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The Lav Mic in the Uniform


Jan McL

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It's been a while since I had to place lav mics in the heinously noisey professional uniform.

 

Last time, it was B6 through the buttonhole with less-than-stellar results.

 

This time, there will be mostly uniforms and I want to use the DPA's I've come to favor. Their "snoot" through the buttonhole seems to be a likely answer, but I'm thinking that it might be better to go through a hole made through a pocket or behind an insignia/medal and leave the mic more exposed than hidden.

 

Let's talk military / police / EMT uniform mic hiding techniques, shall we?

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You pretty much covered it...

 

 And you are spot on..depending on the uniform color and how much "stuff" (pens, tools, radios, badges etc) are present, we have had good luck with the mics in plain sight.. with so much "stuff" on the uniform, it is normally too busy to pick out the tiny mic head..  

  I once told a concerned wardrobe person to step back 2 ft. and tell me with all thats going on to spot the mic... they couldn't, or could only because they knew it was in a particular spot.  

  We have also hollowed out a pen and ran a COS-11 up the pen through the "new" hole in the pen on top...  worked just great... couldn't of been in a better place. The long thin shape of the Sanken was perfect for this style of mount.

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Probably not of use to you Jan, but I often find myself thinking about a kind of hybrid 'wardrobe/props-sound department' when dealing with a noisy outfit but with loads or potential for cleaver ways to hide mics. Buttons, chin straps, pens, stethoscopes, mobile phone ear buds, walkie-talkie antenna, badges, necklaces and jewellery, lanyards, prosthetics, hair extensions, spectacles etc. Probably not too practical in reality as swapping out a lav could be nightmarish. I saw somene had tried doing lav concealment jewellery. I do a thing with a little bit rubber cord and a røde concealer, which effectively turns the lav into a pendant/necklace where the lave wire goes over the shoulder (to the belt pack), it's not really meant for 'view', more a way of quickly getting a mic on someone and repositioned when necessary because it doesn't need to be stuck to anything so changes in the layers of costume are easier to accommodate.

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Hi Jan,

 

 I had great success on a cop show by doing exactly what you are discribing. We had wardrobe cut a hole and we came out from behind the name tags. The name tags were velcroed on which held the mic nicely in place with some snot tape and we had the head of the mic just hidden behind the name patch. The TRX's were in the lining of the jacket that had a pocket to hold a fake kevlar vest. This ment the actor could take the jacket off and not disturb the mic.  Mind you though it can be the nature of the beast if the jackets are nylon and the actor likes to swing their arms.

 

Bill

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