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api

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Everything posted by api

  1. api

    WTF

    Everything used to be more rugged in the olden days.. even headphones!
  2. Apogee Quartet offers great value for money: http://www.apogeedigital.com/products/quartet.php Even the smallest models by Genelec are really good.. a pair of 8020Bs perhaps? http://www.genelec.com/products/8020b/
  3. Yes, I agree, they probably don't have a clue. For starters, Craiglist just doesn't have the right ring to it But I stand by my point.. there ARE professional art projects and people who prefer analog production methods and gear for valid, although usually purely conceptual reasons. I am referring mainly to the contemporary art/video art crowd.
  4. People who prefer to work with vintage and analog equipment often do so not only because of the certain organic quality, but because of the technical limitations that the tools impose on them. Having to rewind tape etc. Daniel Lanois, for example, is famous for producing and recording music with analog gear. The lack of limitations is indeed the greatest enemy of creativity. Some people feel that with the advent of digital audio workstations sound design has become too easy these days.. almost like an aural version of CGI effects. There is a whole scene of artists working with old synths, 8 mm film etc that just like the whole concept of working with mechanical devices. The tools they use are part of their expression method, so to speak. Media is the message and all that. My guess is that this is one of those "auteurs" looking for like-minded people to do something artsy.
  5. Yes, it's by BBC. They have factored in electricity and replacement bulbs as well. The rental costs on which the chart is based must have been calculated on long-term and wholesale rental prices. A continuous 3 month rental is going to be cheaper than the price for 12 individual non-continuous rental weeks. Also, I think it's important to note that, as a rental service provider, one may have many other expenses besides the capital investment on the equipment itself. You may have to do credit checks, pay for equipment insurance, pay for repairs and spare parts, advertise, print out invoices and spend your precious work hours on other office tasks such as negotiating with customers on schedules and exact equipment requirements. On my local rental market here in Helsinki the undiscounted daily rate for a single Dedolight fixture without a stand is 7-12 euros per unit. I guess they are a little bit cheaper to purchase in Europe. The local market has been polarized into a multitude of small one-man-band operators that cater the reality tv and web video producers and a handful of big houses renting to the high-end clientele such as feature films and big budget tv commercials.
  6. I stumbled upon this chart by accident while researching the new LEP (light emitting plasma) light sources. According to it, it's 150 rental days to pay back a small litepanel led fixture. Found this at http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/outreach/BBC_LEL_Guidelines.pdf
  7. I run my own little one-man-band production company. Over the years I have slowly built up my own production equipment inventory that I also rent out occasionally. The rental price for lights is usually quite low and only some of the lights I have bought have paid for themselves. I bought two LED panels from Cool Lights with softboxes. In retrospect, I wish I had purchased V-mount battery adapters for them too. I also got a 150 Watt ceramic discharge fixture from Cool Lights and although it has a much better light output and casts hard shadows, it is not as mobile and easy to carry around as the led panels. For mobile fresnel style lights I got a 3 light Dedolight Explorer kit in a backpack and I can't speak highly enough of them. They are expensive, but well worth it... durable, compact, ergonomic and the replacement lamps are cheap. The thing with LED lights is that although they are light and handy, the shadow they cast is often "multi-point" or matrix-like and therefore they work better with diffusion in front of the light. Also, their color rendition index is lower than on other types of lights and many more experienced DPs dislike them for this attribute alone.
  8. EN2 TXP also has adjustable low cut filter. EN2 TX doesn't have that, it only has a fixed low cut filter (100Hz, 6dB per octave).
  9. api

    zaxcom.com hacked

    Zaxcom.com is hacked for sure. Someone should email Glenn about this right away.
  10. After some googling around I found out that an anti-reflective coating alone might cost 1000 to 2000 dollars per batch. You could coat hundreds of glasses in one go though and perhaps a glass panel could be coated before it is cut into smaller pieces. However, I have a feeling that this might be an expensive consignment and not really feasible unless there were dozens or hundreds of screen protectors made in one go.
  11. I just saw a plexiglass screen protector for 664 on the SD facebook page. It just occurred to me that it might be economically feasible to have a small batch of custom screen protectors made of sapphire glass. Perhaps, if it is exactly the right size, it would stay on without any adhesive. Sapphire glass is the kind of glass they use on watches and it's super hard.. very difficult to scratch and optically superior. http://www.rayotek.com/sapphire_windows.htm I'd buy one or two in a group buy for sure.. especially if the price is right. What do you think?
  12. I'm just starting to build my kit. Got SD 664, Cinela Piano and Sanken CS3E this year. I love each one of them and just can't decide which one is the best purchase. Looking forward to getting 2 channels of proper wireless mics next year, but I'm having a really difficult time trying to decide which brand to buy. Probably Lectrosonics, but I've been very impressed with Sony DWX series too.
  13. Thank you, Vasileios! I had somehow missed that.
  14. Thanks for the info, Rich. I think I'll just ask my dealer for more details about the technical implementation of this particular detail.
  15. I've been researching options for a high quality camera hop for use in Finland. Like most other European countries, we are limited to 50 mW transmission power with radio mic links. Transmitters that have a menu option to select a higher power are not licensable for use here. I am curious if TRX 742 is CE approved and if there is a special factory menu option or firmware for European market that caps the transmission power to 50 mW to make it legal to use over here? I assume that Zaxcom Maxx, once it becomes available, will have a similar arrangement to comply with the EU regulations.
  16. api

    K-Tek Zeppelin

    Have you considered Cinela Piano? It is quite expensive, but it works really well and is light weight, too.
  17. I had a closer look at the DWX system last week. I tested the bodypack transmitter with a line input from a field mixer and a rack mounted version of the receiver. The biggest issue with this system would be the construction quality of the transmitters. Just to be clear, I don't think that they might easily fail internally. Sony is usually very, very good with that sort of thing. The antenna connection and weather sealing, however, were not all that impressive. It seemed to me that it wouldn't take much to break the antenna connection. The dealer told me that they could take a moderate amount of beating and that previously only unit at a theatre in Sweden had to be replaced because of a completely broken antenna connector. Also there are that many accessories available and, according to the manual, the lavalier mic choices are limited to DPA 4063 and COS-11D and Sony's own lav mics. The DWX system is obviously aimed primarily for use in fixed installations. They have sold a few big installations to Scandinavian and German theatres. It worth noting that Sony did win the bid to suppy digital wireless mics to the national broadcasting company here in Finland. The sound quality was absolutely amazing. The wireless link was practically 100% transparent and I'd be hard to tell the difference between the wireless and wired connection in a blind test. I didn't have the time to test for range or interference. I did try putting a condenser mic (AKG CK93) very close to the transmitter and there was some mild "digital noise" on the signal when I put it directly at the base of the antenna (within 5-10 centimeters or so). At greater distances there were no spray issues in my test. Overall, I was quite impressed. Personally, I am trying to decide between Sony DWX, Lectrosonics SRb adapter and the Audio Ltd CX-2. This would be for use as a 2-channel camera hop system (semi-)permanently installed in an Ambient V-Slot adapter on a Scarlet-X. The Sony receiver would be mounted on the back of linkable Paglink batteries. In my opinion the sound quality of Sony is unrivalled just like the durability and construction quality of Lectrosonics system is. Audio Ltd CX-2 would be an economical choice for me, since I already have an EN2 transmitter. I have also considered Zaxcom, but the ergonomic benefits of a slot-in style receiver are a significant factor in this particular purchase decision. Wisycom is also attractive, but I find it hard to justify the price when comparing it to Lectrosonics or Sony DWX which are in the same price range.
  18. Lectrosonics are readily available for rent. Drop me a line if you suddenly need replacement units. There are no issues finding free channels. The bandwidth is very well regulated and clean. Most people don't bother with licenses although officially they are required except for 823-832 and 863-864 Mhz. Technically speaking the maximum transmission power that you can use is 50 mw. Generally speaking, over here things happen on time, people pay their bills and wait for the red light to turn green before they cross the street. It's a quiet and safe city. Bring warm clothing though and prepare for rain and slush, not snow. It's an unusually warm winter this year.
  19. Have you considered a Zaxcom ZFR100 with a STA042 AES adapter? Sony PCM-D50 has a very nice A/D converter although you can't use the SPDIF input with a MixPre-D.. even with an SPDIF/AES adapter. MixPre-D doesn't output the header data required by the PCM-D50.
  20. The latest firmware on Scarlet (V3.3.14) also has a documented change: "Fix Audio meter to show real peak". I am not sure what that means. I also noticed that the minimum value for audio level in adjustment is now +15dB. It used to be +8dB in the previous firmwares, I think. It is now impossible to compensate for the line level out on a Pix 240 without using a line to mic level pad on the cable. That is even when using the -20 dB adjustment on the Pix menu for audio output pad value.
  21. Try not to get fixated on a specific budget until you have figured out what exactly is "usable sound" for your needs. A Sound Devices MixPre-D field mixer might be a more pragmatic initial investment than a hand held recorder even though it is a bit more expensive than $500. The onboard audio on RED cameras and DSLRs can be quite surprisingly good if a proper preamp is used with them.
  22. With the price cut, an Epic brain is being repositioned as a "loss leader".. a product that is sold at market cost to attract customers to the Red ecosystem. The price cut is targeted at customers who are considering the purchase of a camera system like this within the next 6 months. It might be just enough of an incentive to keep an Epic as one of the options. The media costs alone with RED are very substantial. That will also likely be the case with the new Sony SxS Pro+ cards which are a requirement to use the new XAVC codec on F5 and F55. I suspect that a 128GB SxS Pro+ card will cost at least $3000 at launch and the AXSM will be even more expensive. It's also worth noting that the warranty on the Redmags is only 90 days and they do fail occasionally... I've been there. At nearly $4000 a pop for the 512GB even a single media failure can add up a lot to the operation costs. When Canon released C300 they said that "the industry is not ready for 4K yet". I think that they were right in many ways. Sony F5 and Canon C500 are primarily 2K cameras with a 4K option as an add-on. RED cameras are primarily 4K/5K cameras with an option to record 2K proxies with the new Meizler module. The success of Alexa underlines the fact that people are completely satisfied with 2K if it is "done right". The clever color configuration of C300 sensor makes it practically equivalent to shooting 3K on a RED, resolutionwise. But it's not just the resolution that people are interested in. The operational stability, sensor dynamic range, skin rendition and sensitivity are much, much more important factors for many customers. Not to speak of practicality and ergonomic issues while operating the camera and post processing the ingested files. I think that RED should have concentrated on these issues instead of bumping up the resolution and sensitivity with the new Dragon sensor. Granted, the post production is becoming easier and easier with Apple and Adobe adding native Redcode Raw support in FCPX and Premiere. I would gladly pay for an upgrade simply to get rid of the noisy fan instead of paying over $6K for an ever higher resolution sensor and perhaps even noisier fan. All in all, I think that the price cut is simply a direct reaction to the new product launches by RED's competitors, much like the Nomad product line revamp was a reaction to Sound Devices 664. It's a fast paced "adapt or die" business environment these days.
  23. I did ask about the audio module on the Sony Facebook chat and if my memory serves me right, they did say that the audio and timecode modules will be standard, but removable. I believe that would make it the first S35 format digital cinema camera with 24 bit / 48 khz 4-channel recording and AES3 inputs on XLR connectors built in. With RED, AES inputs are an extra purchase. With the proper XLR-lemo cable it's an extra cost of $4000 or so. I'm not sure who would use the RED pro i/o module for actual production sound, but that is one of the functionalities it is marketed with. On the other hand, Sony has a great history of designing robust and easy to work with codecs. XAVC will probably make 4K a lot more accessible to many post production workflows. 4 channel 24 bit/48 Khz audio synchronized to picture will make direct XAVC editing even more appealing... especially for fast turnaround projects.
  24. That's an early prototype. The shipping version will not have the fan on the external recorder visible like that. I'm not sure if there is a fan on the camera body or not. They did say that they have worked on thermal issues, so my guess is that this will be one of the more silent S35 form factor cameras... especially if used without the external recorder module.
  25. Ahh, here we go! That's where the XLR connectors will be:
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