TimoK

We have a winner! Congratulations to Bryan L. from Singapore.

Facebook votes:
1. Martin L. 98 votes
2. Bryan L. 37 votes
3. Sergio S. 20 votes
4. Thomas A. 17 votes
Ambient jury:
1. Bryan L.
2. Sergio S.
3. Thomas A.
4. Martin L.
Combined Result
1. Bryan L. 4 points
2./3. Martin L. 5, Sergio S. 5 points
4. Thomas A. 7 points

Thanks to all contestants. We received more beautiful designs than we would have ever imagined. The quality standard was so high that we will definitely use some of the designs for future merchandise and giveaways. If that happens we will of course contact the designer and he or she will get some cool stuff as appreciation.
Even some designs which didn’t make it to our facebook page because of too local humour or inappropriate content made us lough a lot. So, we cannot thank you enough for joining in!
But there can only be one winner to this contest: So, congratulation to Bryan L. from Singapore! You won the last of our 200 limited 20years special edition 204 Lockits! The t-shirts are already in the print and will be our NAB shirt 2014.
We will raffle off the TinyMike today and announce the lucky winner! Look forward to seeing a lot of you on NAB #C544 .

And this is our winner design:

P.S. The contest is still open, so even if you're not on facebook send your design to newsletter@ambient.de .

Not everyone is on Facebook.

If you want to join and share your opinion on the recent designs please follow this LINK

The folder will update automatically when new designs are uploaded to the contest. Just share your thoughts here and I count it as vote and you'll take part in the raffle!

some shirts are hard to translate...  :-/

I know and they won't make it but some German shirts are quite fun, so I just posted them because people made up their minds and invested some time on them. Maybe we'll use them for Germany!

Wow,

Day 1 and already 6 beautiful designs and some more who told us already their ideas...

It would be great if you take your vote at www.facebook.com/AmbientRecordingGmbH

Cheers

Timo

Win the special edition Lockit #200

Submit your Ambient t-shirt design

Since our last years t-shirt design found ambivalent reactions we now try a different attempt! The best design wins the last Anniversary Lockit  and people who Like it on FB get raffled to win a Tinymike!

So, if you

• own a beautiful, funny or cool and printable location sound picture,
• know the funniest sound mixer joke,
• are a passionate designer or drawer,
• or just have a brilliant idea for a shirt

send it to us!

»The best shirt wins!«

The contest starts now and ends on the 23rd of March. We will share all promising designs during the contest on our facebook page. If you want to use Ambient product pics or logo please follow the link at the bottom of this mail. (This is not a must!)

»Be part of the jury and win!«

With your facebook likes or your comments here, you can vote for your favorite design. These votes will weigh in with 50% to those of the incorruptible and relentless Ambient jury in the final decision process.

To see the designs not on facebook please follow this link

»Vote for your favorite design and win a TinyMike!«

We highly appreciate  your opinion! Therefor we decided to raffle off a complete ATM 216 Set, plus fur windshield and all DSLR, XLR 48V Phantom and Lectrosonics cables. Thus you can use this high class mini shotgun on a small cam, in a standard setup with 48V Phantom power and as plant mike with your Lectrosonics transmitter.

»And the lucky winners are...«

We will present the winning design on the 24th of March on all our social media channels. The t-shirt will be our giveaway on NAB and IBC 2014 and of course on smaller shows during the year.

Terms and conditions

• This is a fun campaign. Ambient Recording reserves the right to delete all designs from the contest they find inappropriate.
• Your shirt design has to arrive at newsletter@ambient.de until 23.59 CET on the 23rd of March 2014. Designs arriving later will not be taken into account consideration for the contest, no matter when they were send.
• All copyrights of the design and used graphics have to be owned by the participant.
• With the submission of the design you grant the company Ambient Recording GmbH a permanent permit to use, edit, alter, copy and publish the submitted design.
• Any attendee of the above described contest waives any claim against Ambient Recording GmbH concerning the above described design contest.

Send us your design Ambient Recording logos Ambient product pictures

Timo that is the funniest video i have seen in a while, good job, still laughing here, but does show the quality of the mic. Are you going to be at NAB? if so i'll see you there

Yepp, will be at NAB! If you need a guess pass please feel free to use our number LV9857 to get a free pass.

Crikey, all I see is a sound designer showreel in action.

Seriously, video (and audio) looks awesome but tells a potential user nothing of interest.

 

Grant.

I had the same reaction.  All flash and fluff.

As promised some sound examples... completely recorded with a TinyMike... No EQs or Dynamics have been used during shot or post. (Beside the jingle of course)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=TOgJ3j-vWdU

*prices subject to change* then? no prices or difficult to find prices means no sale or very very delayed sale as far as I am concerned. # pet peeve

remember we're talking about a manufacturer here, even though they also sell things directly to customers. But I think most shops absorp the price differences with their profit margin. So for the consumer the changes are not noticeable.

Hi fieldmixer, Constantin,

Sorry for the late answer I was sick the last five days. Today's the first day I'm feeling better again.

We have two fixed pricelist. One in € one in $. While the Euro price list of course is our own currency and will always stay constant, the dollar list is based on a mixed calculation. Only when the exchange rate changes dramatically and stays that way for a really long period we will be forced to adapt the prices to the new situation. 

The prices were mentioned in the very first link I posted. It was not my intention to hide them but next time I will post them as text right away.

timo, what is the lowest voltage it needs?

or specifically, will a zaxcom tx power it - it puts out 3.3v. though wether it will be affected by the digital rf is another thing.

Rich,

the ATM216 works from 2.7V to 7V and thanks to the alumninum housing its better shielded than most lavs but I never tested it close to a Zaxcom.

Hi timo,

 

i bought one of the tiny mikes many years ago (late 90s/early 00s?) for a video camera. i really liked the mike and the tiny mix which i got with it. The weakest part of the system was the suspension. I made something myself from a squash ball and a piece of titanium wire but i'm sure the rycote has greatly improved on both of these. I also had a lead made up allowing me to use the mic with an audio 2020tx (for spot micing). Ambient doesn't seem to make the tiny mix any more. This got used more than i ever thought as it was very convenient way to use the extra 2 line i/p channels (return i/ps) on my SD302.

What happened with the Tiny Mix? I saw it got updated, then discontinued.

 

regards,

 

dan.

Dan,

glad to hear you were happy with the Tiny Mike and Mix. At that time Ambient was a 4-5 people company. The TinyMix was actually quite complex to manufacture and didn't sell that good to invest in new production tools, so we decided to discontinue it. I'm sorry.

I could see this being useful with a UH400a to plant. Would love to hear some samples.

Hi Sean,

I was sick the last week and still am but I promise to record some examples as soon as I can. Sorry for the delay.

Perhaps appropriate for that end of the market?

 

But ya, would be nice to hear some audio from the latest tiny mike.

The video was made for the prosumer market to showcase the mic in big showrooms and on Web. I will capture some examples and post them on Monday.

Sadly, my experience is that many low-end producers will believe that a mic like this can replace a sound mixer. I don't doubt there's a market for this, but the sad truth that I see is that there are a lot of ignorant people out there who will misunderstand the microphone's purpose.

True enough. The complete prosumer attitude is to try to capture professional material with consumer technology. What they don't understand is that they still need professional staff to get to that goal.

Would it make a difference if a small company like ambient would discontinue a product which has been out there for ten years with all the Sennheisers, Shures and Rhodes out there?

I don't know, but since we love the product a lot we decided to continue.

Thanks for the info, has the ATM 216 ever been combined with the ATE 208 “Emesser” for a mini MS rig?

With windshield?

If it has any pics of the suspension arrangement?

I've been looking at the possibility of some kind of highly portable but reasonable quality setup which means there's a chance of having something with you, for those unexpected occasions when you might not have the full setup to hand, and have looked at the Zoom H6 but not had a chance to evaluate whether it's bulk, quality, and robustness add up (certainly it's not too expensive), and this setup with say a Sony PCM might work?

Not yet... Would be a bit tricky though to mount the ate onto the atm. Bit i find no reasons why it shouldn't work.

Prices? I'm in the market for a kit.

473 $ for the dslr Kit

527 $ for the Phantom powered Kit

You'll find the details behind the links in the first post.

Hi Timo, i was thinking It could be a good plant mic too. I know you have the adapter to XLR +48, but could you cable it to be powered by a wireless transmitter? Let say a Lectro SM with the 5v output?

Diego,

Yes that would work. The Tiny mike accepts up to 7V. We can send you a wiring diagram when you decide to try it.

DSLRs?  Yikes...

Marc, I waited for this!

The Tiny Mike is a very good sounding, light weight alternative to a standard video mic. Still it's just a video mic. Even in combination with a small recorder underneath the cam it will never replace a sound guy.

I decided to share it here because I know some jwsound members own a Tiny Mike and might be interested in the new accessories.

Personally, I use the ATM 216 for my private videos because I was never satisfied with the built-in mics.

Self noise fig and polar pattern chart? Wonder how useful 20hz is in this application. LF rolloff?

Technical Data

Polar pattern Hyper cardioid (mini shotgun)

Axial-addressed Axial

Frequency response +- 2 dB 20- 18000 Hz

Sensitivity 17mV/ Pa

Noise: Equivalent SPL rated at CCIR 33dB

Max. SPL 1kOhm 128dB

Dimensions Ø 12/ 8 mm x 140 mm

Weight 30 g

Most cameras own a low cut

Please meet our new Tiny Mike Sets

http://vimeo.com/84658414

Now including a Rycote InVision

and our sophisticated QBS

More information about the new sets can be found here in our newsletter, or here on our website...

Hi Constantin,

No, we also changed the German pricing. It's 22,50€ net. It was a miscalculation done automatically by our ERP system which not even our resellers found until this very thread.

The QAPL, as said before, is within the purchased parts package of our internally cabled booms. It's a rather simple and robust piece so we very rarely sell it as spare part and it hasn't been published as single accessory, yet either.

As we send out new pricelists this week the price will soon be changed. If want want to get one earlier please feel free to contact us directly.

Cheers

Timo

Thanks, Jon. I missed seeing those due to being on a cell phone at the moment.

However, since I don't have any Ambient poles, I'm wondering how much tolerance variation there is for those that aren't exactly the same as theirs.

John,

the the diameter fully expanded is 31mm with the QAPL30 and 36mm with the QAPL but please keep in mind that the central screw fixes the XLR as well as the boom. So if you push it to the limit you'ld have to use a shim for the XLR. As the XLR clamp also holds the transmitter it might get wobbly, depending on the shim you use...

P.s. Thanks John for not blaming the only dealer who had even this small accessory on their site. As said before it might take some time.

Well, I just found out that we had a wrong price in our international sales price list. So please don't blame any dealer it's all our fault. We will send the new price out tomorrow but it's valid from today.

Sorry for any inconvenience this might have caused.

P.S. for people who want to get the QAPL as accessory the netto listprice is 30,50$.

The QAPL is already included in all cabling sets with side outlet. So if you get a cabled Ambient pole it will work immediately with a plug-on transmitter.

Here quick snapshots with my cellphone with a HM to show that the distance is big enough for all plug-on transmitters out there...

I'm a little suspicious of these Rean connectors. Had some DPA lavs with Rean TA5fs and they died very quickly.

Hi Christian,

Rean is a subdivision of Neutrik so no reason for suspiciousness.

Timo:

 

 It would appear it is in the cable right at the connector. I'm having the cable replaced and using the original connector. Don't get me wrong I'm not trying to put down the UMP II. I own two of them. It is impressive how long the two double A batteries last. 

 

Bill

Hmm, strange. I would like to take a look at your cable. If you would send me your contact details to timo@ambient.de I will have yours replaced by Redding so we can take a look and sort out if it was just the "one in a million" or not...

Timo, I'm loving the UMP and QWB! It's exactly what I was describing in on this site.

 

However I would love it if there was a version of the QWB that allows you to mount the UMP and transmitter on the other end of the pole much in the same way as the K-Tek KTA2 does. One thing I don't want to be adding to the end of an already heavy pole is more weight; a fully extended pole with full wind protection recording a 15 minute take can bring a grown man to tears! If the QWB, UMP and TX could be mounted in the bottom section of the boom pole (via internal cable) perhaps between where the boom op's hands would be while booming, it would be free from the RF damping from the TX being close to the body but also mean the boom is not tethered to the operators body meaning you can pick up and put down the boom quickly with out having to unclip the belt-clip and find a safe place for the QWB. When booming I often find I need to quickly put the boom down to adjust talent wireless between takes which is a bit of a hassle with my current MM-1 wireless boom setup.

Ed,

what we already offer for ages comparable to the KTA2 is the QAPL . I will post a picture later how it looks with a HM.

Finally! It's been announced for a while and we are happy that we now are ready to release it: The MAC updater for Lockits and Tiny Lockits.

Additionally we aligned the different firmwares so that one updater tool will work for all recent and upcoming network ready products. Obviously, it took us longer than we expected and we hope that the new features now also available for Mac users will compensate for the latency.

Get your firmware 3.11 now and add powerful new features to your devices.

Firmware download page

http://vimeo.com/71959025

Hi Bill,

thanks for the feedback on availability and of course for using our gear. To be honest you are the first who reports that issues with the TA3 connector. Was it the cable or the connector?

Cheers

Timo

Is there any possibility of a VSLOT alternative version fitted with the Sony 15 pin connector, instead of the Panasonic 25 pin?

Joq,

we did not design a Sony version, yet based on the low demand for it. I'm sorry

The UMP II: 355,05$

The unit is delivered with two cables. A TA3f-XLR3M and a TA3f (both 40cm) with open end to solder the right connector for your wireless to it.

The VSLOT: 405$

Machined out of POM and aluminum and equipped with original male and female IDX V-Mount connectors to prevent a wobbling rig. The whole VSLOT only adds 4.8cm to the camera lengths to maintain the camera balance. Weight without receiver: 480g

The included VSL-2X3 cable (as on the picture) TA5F-2x XLR3M is 20cm long and as thin as a professional shield allows it to be while the PE insulation takes care of the robustness.

And now for the prices and pictures: The QWB: 140,40$

For rougher conditions we also offer a fitting rain cover with control window: QWB-RE 52,65$

Thanks for your feedback John & J, it is highly appreciated.

As said before, we are working on that at the moment but after all these years without distributor, where single "aluminum plates" had to be ordered and shipped directly from Germany it became far less attractive for resellers to sell these items. It might take some time to reinstall what was lost. But we are making good progress:

We just shipped demo boom sets to five resellers chosen by Redding and a demo set of accessories will follow, soon. Thus you'll be able to touch feel and compare our products in all big shops from the next weeks on. More news on that will follow, soon.

In the end we are very thankful that you care and support us with your feedback and of course just by using our gear!