Brett Sorensen

I've never had an issue using a comtek, and as mentioned before - it's comforting knowing it will stay a scratch track. Just make sure you talk to the camera crew before hand on whether their pig tails are male or female (I've seen both), if you don't travel with the appropriate turn-arounds.

For starting out assisting/booming, your mixer should have you covered on gear (as stated, bring your own cans). During these times, I feel the best you can do is make sure your mind and body can work effectively for 12-16 hours (proper clothes, shoes, hydration, etc.). A multi-tool of some fashion couldn't hurt. Brett

I am local to Grand Rapids, should this fall through again.

May be a good idea to see if you can locate the damaged files. I used to lug around a PD-6 (not to say they are comparable) with a headphone jack that went crazy in the humidity. I was on my way to a meltdown, when I realized it was not making it to any of the recordings. Obviously still an issue, but potentially a cheaper solution.

I just got off a shoot with two ex3's. They seemed to have a plethora of issues even beyond timecode. Granted they traveled in a plane from LA to Michigan. For whatever reason, we couldn't get either ex3's to receive timecode from the 788t. We ended up using the camera as the master to jam the 788t. This seemed pretty reliable. Even as I re-jammed throughout the day, the camera's were still in sync before I did. Can anyone speak what using the camera as a master means for post?

No intelligent reason. Nerves the days before a shoot tend to cloud my judgement.

Thanks Philip, they are using the Sony ex3's - a quick google image search shows me this is fairly common for this camera. I was initially unsure how setting two 411s to the same frequency would behave. But I guess ultimately that's what you're doing with IFB, I just don't have much experience with hops. I appreciate the clarification. Do you suspect the TX's gain will more than likely be hot if it doesn't come pre set?

That was my concern. They are coming with their own kit, on the equipment list for hops the have two 400's and four 411s, along with four lectro mounts. So I'm just trying to piece together what whoever assembled the kit had in mind, as production doesn't seem to know anything about it other than they have a kit.

Ah yes, I should have know better as I am familiar with the 400/411. I've just never used them as hops, generally my shoots are just scratch from comtek. Is it common to mount two 411's on a camera?

Hey all, I'm mixing a show this weekend with the 788t/CL8. Two camera shoot, four wires and a boom, 2 hops, and IFB. The hops are 400/411 (2), and the IFB is a 400 to two R1a. My question being - If any, which should get the digital outs? Assuming the 400's can take a digital signal? My original thought was to use the digital outs to send LR to cam, and the analog to send summed to IFB. But maybe I have it backwards? Any thoughts are appreciated. Brett

Executive Producer: shows up twice during production, demands comtek (never puts on his/her cans), then leaves set with comtek.

"Did YOU hear that..?" Far too often, Me: "Hold for plane/train/traffic/dog" Prod: "We gotta go now" Me: "speed" Prod: "Sound, did you hear that?" Me: .....

Yeah, I got busy with live/FOH gigs for the summer and lost touch for a bit. The 200/10 150 a day rental is probably more the ballpark where I'm going to have the work. Thanks. It's always hard for me to tell someone how much you're worth, despite doing it for a while.

Once again, thanks to everyone for the lengthy responses. It truly is pretty refreshing to get all the advice, despite most of you not agreeing with my logic. Maybe I'm going about it the wrong way (This has gotten off topic fast). All of you have that young boom or utility you trust that you throw the gigs you won't take (even though you still kill him on rental). I'm that guy. Now picture telling that guy that you withdrew from the union, and sold your gear. What does that guy do? I suspect that many of you, if not most. Came up in exact fashion that you are trying to discourage me from. All that being said, I'm more unsure than ever on what I should be doing.

Tom - as always, very helpful. I am going about this more professionally than I am apparently leading on. The debt, should I decide to take it - will be by way of business plan/bank loan. These are all numbers I am aware of. I assure you I charge those rates when applicable, and only work for the 'right' small budgets. Its just a lot of what you said about it just not existing. I did see that post. Thanks. Unfortunately I'm in the beginning stages of planning still. And now, second guessing a lot of things.