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Philip Perkins

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Everything posted by Philip Perkins

  1. I use Neutrik NA2-IO-DLINE. It has mostly just worked, no issues, ditto with the Audinate AVIO 2 in or 2 out adapters--all powered by the network. But only 2 channels....
  2. I haven't been on Really Big Music Multicam shows lately, the ones I'm doing rely totally on TC sync with cameras (cameras deriving sync from ext TC with no genlock used), so the accuracy of the TC they get vs the audio recording is important, as is the audio WC being locked to the TC. That's why I usually want to be the show masterclock, since my rig can make very accurate WC and TC that are locked together. This works well for most shoots I do. For bigger stuff the conversation with the FOH people about possibly supplementing their rig with an external box that has a super accurate clock, can make WC, TC and Dante can be delicate if they don't have this together already.
  3. Actually we posties generally don't let the production people know about sync issues much, esp in concert work, we just fix them if we can and move on. We don't have time for discussion about what's already done unless there is a huge disaster in progress. These jobs are usually one-off, not a series where you can build a relationship, exchange test files and dial things in over a few tries. We usually proceed from the point where everyone assumes that what's delivered to post is in perfect sync from beginning to end, and then fix what needs fixing (since "perfect sync" in a live performance video often doesn't LOOK perfect even if it is numerically correct TC-wise!). There are always many places to pull sync up in a live show, but assuming that puts me in the uncomfortable position of adding work to someone else's gig without their permission. Thanks for the info that Dante clock is consistent within the network--the issue seems to be getting the network in sync with a TC generator for the cameras to begin with.
  4. As was said, I'd be tempted to just set my phone down on a powered speaker playing the lines off a laptop and call it a day. You can take a feed from the laptop to your rig for dailies. For playback you might consider "QLAB" which will allow you to trigger the lines separately with a spacebar (or other) hit. The free version of QLAB will only output via the computer's headphone jack but that would be fine for this.
  5. I think Brainstorm has a pretty sexy box for this too (https://brainstormtime.com/products/dante-dxd-firmware-update/), that has a boffo clock, makes TC, WC, Dante etc etc, and is also Mighty Expensive. I get the argument re: lightweight snakes for stage boxes etc w/ Dante, but 1000' runs don't happen much for me any more. And in truth, if some FOH people are talking a Dante feed for me they are also probably saying "why do we need him?" to each other, and I'll be bumped off the job forthwith with them recording the output of their board however, themselves.
  6. I am old school enough I guess that if I was to get on a multicam concert gig where I was expected to be the source of TC for cameras (via sync boxes with accurate clocks), I would want to know how to align whatever I was using as the master TC generator to make that TC, as well as word clock for devices I'm using that need to do their own ADC (ie feeds not coming from FOH, like audience etc mics). I guess the answer might be that this is an "in for a nickel, in for a dollar" sort of deal, where said TC generator/masterclock for audio etc would have to be a Dante device also, so that everyone and everything was on the same clock. I don't like it--too much of a rig like this is out of my control: I'd rather start with the analog sources pre-FOH (like analog splits) and be completely independent of what they are doing, but that is an increasingly unpopular idea with FOH folks I've been finding. And anything Dante is pretty damn expensive.
  7. We have the same issues that actors, extras and all production crew have. A main attraction of AI to producers is the reduction in the number of shoots days required for a project
  8. It seems to me that if you replace a set of 1 or 2 channel RX units with a single multichannel unit you will be more or less obliged to keep your older gear around as a backup, unless people on your team have some gear of their own you could use or you have close-by rentals. This kind of precludes the "sell the old to help pay for the new" philosophy a lot of us used to follow, oh well. But re: the OP's concern, yeah, you better have "a backup plan" for everything mission critical you use... In a perfect version of our world you could have a big failure, pull out the back ups and the production would be unaware.
  9. It's crazy that Axient Spectrum Mgr would auto retune into non legal or dangerous bands. You really can't lock out certain zones? it seems like that would be important for multistage music fests, theme parks, political conventions etc....
  10. I'm not really clear on what you are saying here, can you elaborate? If an FOH board is running on it's internal clock, and has a Dante card for communicating with its stage boxes and other systems, are you saying that the master clock of that rig is the clock in the console's Dante card? That the board's ADC (in the stage boxes) is under the Dante card's clock? And the clocks in Dante cards are "video audio accurate", ie what we're used to re: sync sound on movie jobs? And that a movie sound rig that has taken a Dante feed from the FOH Dante system could then successfully jam sync TC boxes etc and the sync would hold as well as if the video audio recorder (SD, Zax etc type), now creating the timecode for the video shoot aspect of this gig, were the master clock?
  11. I work a lot in live-show sound anymore, and the installed base I've run into in the USA is heavily Shure (although not necessarily Axient unless it is a high-end venue), and those that aren't Shure are Sennheiser, at least so far, as are the Euro halls. It doesn't seem like the diffs in price are that great, and even in smaller markets there are often rentable Shure wireless (but not with "baggable" RX) when there are no Lectro/Zax etc rentals available except from individuals.
  12. A shooter friend of mine just bought himself a brace of Diety TC1s. His cameras are FX9 and A7 types, and he's been having pretty good luck with them on long-roll multicam shoots. The specs are impressive and the price is pretty darn low. Anyone adopted these? At $200 a pop or $550 for a 3-pack is there any point in getting into these re: rentals, since I'd guess serious shooters will just buy their own?
  13. I'd be interested to know if any sound folks here working in drama or docs are using Axient (or other Shure) these days? Where I live it is all Lectro, Zax and a few Wisy, with the solo-shooters using low-end Senn G4 or the Blutooth stuff. I like Shure, but what with diffs in mic connectors etc it's hard to change horses.
  14. I "handled" genlock sync for many years: our earlier TC boxes like Ambient "greenies" and Denecke SBT all made trilevel sync as well as TC. That's what we put on the cameras, and, yes, we soundies were expected to do that. WHO supplies the sync boxes is always a matter for discussion--it seemed like the bigger (LA based for me) jobs got the sync boxes with the camera packages, the local (non LA) jobs expected me to to deal with it, so I did. A truly huge number of jobs were done this way, including multicam long-span recordings of concerts, events etc., successfully. The Dante issues are VERY related to all this now, in that it is increasingly unlikely that a video audio recordist will be able to get any analog feed from a large FOH sound system other than a 2-mix anymore. The only way to derive a full track-per-mic split is probably via getting on their Dante (or MADI) network. At that point the clock of the FOH system has to be questioned, since in many FOH setups the board looks at its own internal clock, only, and that board is now your ADC.
  15. I can only speak for the jobs I do, but in nearly all cases in recent years there is no overall video TD as there was in the '90s and before, and sync seems to fall to the sound dept. Thus my rig becomes the master clock, having the most accurate clock+TC gen on the shoot, and my TC jams the TC boxes that are put on the cameras, like most sync sound double system shoots these days. Even on jobs where the "record span" is really long, like hours and hours between camera reloads with audio rolling through, Genlock isn't requested or done, and the TC boxes in use don't provide it. It seems that the cameras, looking at the external TC from the sync boxes are stable enough without external Trilevel sync being fed to them. The idea of running separate TC+Genlock lines in addition to a monitor video line (if video transmitters aren't being used, which they usually are anymore) is kind of a non-starter on my jobs anymore. I generally find that ACs are not very well-versed in multicam sync matters. Further complicating a concert shoot for sync is how the show sound system is being clocked, especially if video audio is required to take a Dante etc feed from their board, with that board becoming our ADC vs our own rig. Lotsa questions to ask at the scout!
  16. So with that battery pack you had 12:30+4 hrs of runtime? Or 12:30 hrs total?
  17. Popups demand having a pretty decent sized vehicle. I got the smallest I could find and then sold it--the van I had then was just too small to work around it. I had better luck with a silly-looking hunting blind tent--just big enough to contain a Jr Magliner and me, it folded up very flat. In theory it is production's problem to get shelter for all critical gear up re: weather. In practice I did not find this to be the case more than 25% of the time. If rain suddenly started PAs and grips would scramble to cover camera, village, HMU +wardrobe if they were close, big lights, crafty, spare lights and grip gear, and then they would watch us soundies struggle and get wet from under their tents.
  18. That doesn't describe how I or many others work--I need whatever the ADC is to be clockable directly, not via Dante etc.
  19. Not only no TC but most all of them have internal clocks much inferior to what we're used to, so they need to get WC from an external source, preferably one that is also making the TC for the whole system (and camera boxes). Most low budg digital mixers (incl. this one) do not have external WC inputs, which makes them kind of useless for movie sound no matter how great the rest of it is.
  20. Same as DAWs--there is always the "vocabulary problem" on moving from one platform to another. LMK if you find one for $1k.
  21. If you test drive one please report back. The form factor is very sexy.
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