Matt Martin

I heard from a fellow mixer who does a lot of sports that all NBA jerseys come manufactured with channels specifically designed for running lav cables, that way they can wire any player without fiddling with special uniforms. Did you find it true with the WNBA?

I would recommend looking into the countryman E6 or E2 earset mics ( or similar) http://www.countryman.com/products?cat=7 Getting the mic as close to the mouth is a lifesaver when it comes to live sound. The closer the mic is to the source, the less gain needed, and therefore less prone to feedback. It is also great for following head turns and gives a more even pickup. The E6 is omni and has a long arm that puts the mic right next to the mouth. The E2 is shorter and is further back on the cheek but is cardioid which helps reduce feedback. No matter what you'll still need to be very careful with speaker placement (make sure the speakers are in front of and as far away from the presenter/podium as possible.) If high volume reinforcement is needed it still may be a juggling act between careful EQ and riding the faders to fight feedback.

By the way, hey Brooks! I just put two and two together as to who I was responding to. Hope all is well! Not sure if there were any complaints about the warmth of the extra shirt. I wasn't really involved with the process after everything was setup and routed through my board.

I just had some experience with lav'ing up pro soccer players a few weeks ago. I do house sound for a pro soccer stadium in Philly and the in house production crew was testing out the Q5x wireless systems for capturing in game audio for some shorts they were producing. They had great results with their mounting approach and this is what they did; They mounted the mic semi permanently inside a tight, form fitting Under Armor shirt the player wore under his usual jersey. I believe they sewed a small pocket for a B6 head (heavily taped down with moleskin and then sewn shut i believe.) They sewed another channel in the shirt to run the cable through so there was no chance of it hanging loose, getting ripped out Etc. They ran the cable channel to a neoprene pocket sewn on to the shirt around the small of the back for the transmitter. This shirt kept the mic head nice and tight to the body for no flapping and since there was no exposed tape it didn't get dismounted by sweat. I monitored the audio for most of the game and surprisingly never really heard any clothing rustle or bouncing except for when players brushed against it hit the mic itself. This rig also made it incredibly easy to have an all in one, pre rigged shirt that they could just pass off to any player and they could be rigged and ready to go in about 10 seconds. I would also definitely look into renting or buying a q5x system for this type of job. A hard metal transmitter attached to an athlete during gameplay or even practice is a big liability. One bad fall or hit in the back could cause some serious physical injury. The Q5X transmitters are rubber, small, flexible and designed for sports. Just throwing that out there. http://www.q5x.com/wireless-audio-solutions/wireless-audio-for-sports/ Good luck and let us know how it goes!

I first posted this on the Zax forums. I figured I'd post it here for further discussion: ---------------------------- I just wanted to post my first impressions of Automix after briefly using it on a job the other day. - It worked out fairly well for me but the conditions were not ideal. I was Auto mixing only two unscripted lavs and the two talent were always standing right next to each other so cross talk was an issue. If they were another two feet apart or so I feel it would have worked much better. I'm sure any auto mixer would have acted the same. - when a mic was opened I felt like the quicker attack times sounded like very hard cuts on the beginning edges of words. Longer attack times only seemed to delay the hard cut. I see there is a new update possibly addressing this. hopefully this adds some sort of very short fade up to help mask the Open. I'll check it out tomorrow. - Metering. I'd love to hear some new ideas on how to integrate the Automix into the meters better. Currently the Automix screen displays too much info. In my situation I am usually not going to be auto mixing any analog inputs. I have my boom on analog 1 and then would theoretically be using auto mix on my 4 lavs on AES 3-6. Currently the screen always displays all analog inputs and any additional AES channels used making a lot of wasted space. I would love it if there was a way to show only the channels enabled in the Automix plus Outs 1 & 2 (instead of just Out 1). Additionally I only ever really use the card mix screen. (If I am sending a mix out to camera I record those sends as well, so I can monitor those post fade card tracks instead of viewing the actual output meters). Is there anyway to get the Automix indicators (the "A" and the dot) to display on this screen as well? I understand the card tracks can be routed in MANY different configurations, so this may not be easily achieved or possible, but just throwing it out there. Also, I wonder if some sort of band pass filter (side chained) could be added into the Automixer to help it better open only on dialogue versus other sound. Maybe a band pass around 300-500 Hz to 2khz or so would help eliminate the auto mixer opening up on light clothing rustle etc? This probably wouldn't help with cross talk. But would at least make it so the extreme lows and extreme highs aren't taken into consideration when determining if the signal has crossed the threshold? Do other auto mixers do any filtering like this? All considered, I'm very happy with the start of the Automix. I can see it being very useful, especially for the panel discussion and live event jobs I get from time to time. I'm looking forward to where this feature is headed!

Sounds great. The ramping up of a channel opening (more of a quick fade rather than hard cut) was going to be something I was going to suggest. Glad they read my mind. Looking forward to checking it out!

Congrats and awesome job!

Brilliant.

I've been using the 500mah tenergy's for almost a year now. I've had very good results using them in my comteks (216's). I find they last about 2 long shoot days before I need to swap them out. I find the transmitter begins the battery warning a few hours earlier than the receivers. The charger, as Jeff mentioned, is laid out a bit odd and requires some flopping to get the polarity right. But they do protect against putting them in backwards, it's just a minor annoyance. Very happy with them so far and haven't found any diminished capacity after a year of use (using the tenergy 6 bank charger).

And also, what exactly does the "noise reduction" affect, and how?

I had a few moments to try it out today while an interview was set and lit (quite slowly!) Really nice feature so far! One thing I am not sure I am doing right. When set to Post Fade, it behaves as I would suspect an auto mixer to work. Fading down the pot all the way mutes that channel. 12 O'clock brings it up to unity. These fader adjustments are taken into account when the auto mixer determines if a channel has crossed the threshold. All makes sense to me so far. However, when I set it to Pre Fade, even with the faders down the auto mixed signal is still present. Fading up a particular pot puts the unaffected signal back into the mix, along with the automixed signal of that track. So if a channel is active, putting that fader at 12 oclock essentially just doubles the signal. I thought the pre and post fade option simply referred to where the auto mixer was receiving its signal. Sort of like a Inserting a physical box or plugin In the signal flow. Shouldn't the pot still have full control over the final output of the channel? I guess I am thinking of it like inserting a Dugan Automixer on a console. If it is inserted pre fader (meaning the fader has no effect on when a signal crosses a threshold) the fader still has the ability to fade that gated or ungated signal from 0 to max. I double checked that nothing else was routed to Out 1 and that my monitor selection was only output 1 to be sure I wasn't listening to anything else.

John, you bring up a good point about the two separate copyrights. That is how it works in music, perhaps it is similar for our work. However, based on my understanding (disclaimer: which could be wrong!) I believe those copyrights act independently and can be owned by separate entities at the same time. Also, I believe an infringement claim on just one of those copyrights does not have to affect the other. In music, the performance copyright is filed under form PA and covers the underlying composition, words, lyrics, music, etc. Usually, the publisher and songwriter share this ownership. In our work it is probably a different form but would be owned by the script writer, or person on screen improvising or otherwise creating/providing the intellectual content. The release form/work for hire signed by the performer/creator transfers this copyright over to the producer/client. The sound recording copyright (form SR) is separate and covers the physical recording. This is typically owned by the record label (but first owned by the recording engineer until he is payed as per the work for hire contract) I believe this very much applies to us in the same way. In the music world there certainly can be a copyright violation involving just one of the two copyright owners and not the other. I would think that in our world there could be all sorts of valid copyright claims for a given project if certain people were not paid as per their work for hire agreement states. Again this is all conjecture based on a handful of music business/law courses in college (which was clearly not my major).

What a great idea to give back. You can expect a message about my donation soon!

Great Thread. I've only been in the business freelance about 4 years now and am finally starting to figure this all out. Quarterly taxes, gear insurance, retirement accounts, college savings accounts, etc... Most importantly I learned to enjoy the free time with my wife and two little girls (4 mos and 2 yrs). It really is the best part about this job. This winter when I was really slow I decided to redo our kitchen and since I had the time, I did all the work myself. A complete demolish and everything new. I saved myself I'd say at least $15k by not hiring contractors. Took me about 20 days of work over a month and a half and I really enjoyed it. Even though I only had a handful of gigs in the winter, I feel like in a way I "made" $15k by doing the work myself and I don't think I could have done that with many other careers. I'm still trying to figure out the long term plan, as the wife (currently a school teacher) wants to be a stay at home mom in the next few years. Health insurance is the big question now (which she currently carries). Maybe we'll win the lottery...

Yes, crap happens. Thanks Howy for the quick response after hours! It's on it's way to you guys.

Nope. Worked fine for the first 10 days of this shoot. First thing in the morning of Day 11 this is what happened.

I tried calling Zaxcom but they were closed for the evening and also posted in their support forum. Just hoping you fine folks have a clue as to my issue or have any trouble shooting tips. I'm on a job with a borrowed QRX100Q and it just stopped fully booting. On power up it goes trough the following sequence. Backlight comes on, side LEDs scroll blue/green quickly. Screen reads: V2-12 PLD60AA TC = XX "XX" counts from 1-18 then the screen changes to: "RF TUNE FAILED" side LEDS flash red and unit freezes. From this point on no buttons are active and the power button will not power down the device. I have to pull power for it to turn off. I read in the manual it mentions this error but literally says "OPTIONAL PAGE: If you get this don't worry" I'm assuming they mean not to worry if the unit continues booting past this, but mine just freezes. Any idea what this means and what a possible fix could be? Any button combinations to do a factory reset or force a boot up?

I definitely use mine exclusively as a scratch/tc box so far. I'm not opposed to using it as IFB in the future when I get more. I've been meaning to change over all my camera cables from straight 1/8" to right angle and then attach a small Velcro strap that can be latched over the jack. I haven't had a straight cable come out yet but a right angle with Velcro would make me feel better.

Interesting idea. In theory it will definitely work, and probably sound pretty good I would think. I wouldn't think it would be able to stand up to a set of larger diaphragm condensers, but who knows. I've never tried it specifically for music, but I did use cos-11's through trx900lts for hanging audience mics once. Gaff taped them hanging off the balcony edges and they sounded great for audience laughs and clapping. It sure beat running 100's of feet of cable! Let us know how it turns out!

Its not the current HP knob - it is a similar style knob but slightly larger in size. Yep, I got it. I was just agreeing with the findings that using that specific knob wouldn't be a good choice. Good call to have smooth faders rather then picking one just because it has a push feature.

The knobs will be closer to the size of the menu knobs. Push knobs were looked into but since they have play in them they would not be great for mixing with. That's understandable. The feel of the current headphone knob wouldn't be fun to mix on and the current menu button would be no good as it has the "clicks" Perhaps the PFL buttons could be multi-use like they are on the main unit. Single push for PFL, push and hold to access a user defined shortcut to a certain home screen or a frequently accessed menu page. That would be powerful. I am REALLY loving the ideas behind this unit and can't wait to see it.

From another thread Jack said: "It will attach to the top of Nomad and run approximately the width of the Nomad by roughly 1" to 1.5"" Sounds like it would then have to be the menu knob sized knobs in order to fit the PFLs and others. Of course, I am only assuming though. It may have been mentioned previously, but I would love if the knobs also could act as a push button (like the menu knob without the clicks). That way we could also assign the push knobs to be user assigned shortcuts. For example one could be a shortcut to the metadata page, playback page, etc.

I just picked up a couple and they are really nice. Fast shipping to the US too.

So the audio heard upon playback was the internal camera mics? If so, it sounds like your cable got unplugged (partially or fully) or it got plugged into the AV jack instead. The internal mics only get recorded when nothing is plugged into the mic in. When you were looking at the meters, are you sure it was the audio from the G3 and not just audio from the internal mics? Those jacks are so easy to unplug during lens/battery changes, etc. So it is very well possible you had all setup correctly and then right before action something got bumped and went unnoticed.

A good place indeed!