Michael Wynne

Agreed 100%!

Those are very well thought out workflows! I’ve done similar things in narrative where I delivered MS ambiences to audio post directly when it made sense. I was working on a show on a large farm house and we were able to plant an MS rig and record some wild ambiences. Rather than confuse editorial, we just delivered directly to the audio sup with some notes on which scenes they were attached to. They loved it and it’s a great way to make friends. Like you mentioned it’s not for every shot or location but a good mixer will intuitively know when it makes sense! The two MS mics I own are the ATBP4029 & my latest one is the Sanken CMS50 which has a wonderfully small profile.

This method of using it as an interview boom mic is intriguing to me, I’ve tried some experiments with my CMS-50 as a dialogue mic on a boom and I noticed the mid element is not as effective mitigating room reflections as a typical super cardioid. But what I haven’t tried is using it in the MS world like you mentioned. I’ve only used MS for stereo ambience capture. The issue I see are that American audiences are so accustomed to a dry mono hyper cardioid boom & or lavs on the center speaker. But with phase align I feel there is a world where both the MS and mono elements could all live together for some genres. With atmos being the industry standard now for final delivery and also the use of surround in sporting events, I’m also curious what that advantages of MS capture are in the Atmos format.

Was curious on what folks experiences are recently working with MS microphones/tracks these days? For doc type workflows I really like the idea of having the cardioid mid element and figure 8 side element mounted on a camera. I also love the sound of it and the stereo width flexibility of MS in post allowing things to better fit into the mix. But it doesn’t seem to be commonly used in my experience, at least on the projects I’ve worked on. Since I’ve worked mostly narrative as a production mixer these last ten years I'm out of the loop on today’s common uses. Is it falling out of favor, or is it most common in games, VR and other mediums outside of film sound. Also with phase align tools these days, it seems like a great use is mounting it on a camera for stereo imaging combined with on camera dialogue in genres like docs where you want the realism of the moment. Anyone extensively using MS, and what are the kind of projects and workflows are you using them for? And were they used more in the past than they are today?

Will also hold on to my Cantar X3 for what I hope is many years to come, also invested in Scorpio as a second rig. Both great, varying strengths.

Love it!

Had this issue, almost sent it to SD, then I tried spraying some Deoxit under the fader and problem solved!

Nice set up Ian, Curious if your using the same Android to run your SD Remote or if you have a separate tablet for that,

Well looks like I’m buying an Android! Awesome! Makes sense to me! It will save me money to!

I’m looking for a powerful RF coordination iOS compatible app to have in the bag on a small IPad. It should be able to import CSV scans, do coordination for wireless mics, and have up to date TV band info by location. Does this exist? I’m familiar with all of the macOS windows software. Was hoping to find something that is on par with the Mac/PC versions. Would happily pay top dollar for this kind of thing.

Yes, we had road closures for this work, police on both sides with radios. Very minimal lighting if any was used, mostly modifiers. I’d say no, post still expects the mix + ISO’s and rolling and cutting, In this scenario, I didn’t want to tie the talent with the mag mounts, so I opted to reach out to post to see if they would be OK with me doing a continuous TC locked record capture on the LAV mics and they said it was fine.

Love the mag mounts, also have the window mount versions when that makes more sense. Exactly, preemptive discussions all the way! I agree with this method, and for certain types of work it's the best case scenario!

Always like the idea of a double system, in this particular scenario the lavs were recording TC locked continuous and we gave post the heads up and they appreciated the idea. That eliminates the separate recorder/RX. Obviously transmitting and recording would be nice, but you’re not really gonna get good range from lavs when they’re inside a vehicle on this kind of scenario anyway so it defeats the point.

Sure thing, these are not from last week cause it was simply too busy for me to take any shots, but these are from the show I wrapped earlier this spring. You can see the biscuit rig, follow van antenna mounting and our approximate distance from the vehicle when working.

Seems like the popularity of biscuit rigs (pod driven process trailers ) has been on the rise at least for me lately for me on my last few shows. These self driving process trailers allow more flexibility for camera since they can be reconfigured easily and the camera can shoot more angles whereas a traditional process trailer with insert vehicle is quite limiting in comparison. For me the RF workflow & challenges when mixing from a follow van ( since most of the time we can’t get on these rigs ) requires careful planning and execution since I don’t have the benefit of riding in the front of an insert vehicle which allows for more controlled workflows. Bag drops are not practical for narrative work because providing a proper production mix, rolling and cutting are expected. Also the biscuit rig that is being utilized a lot in my market is much louder than a traditional process trailer since the engine is under mounted and much closer to the picture car. I’ve tried a few different type of RF & capture workflows and I’m finally starting to get a handle on what works best for me & my team and what I prefer. Just this last week we had to rig a follow van and a biscuit rig with plants and mic everyone up and make everything work under fifteen minutes which is border line ridiculous. It’s been a bit of a painful learning experience working with these rigs but like most things in life a bit of struggle had always been a good teacher!