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sdog

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Everything posted by sdog

  1. Thanks, guys. A fair amount of illumination on this topic. And I believe Constantin's last comment is correct. At least in the ham radio world, the FCC regs are all about "operators", not "owners". I presume that's true for the entire RF universe. Hey Karri, do you know off the top of your head what that free frequency range is? No worries if you don't - I can look it up. Just thought I'd ask.
  2. Thanks, guys. All points well taken and kind of what I suspected. The difficult part would be trying decide whether I would get more pleasure from the target practice or selling it to the "videographer". Piling on the unfortunate just seems mean though, so target practice it is! (after I weary of running from the FCC dream police!)
  3. Hey, this topic pops into my mind on rare occasion when I'm going through old equipment. I have an old C-band (aka >700MHz, aka illegal) Sennheiser G2 system in my "old equipment pile". If I recall correctly, I went directly to Sennheiser a year or two ago to see if they do frequency mods on old systems and they didn't want anything to do with it (presumably because they prefer to sell their newer systems). I have two questions: 1.) Does anyone know of any third parties that do frequency mods on old C-band G2s to bring them into a usable range (or is such a thing even possible)? 2.) If so, would it even be worth the cost? (I know. Question #2 is a little vague and subjective but I'm a guy that actually likes all the wild and subjective opinions on this site!!) Although it wouldn't be my first piece of gear left behind by the incessant onward march of time and technology, it seems kind of criminal to simply toss a piece of gear that was once so expensive . Thanks All, Doug
  4. sdog

    Subtle Sounds

    Cool, Cory. Dig the "Doohickey". Just the type of thing non-soundies need to see to understand how some of this stuff fits together.
  5. Hey Noah, I don't feel like you're beating a dead horse. I always find it fascinating to discuss the endless variety of ways we all approach solving our problems. I do hear you that sometimes things just are what they are and you just have to make them work. I suspect you'll agree that most of us audio engineers are crazed problem solvers anyway and relish the opportunity to tackle a challenge. ("Hmmm. You want me to do the impossible? Give me a minute to think about that; the 'impossible' might take me just a little longer than the usual 'improbably difficult'."). There's always that sense of pride when you figure out how to make some really gnarly situation work. In any event, it probably goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway: Nice work on Person of Interest. I just watched another episode last night. You've tackled the impossible (or at least the improbably difficult) with great success!!!
  6. Hi Constantin, My response is primarily for scripted narrative. I might have a different answer for other formats. First let's state the obvious. If you are a director/producer who already knows more about sound than I do and are only hiring me as a cog in the machine rather than as a sound expert, then of course I'll wire whatever you hire me to. Otherwise... I wire as seldom as possible for several reasons. First, I personally prefer the sound and perspective of the boom over the always-too-close, omni-directionality of the lav mic. (Since in this particular scenario, I'm the one deciding, I get to go with my personal preference!) Second, I'm a control freak. I can control where a boom sits and how it sounds. There are too many elements in a lav mic situation that I can't control. I can mitigate radio interference, but I can't guarantee it won't happen. I can mitigate clothing rustle, but I can't eliminate it. No matter how many spiffy new tricks I learn for hiding lavs, there is always some new costume that thwarts everything I know. If the full mix is important, an RF squawk or clothing rustle on a single mic can ruin the whole take. If instead, the ISOs are what's important, too many mics can frustrate my ability to monitor and therefore thwart my ability to guarantee a good take. If I have a boom and many lav mics, I can still only monitor with two ears. If I hear a glitch, I have no idea where the problem came from and whether it needs to be fixed. Did the rustle come from the speaking actor's lav? The reacting actor's lav? The third actor-who-only-has-one-line-but-is-wired-anyway's lav? I have no choice but to declare it a bad take for sound even though that rustle may not even be on a relevant mic. (Or I need to pause for playback while I check.) If I am listening to a number of sources that is less than or equal to the number of ears I have, I can tell you with dang near absolute certainty whether you have a good take for sound. Third, because I'm a control freak, I hate offering choices to editors that I know they really shouldn't use unless it's an emergency. This doesn't matter as much to me if I know that the project will be going through a real honest to god audio post engineer. But too many projects may only pass through the hands of a one-man-band picture editor. God bless 'em - I love picture editors, but too many know too little about sound and will use tracks in the final product that were only intended for safety. Having said that, I will definitely still wire when it seems necessary (wide shots, improv, etc.). But I will even go for a good plant mic position before I'll choose a body mic. As for when I decide, it depends a bit on how the production schedule lays out. In an ideal world, when blocking is done at the very beginning of the shot (i.e. before lighting, makeup, wardrobe, etc.), it is simple to tell during blocking whether actors will need to be wired or not. On those weird sets where things get discombobulated and and everyone decides that lighting and makeup are more urgent than blocking, all rules go out the window. As far as when I actually do the wiring, once blocking is done, there are usually quite a few opportunities to get the job done while all the other departments (lighting, camera, wardrobe, etc.) are doing their parts. Obviously for any given actor, one must wait at least until wardrobe is done to start the actual wiring, but much planning and strategy can happen just seeing the wardrobe. Again, if someone decides that blocking is not a high enough priority to do first, then I presume that they've also already decided that they don't mind sitting around forever waiting for sound to wire people. (That was just a snarky reminder to directors to start your production with blocking, for all departments' sakes!! ) As far as where, I'll pretty much just make an improvised decision on the spot whether it's easier to bring the actor to my kit or to bring my kit to the actor. I don't worry too much about where unless there is some major costume strategizing for an actress who I sense may be shy, in which case I'm likely to find a quieter corner where she won't get too embarrassed by whatever I have to do to get this thing in place. I've had the good fortune to work mostly with actors who understand that lav mics are part of the process and are not easily embarrassed. Regarding the question: "If wired, will you always record the wire? Even if you feel like the mic doesn't work very well?" Totally gut instinct on this one, but often will choose not to record, even if they're already wired, for shots where the boom is sounding good. There are cases where I'll highly suspect that a lav will be needed and will wire up talent just in the strong likelihood. But if it pans out that the boom is going to work well after all, I'll tend to shut off the lavs. On the other hand, if I sense that it may be necessary to have a consistent set of sources all the way through a given scene, I'll go ahead and record the lavs through all the shots, even though I know they shouldn't be used. As far as how long it takes to wire someone: It always feels too d$%n long no matter what the clock says. Sometimes it goes really smooth and fast. Other times it's a struggle. A couple of weeks ago I wired an actor in a simple costume that should have been very straightforward and yet I could not get rid of the clothing rustle no matter where I placed the mic. I swear I spent a half an hour on that mic on every side of the blouse, every side of the jacket, in the bra. I'd have tried implanting it in her nose if I'd have thought there was a chance in h#$$ that would work. Eventually it did and it probably didn't really take a half an hour, but it extremely frustrating to feel like I was just chewing up the clock.
  7. I hadn't thought about it, Jeff, but I think you're dead-on. It is far more than just the actors that must go through unnatural contortions to make it all appear natural (and easy and real and authentic!)
  8. +1 !!!!!! An actor, if good enough, can change his performance. I, on the other hand, no matter how good I become, CANNOT change the laws of physics. Part of of the JOB of an actor is to be heard. I am NEVER afraid to make a simple statement of FACT to a director: "This performance WILL NOT BE understood by the audience." (I'm a bit more cautious about going directly to the actor unless I've been working with him/her and the director for a while. One CAN crush performance mojo with the wrong words.) Sometimes it's O.K. for the dialog not to be understood because the content of the dialog is not important, only the tone/mood/gist is important. But in any event, the director needs to know. It is my job as a left-brained audio geek, working with right-brained artsy-fartsy people like directors and actors, to understand and communicate the limitations and realities of physics and technology. (please don't misinterpret that last statement as derogatory. I LOVE right-brained artsy-fartsy people. I just recognize that they have a different talent set.) It sounds like Noah has mastered that art of fighting the good fight along all the technical lines of framing and noise reduction. But I also argue that it's always worth the effort to at least point out the obvious, "We wouldn't have to shoot everything in close-up, move all our locations 20 miles from the nearest airport, and ADR half the performances if the actor would speak up just a little." Perhaps for a particular actor it just doesn't work, but, for an actor that can pull it off without blowing his performance mojo, it is by far the most straightforward solution in most cases. On a related side note, I reserve my deepest professional disdain for acting schools that teach that the job of an actor is to to be natural. NO! NO! NO! NO! An actor's job is never, ever, ever to BE natural! An actor's job is to APPEAR natural - while doing extremely unnatural things, (like hitting a mark or restricting movements inside a frame, or raising the cup with your left hand, or speaking so people can hear you.) Most of the things an actor MUST do are VERY unnatural. That is why we have so much respect for actors who can do all of the difficult work it takes to make a performance APPEAR natural no matter what discomfort they have to go through to create that appearance.
  9. sdog

    RX 4

    Got the upgrade. Use it every day. Love it. Oddly enough, still haven't really explored the things that are new since RX3 Advanced, so I can't actually say whether the upgrade improvements are truly worth that much more than the functionality in RX3. However, RX is such an indispensable part of my workflow that I suspect the new features will come in handy at some point. I don't feel too "splurgy" for springing for the upgrade. Izotope's Ozone has a feature similar to the EQ Match that I used with great success on an audio problem I had to solve a year or two ago. Haven't dug into it deeply enough to know if it operates the same way as the new EQ Match in RX, but suspect it's similar. The one improvement I would love to see in an upcoming version would be either in file selection for for the batch processing interface or the ability to save chains of steps as presets. I often deal with a single take that has been diced into alternating dialog bits by an editor. The underlying audio, which was originally in a single file is now, in my project, multiple individual files. Easy enough to open them all up at once in RX from my DAW timeline. I can develop a clean up strategy for one file and know it will work for all because it really truly is originally all from the same source, even though it's no longer in a single file. I can hunt down just the right Q and gain for that hum at 2750Hz, another perfect Q and gain for the hum at 120Hz, plus several more for hums that are not quite harmonic. Then on top of that a low cut EQ once I discover there's nothing I want in that audio below 50Hz. Great so far. Now I've just cleaned up one file and discovered a set of processing steps that I know will work on all the other files that were created from that original audio file. But now there's no way to apply those steps to the other files. "But wait.", you say. "Can't you just add those steps as a job to the batch processing interface?". "Why, yes.", I say, "Of course I can." But now I'm stuck because the only way to apply those steps to any files is to choose those files from a project media directory filled with hundreds of files helpfully named with gibberish like "12345(1).wav" and "876543-6.wav". From within my DAW, it is super obvious to tell which files all came from that same original source file, and super easy to select them and say "open with RX". Identifying those same files from a standard "Open Files" dialog like the one in RX's batch processing interface is almost impossible. There are two potential improvements to RX that could make this work a whole lot more smoothly: 1.) In addition to the "Add Files..." dialog presently used to select files in the Batch Processing interface, a button or dialog that says, essentially, "Choose the files I already have open now in RX". I've already identified and opened the files from my DAW. I know what they are and RX knows what they are. Simply a matter of building that list for the batch processor. 2.) Or simply allow a chain of processing steps to be saved as a preset. The basic workflow would be a.) identify chain of steps while operating on one file. b.) save that chain as a preset. c.) open the next file that is known to need exactly the same processing (or move to the tab of that already opened file) d.) run that processing chain preset on the second file. Either of these two interface improvements would allow a known chain of processing steps to be applied much more quickly to files that have been identified differently than from an "open file" dialog (i.e. identified and opened from within a DAW). The second approach is a little more "one-at-a-timeish", but I actually prefer that workflow as it would allow me to double check my cleanup assumptions one at a time as I go.
  10. I agree with Vasileios that it is probably unrealistic to specify the levels of the audio that exactly. I see the recording engineer's primary rule as this: "Record as far above the noise floor as you can possibly get without clipping". Because none of us know exactly what the sound levels of the talent will be before they are recorded, there is a "science and art of prediction and anticipation" involved in setting levels with the right amount of headroom. In order to achieve this vague and magical level spec, you are likely to wind up realistically with a much safer headroom of -20dB. Let the location engineers do what they need to do to stay in that magic "noise-to-clipping window and leave the responsibility for massaging final audio levels with the post team. I know - recording engineers are asked to hit specific level targets all the time, but I believe it's philosophically the wrong approach to place this requirement at the recording stage, given the upper and lower physical limits of noise and clipping and the intuitive art of responding to the dynamics of real actors' performances. Ask for it anyways if you want, but if you're too demanding about that, you can expect more noise, clipping, and pumping as the recordist fights his natural tendencies toward the levels he knows are intuitively correct for the performance in order to twiddle knobs toward your spec.
  11. If file naming and directory organization is important to you, you should definitely specify that. There is a lot of metadata associated with sound files. Some of it is useful to your particular workflow/project. Some of it is not. Some of it is easy to capture, depending on the recording device/production system. Some of it is not. Metadata can be stored within BWF files, but much of it can also be embedded in the file names and directory structures themselves. This type of embedding, if done correctly, can make searching for the right audio takes much simpler and easier. Want all your wild sound to sort to the end? Ask to have wild audio file names prefixed with "w_" (or something similar). Doing a scripted show where scene/shot/take has been cleanly defined and professionally followed throughout the shoot? Ask for file names to start with scene/take. Doing an unscripted documentary where you need to map camera to audio by the time of the take? Ask for file names to start with date/time. Did someone during production capture a really good handy log mapping video clip numbers to audio clip numbers? Ask for file names to contain the audio clip number. In your post system, is it easier to look at all files in one big directory? sub-directories by date? sub-directories by scene? Don't care? Don't mention it and take the location engineer's default. Their default names probably won't be too bad. These are just some examples of ways that file naming, directory structure can help make your job easier. HOWEVER.... Be aware that you may not be able to get exactly the naming you like. If you take delivery of the audio the same day you shoot, you're probably stuck with a limited number of naming schemes offered by the recording device being used. Also, that particular location engineer may have limits on his file renaming ability. There is no good standard BWF renaming tool we all use (that I'm aware of) that fits all these scenarios. I'm usually able to name things pretty quickly and flexibly, but only because I've kludged together a renaming system out of number of different renaming/reporting tools, including generic file renamers liie "Bulk Rename Utility", BWF tools like "WaveAgent", and custom python scripts I've written myself. Don't be surprised if your location engineer can't deliver file names exactly like you want them, but ASK ANYWAY if it's going to make your life easier. If they are able to accommodate you, most engineers would much prefer to deliver files that make your life easier if they can do it without too much pain themselves. It makes people want to work with them again. Be aware that it may cause more overall pain for the location engineer to rename files than it does for you to deal with default naming schemes. Negotiate honestly. Talk it out and choose the approach that will cause the least amount of pain overall. (Or you can figure out which one of you is getting paid the most and let that person take on the most pain (CLARIFIER: that was a joke!))
  12. Philosophical Opinion on Responsibility: An NLE or any other software that does a conform or otherwise places or shifts things on a timeline needs to shift them according to the finest expected resolution of its content. If your software operates on the time relationship between picture and audio, that "finest resolution" is the sample. It is therefore the responsibility of the NLE to operate with sample accurate movements on a sample accurate timeline. (Not saying this is easy for Avid, just saying it's their responsibility). While it may be a good, smart business move for a company like SD to compensate for another company's shirking of its responsibilities, it is certainly not the responsibility of recorder manufacturers to record on frame boundaries. Or perhaps more succinctly, "You move it, you buy it".
  13. Are you saying there are editors out in the world today that don't already think they are sound designers?
  14. ooooh yeah. Hadn't even thought about that. Some of those little boogers will eat anything.
  15. Agreed, John. Sometimes all best attempts at communication by either side are thwarted, whether by producers who don't completely understand that "workflow" is often not standardized but rather unique to each project and needs to be nailed down, or by any other number of obstacles outside the producers control. I guess we just keep trying whenever we can scrounge up a name and some contact info!
  16. What a great show. I never noticed this while I was watching because I was so absorbed in the story. Even now it doesn't bother me, but I think I recognize what it is. I can't tell for sure, but it sounds like slight misuse/overuse of broadband noise cleanup or expansion. It sounds familiar to me because I've created the same type of sound on dialog the same way (not on purpose). I really hear it most in those non-tonal midrange fricatives (sh, th, j, etc. ). It sounds like the noise in that range is reduced between words. Then, when those midrange fricatives come out, the processor opens and you get the all the fricatives + the noise in that band. Because fricatives themselves are so similar to noise, it doesn't really sound like extra noise, but rather like there's just too much energy in that band (because there is). Makes those frequencies sound a bit hot and slightly harsh. I could just be full of it, but that's what it sounds like to me.
  17. +1 : Right on. As a location engineer, I always try to find out how the editor prefers the files before I deliver. Sometimes they want mono. Sometimes they want poly. Most often they say, "meh.", or, "huh?". Unfortunately, quite often they say, "Oh. We haven't hired an editor yet." Most often I say, "Why the hell aren't post people and production people talking to each other and telling each other what they need?" I consider this type of communication one of the most important parts of my job whether I'm on the production side or the post side. +1. Not an oddball. I feel the same way. But of course I'm looking at this from the audio post (i.e. DAW) perspective. If I were the picture editor who first has to drop the sound into an NLE and I had to deal with quirks specific to Avid, or Premiere, or FCP, maybe I'd care more. But I'm not a picture editor and really have no idea what makes their life easier or more difficult so I just ask whenever I can. COMMUNICATION!!!! (or WaveAgent)
  18. +1 It's already been said here, but to be a bit more emphatic... In deciding how far you need to dismantle your electronics while rinsing and blotting and wiping or how thorough you need to be during this process, it will be very good to remember the following points: 1. Salt water is extremely corrosive to electronics. 2. Salt water is extremely corrosive to electronics. 3. Salt water is extremely corrosive to electronics. 4. Salt water gets in tiny little crevasses and is extremely difficult to see. 5. When in doubt, re-read the first four points. If you DO get the salt water COMPLETELY rinsed out, you'll probably be just fine, but how you will convince yourself that you've achieved this is beyond my ability to imagine. I offer you therefore a "Best of Luck!!!". (to paraphrase this post - If you can do it without breaking stuff, err on the side of MORE thorough in your dismantling/cleaning, not LESS).
  19. Tom, I think most of your insights and impressions were dead-on, but I strongly disagree with the paragraph above. I consider myself a semi-decent mixer and semi-decent "lav placer", but I've had clothing rustle or other interference on one lav mic ruin a multi-lav mixdown often enough that I always prefer ISOs, even on a 3-channel recording. As a post engineer I always prefer ISOs over mixes. If the location mixer (who may be me on smaller jobs) did a good job mixing the initial levels, great. Dump the ISOs OR the mix track in and leave them alone, BUT, if something needs to be tweaked or repaired, it is 9372 times less time consuming to work with ISOs than it is to surgically dismantle a mixed track. You are right that there are many productions that may never see real audio post, but when there is (and it could VERY easily be on a job that only needs 3 channels), I can guarantee you that I, your audio post engineer, want, and will use, your ISOs (if I can get them past the picture editor in the workflow). 633 - SD quality (sound, build, reliability), mix and record what I most often need (a boom and couple of lavs) cleanly, reliably, intuitively in one small small light unit. Feed a couple more channels in on those occasions where I need a couple of extra mics. Timecode. Without actually having had one in my hands, this sounds exactly like what I need.
  20. Maybe it depends a bit on the flavor of the project, but I've had far more experiences like Marc where a little bit of cleaning on the original performances is far superior to my taste over rebuilding a scene through Foley and ADR. There is just something about all of the super-subtle little real things that happen in the original performance that simply can't be duplicated. I end up on a lot of little projects where I end up wearing all the post audio hats, the dialog editor, the cleaner, the remixer, Foley artist, ADR recordist, etc. It would never fly in N.Y. or L.A., but there's something kind of comforting about knowing exactly what the next audio engineer in the chain is going to need because you are the next engineer in the chain. (Unfortunately, you also know who the previous engineer is that gets the blame for all the problems you are running into because that's you also.) I find that I do a great deal of noise reduction and cleanup during the dialog edit. But I also find that I take a very specific, surgical, artistic approach to that clean up, with the sole purpose of making the whole scene feel like it's one scene and not a whole bunch of different clips. I very, very rarely slap a generic NR algorithm on a clip or a scene or a track. That just never seems to work for me. I lean far more on surgical excision of frequencies and events and spectral editing than on broadband reduction. If I do use broadband reduction, I'm pretty dang cautious with it. If I can talk the picture editor into giving me crazy long handles, I can usually live without room tone, but sometimes it's really handy just to have it in its own take so you don't have to go looking for it. Lately, I've wished more for about 5 minutes of stereo ambiance from each location rather than room tone, especially the dirtier locations. I.e. to use that sound more for sound design than clip glue (and therefore wind up needing less clip glue). The last couple of projects I've done have been the type where I can play with making them as dirty and gritty and real as possible (outdoor markets, traffic, flourescent hum, granaries, AC, busy restaurants, noisy apartments). In the last project, I actually had to add more beeping garbage trucks to a scene. (Well O.K. the garbage truck was grinding rather than beeping, but it was in half the shots and not cleanly removable so the only solution was to blend some more in and make it real.) My experiment has been to see how much dirt I can keep (or add) to a scene and still get the dialog to cut through. I know every project I work on doesn't require this much dirt, but I wouldn't mind if they did. It's been a lot of fun. I just love the artistic decisions of deciding what tiny little elements of sound to clean out, what to add, in order to pull the whole thing into a single scene. Sometimes that art fights with the practicality of an M&E stem, but I'd rather fight the M&E just a little than to lose too much of that original performance/environment. Getting back to the original question, during production, I always try to capture room tone as often as I can, but like others on the list, I'm not necessarily religious about it. I just try to keep my fingers on the pulse of the production. Most directors are pretty good about giving me time to grab it, but sometimes you can just tell that the production is running late and it ain't gonna happen.
  21. Thanks Guys, I already went back to the original project and spit 'em out in Reaper. Not that big a deal, but I may have to try BWF Widget sometime. See if it can handle the large files. I'm just always looking for tools. It's amazing how much a few simple, well-functioning utilities can boost the creative-to-tedious work ratio.
  22. Thanks, Greg. I used Reaper. It uses the BWF RF64 extension to output large BWF files (>4G), which - I'm just guessing - WaveAgent and BWF Manager don't recognize. I can output individual mono files in Reaper. I just need to do a little minor re-routing and re-render so that's probably what I'll do. It's just that WaveAgent is so dang quick and convenient for that, I was hoping to save myself a few minutes if there was a similar BWF splitting app that could handle RF64 BWFs. Ah, well. There always has to be some sort of little glitch right toward the end of a project that goes against the way you thought you were going to get it all wrapped up.
  23. Anyone know a good poly wav splitter that works on large files (over 4G)? I usually just use Sound Device's WaveAgent to split poly files, but I just kicked out a 5.1 mix for a feature in a poly wave file and it comes in at about 5G. Wave Agent is not recognizing this and I presume it's because of some 4G file size limit. (I think the file itself is O.K. I can open it up and listen in Reaper. And Wave Agent is still O.K. because it's splitting my smaller 5.1 trailers and stereo mix files just fine.) I can go back into my DAW and set it up to output each channel mono and re-render, but I would love to find something as handy as Wave Agent to just split the file I've got. Thanks, Doug P.S. Also just tried Fostex's BWF Manager. Same story.
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