'd love for you to expound a bit about your methods on the film. Everything sounded quite consistent which is a feat considering you spent time in boats, trucks, around & in water, up in trees. For instance: When hiding wires are you using moleskin or some sort of tape down? I have Trams and love vampire clips for a quick mount but they can cause hiccups in neck lines of shirts. And Mud's shirt it so thin & mostly unbuttoned it seems it would be really hard to hide *any* wire. Were you using visor mounted capsules w/ collette cables for the cars or body wires or something else? It seemed like the mother was actually driving the car rather than a trailer mount which makes it that much harder for the sound department. And in general it seemed like real world locations rather than sets. Were the powers-that-be conscientious in regards to sound during scouting or were there some difficult locations? Cheers! Sam p.s. The feature I just finished had quite a few crew members from Austin. Great folks. You guys seem to have a good thing going over there.

Marc Wielage- that is exactly what lead my wife and me to see it. The reviews are accurate. Strong story & characters. No gimmicks. And great dialog writing. (And recording!) If they ADR'ed parts then it was very well done. Marc Hoppe - Thanks for the info! I figured most people were wearing wires. And I kept and eye out for hiccups in T-shirt neck lines from vampire clips or the outline of the wire running down a chest. None to be seen. Kudos to whomever did the gig - location and post.

Hello one and all, I recently saw the movie Mud. I found it quite enjoyable on many levels. Good story, great acting - particularly notable kid actors, a soundtrack that perfectly fit the vibe. As a movie it is a great blend of Mark Twain and Stand By Me. I was struck by how good the dialog sounded. And there were many difficult scenes: on small boats with engines running, actors in trees, around lots of water, or any number of situations like that. Best I can tell via IMDB the production sound mixer was Ethan Andrus. Anyone know much about the onset work? How much ADR? Lots of wires or multiple booms? Just curious. Cheers, Sam

Hello All, I am the sound mixer that had the original issue. Thanks for all the input thus far! My 195s are fixed at 577.325 MHz and 572.200 MHz. (Which falls in block 22.) I used the filtering antenna on the Zaxcom and mounted it on my back clipped to my harness. The moment I tried turning the Zaxcom unit off, the desensing issue disappeared and I had a normal reception distance. I wondered about sidebanding & harmonics causing the desensing. However, being in the heat of run & gun documentary battle there was no time to fiddle further with settings. I returned to the normal wired tether to camera and finished out the evening. I did test the rig earlier in the day but apparently didn't do a stringent enough walk & talk test. In short/medium distances it all worked great. There is a THIRD factor at play that just came to mind: The subject was a football coach. They wear wireless intercom packs on their hip. I always mount my transmitter pack on the opposite hip away from the intercom system. The rest of the season I haven't had the issues I had that night with the Zaxcom though. Still, those frequency hopping coach intercom systems (one for offense. one set for defense. and then there is the other team) make for a noisy RF environment. I am pretty good about sending in my Lectros for regular tuning & service. (Hence, they still sound great!) It may be time again though. It has been a pretty hard show for the gear. There have been plenty of practices & games in the rain. Steve - any idea to which frequency your Zaxcom is currently set? Thanks everyone! Sam