Tong0615

TC was feeding into the FX3 via micro-USB Cable, but there's a splitter box between tentacle and FX3 because the 1AC needs to roll camera via Remote, the remote signal also goes into the micro USB (so the TC and Remote went into splitter box, and then into the micro USB port). After 4 shooting days, the production had to replace the FX3 with an FX6 due to a latency problem for the 1AC, which caused problems with getting the picture in focus. With the FX6 BNC TC Input, timecode was fine for the rest of the project.

I'm on a shooting now with a Sony FX3 and Atomos Ninja external recorder, all the images are recorded in the external Ninja recorder. I'm using a Zaxcom Nomad, TC comes from external tentacle sync, one is feeding my recorder and a second one feeding the camera. However, the editing room reported the image and sound were frequently out of syn, the offset was not constant, it varies from -12 frames to +10 frames. Has anyone had similar experiences with this combination?

I think they are not repairing small parts like MXZ and MZF from the beginning. I had some issue with my MZF, went to Sennheiser directly (I‘m in Vienna, Sennheiser has an office here). They didn’t repair it but gave me a discount to buy a new one, it was 2014. Last year I sent my MKH8060 in for repair, even the mic was already 10 years old and out of warranty, they repaired it for free.

Just make sure it's not being misunderstood, you can boom from both sides when using BoomRig, only switching side on the fly (during take) is not possible. I do switch sides on documentary works when I have to go from one side of the camera to the other side of the camera, and this is not possible with the boomrig. You can push/pull the boom pole (I think even more compared to without the Boomrig), it doesn't make any noise when you push the boom pool forward or backwards on the rubbers, and the arm also moves in the forward/backward direction for about 30cm. Since most of the crew knew about the camera easyrig, they were not so surprised. But they were interested in how it works, especially the camera and grip department.

I tried the Boomrig for one day in a real filming situation. My very first impression: The Boomrig is very helpful in some situations, but it requires the Boom Op to adapt their way of booming, and requires curtain adaptation in the sound team. Pros: Very easy to wear and setup, it took me less than 1 minute to put it on. The compact design allows use it indoors, the arm can be lowered, which is very practical to move around between takes. The adjustable load is very practical for all kinds of microphones and shock mounts. In Situations such as long takes, Steadicam walks, and wide shots, the Boomrig helps to reduce the load on shoulders and back significantly. In a Steadicam walk situation, I don't need to pay attention to my supporting arm and weight balance so much, but can fully concentrate on getting the microphone to the spot. That was a huge surprise for me. It's effortless to do a long take, I didn't feel anything on my arm after a long take with fully extended boom. It worked very well when turning the microphone from one side to the other, the two small wheels in the hook are silent and fast. The swing-arm is also responsive and quiet, worked surprisingly well when I needed to change position from above to low. The arm can also move in the forward/backward direction for about 30cm, and it is also possible to "slide" forward or backward when it already sits in the hook, the rubbers on the wheel doesn't make any noise. Cons (or things I still need to figure out) The Boomrig requires adjustment for load/tension after each adjustment of boom, which can be problematic for a 2-men crew (sound mixer + boom op). If the load is not properly adjusted, the freedom of movement can be very limited, and that can cause missing cues. Even though the Boomrig has a compact design, it is still nearly impossible to use it in a low-ceiling situation. The design of the right-sided arm is a bit limiting, It took me a while to learn how to boom from both sides with this arm. It took me a bit of struggle to get the boom pole into the hook every time when the boom pole is extended. It is very difficult or almost impossible to adjust the length of the boom pole when it's in position. The forwards-backwards movement is a bit limited due to the design of the arm. The Up-Down movement is still a bit difficult to get under fully control for me after using it for one day. It is not so easy to get the right load, and when it's not properly adjusted, I need to fight with the Boomrig actively. After one day, I'm still not able to do fine detailed movement with the Boomrig, for shoots, where I need to do fine movement and be very precise, I had to do it without the boomrig. Switching sides during take is not possible (could be problematic for documentary work) Overall, after the first day, I would recommend the Boomrig to all Boom Ops, even though it has some limitations, it reduces the load from Boom pole on the arms and back significantly without losing too much flexibility. I will keep testing the Boomrig this week, and will make more reviews. Please also let me know if you have any questions or some thoughts related to the test. Thanks.

It would be interesting to see a comparison between BoomRig and Exoskeletons.

I smell some kind of "racism" here, non US/EU brands is not equal to "low quality / bad image"! To be honest, our industry has been ruled by US and EU companies forever, I would love to see if there could be a chance for a cooperation between companies like Zoom and Aaton, developing more reliable and affordable machines. I think the cooperation between Steinberg and Yamaha is a positive example. The Zoom F8 series are fantastic products at a relative low price. They gave many people the opportunity to get into the world of cinematic sound, those couldn't afford it before such machine existed. But since here is about Aaton, let's give it a hope that Aaton can find an investor and keep making one of the best machines for the industry.

Let's not forget Sonosax, they also make fantastic recorders and mixers, and well-suited for drama/theater use.

I had today some people came to my home to paint the walls, and they were using a kind of exoskeleton system to support their arms when they were painting the ceiling. This made me thinking, if we can use such system for boom operating. There are electric powered systems and non-electric mechanical systems. Has anyone have ever tried such systems or any experience? One of the systems I found is this electric-powered one, it's pretty expensive, but looks interesting.

It's a personal preference thing, all the brands you named, K-Tek, Ambient, VdB, Panamic make solid boom poles, they can all get the job done very well, maybe go to a local store and try them out. Personally, I use VdB because they were the first one who introduced the Quarter-Turn system (I have worked many years with ambient poles before I got my VdB, always had some issues with the locking system). And their Boom Pole is a bit lighter than Ambient, and the VdB has Quick-Lock system built in. As I'm based in Europe, service and replacing parts are easier to get from VdB compared to K-Tek.

I'm not sure if it's the same cause, but with nomad, it needs about one second for the machine to get the timecode after the whole booting up screen is done (apply to both internal and external tc source). If you start rolling right after the machine boots up, it didn't get the timecode yet and will start at 00:00:00:00. This happened to me several times.

Neumann KH120ii (they just announced a new version) is in my option the best for small studios, it’s not overpowered, has a bit of this cinema „horn“ character. I combine them with a Genelec Sub (which allows 5.1 configuration), you can also go for a while Genelec setup. I use Genelec 8020 at home for some very small emergency editing stuff.

Almost, that was a project about the wind "Bora" in Croatia, was physically extremely challenging, (The local people said they measured 235 km/h at that night, the exact spot we were shooting might not be so strong but was still extreme) I felt very fortunate that beside the Pianissimo I had the Cyclone with me, otherwise would not be possible in that situation.

I hope they could make it as a replacement for timecode slate. For example, by pressing a button, the display shows some image for one frame, with a tone signal. That would make it much more useful than just a timecode display bar, in my opinion.

I partially replaced my Pianissimo with Nano Shield, with the Nano Shield I can switch between Sennheiser MKH8060 and MKH8050 by only switching the shield module, that gives me a lot more flexibility compared to the pianissimo. And the Nano Shield is lighter than the Pianissimo. About the handling noise, I just need to adapt my way of booming and know what kind of movements I need to avoid, that's not a big issue. It was the same with Pianissimo MS Setup. Once I was working on a film about wind, the Pianissimo with MKH8060 did not survive under the 230km/h wind situation, but the Cyclone from Rycote with MiniCIMIT did the job. I would say, see what one can improve with the booming technique before blaming the equipment, compared to the old windshield, the Nano Shield is a thousand miles better.

SFX and Foley are mostly recorded in mono, because that's the "point sound source" you are going to move around either in Surround or in Atmos. Ambience should be at least in surround these days in my opinion. I record my ambience in ambisonic. For non-standard experimental sounds, It's very depends on what kind of sounds you are going to record, but the microphone array is always connected to the output format, the standard ORTF or AB or XY etc... are based on the standard stereo 60 degree loudspeaker setup as output format. I'm not really getting the question about phasing issue, if you are going to downmix to mono, then why with array? If in stereo or surround, phasing is normally not a problem. https://www.dpamicrophones.com/mic-university/immersive-sound-object-based-audio-and-microphones This might help you to get some more information about microphone arrays. If you have other choice, avoid MS and Double MS, they are more like a compromise solution for location recording in my opinion.

"The goal is to hear as close as possible to what a human hears in the room" If this is the goal, I would not use any shotgun, they does not simulate how our ear works at all. How we hear has a lot to do with Psychoacoustic (i.e. head related transfer function) and visual informations (which influence a lot of our acoustical focus) I would not use any Shotgun in this case, they will colorise the sound, especially in a church where there's strong reflection from every directions. Try with Omni (or boundary microphones) , with EQ and Delay compensation, mixing together with direct signals, it will get you much closer to the result compare to two shotguns. You can DIY some Boundary microphones with cheap Lavs even under $100/piece. There are also some 3D Models for 3D Printed Binaural Mic, using Lavalier Microphones.

that make sense, any adding electronic parts could cause problem. but in the real world it’s all about compromise, in the best case would be no RF at all but everything cable. I would be interested, things like Zaxcom MicPlexer, SoundDevices SL and Audio Wireless DADM, they are all powered RF distributors, I would not assume that all these Products will ruin the RF with their electronics and the capability of powering active antenna.

I'm using BSRF AS-62 in my bag, with 1 x Zaxcom QRX, 1 x Wisycom 42, 1 x Audio A10, the BSRF AS-62 itself has power supply for active antenna, but you can turn it off, so in this case it's a passive system. the AS-62 has no amplifier build in, but only power supply for active antenna, in this case, it's not an active splitter+amplifier system, but a passive splitter with 470-700MHz Bandpass filter. I think you can even unplug the power for AS-62 and it works as a passive splitter (have tried once and it worked). The Mini-Circuits one has no band-pass filter, which can cause some problems if you are very close to Walki-Transmitter or Mobile-Tower. Like the post above mentioned, I would never use active Antenna or use active amplifier in a bag, also Glenn from Zaxcom mentioned that one should not use active Antenna or amplifier with digital wireless systems.

I was student and later friend of Jecklin, if you ask him which microphone, he would definitely say DPA. DPA 2011/4011 and Sennheiser MKH are better for outdoor use compare to Neumann because they are pre-polarized electret condenser microphone (the Sennheiser even has the HF Circuit) which makes them more resistance to bad weather condition, extreme heat or humidity. But many people say external biased condenser sounds better and has less ground noise, it's a question of personal taste I guess. DPA 2011 or 2006 would be a very good alternative to Sennheiser MKH, with lower price.

switched from Pianissimo to Nano Shield CB about 5 months ago, feel the Nano Shield is lighter than Pianissimo, handling noise about the same (using vdb boom pole), and it's much better switch between indoor/outdoor with the nano shield as you can take off the basket (not possible with pianissimo). Now I use pianissimo only for ms boom, and nano shield for mono boom. The construction and material from nano shield and pianissimo is very similar, from my experience there's not much difference with wind protection.

I'm using both 6060 and 6061, basically there's no noticeable difference on sound, both can be used as all-around lav, the 6061 maybe a bit better due to higher SPL. However in some whispering scenes, I can hear the ground noise from preamp much stronger than with the 6060, it was with Zaxcom ZMT3 Transmitter. With 6061 we normally start the gain at 30 and do fine adjustment, with 6060 we start at 12. In situation with both shouting and whispering, the 6061 works better compare to 6060 in my opinion. You would rather have a bit more ground noise (which is totally acceptable in this case) then overload and distortion. But with iZotope, you can probably get both problems fixed. I also use both with Wisycom MTP40s on documentary works, I prefer 6060 in normal situation / interviews, and if there's music performing involved or if I'm in loud environment, I use 6061. So my thoughts and experience: as all-around lav for doc, 6061 is perfectly fine and works probably better than 6060. for features, you will definitely need both.

Hi, I was watching the apple events today, and was wondering, how they are doing audio for their release events. Some of the clothes they have, such as labor suite, can not be so silence and rustle free, especially when all the mics are not to be seen. And the voice is so clean, sounds like recorded in a dub-studio. Just interested, if they are recording the audio from location, or dubbing everything in studio afterwards. Thanks.

If you really consider a Super-Cardioid Microphone, I would recommend MKH8050, the more directional a microphone is, the more colorized will be the "off-information", and as you may know, all shotgun microphones work with acoustic tubes to increase the directionality, but the same time, the "Room" will be colorized very strongly. and generally, for the human voice, large-diagram membrane microphone response much better in middle-low range, where the voice is, as a small-diagram microphone. I have read somewhere, that all small-diagram microphone has a low-shelf (due to the size, they can not go that low), and the manufacturers make a low-boost with "acoustic" or "electric EQ".

Looking for Sound Recordist with own Equipment in Munich/Germany for a small job on 06.Aug and 07.Aug.2018. For more detail please send me an email at contact@tongaudio.at. Thanks.