tourtelot

Wow! Great story. I miss those days so much! Imagine a whole movie with using NO wireless. I did many movies like that and even more mixing booms and wireless into one Nagra track that was used in the movie, typically, as I recorded it. Gives me the shivers. D.

I have a bunch of Countryman DIs. They work fine. That is all. D.

Yes to the Belden. "Works" well (stripping and soldering, easy to work with), fits into TA connectors, great shielding, and fairly inexpensive (I buy it in 500' rolls). We used to call this studio hook-up wire and I have wired whole top-tier recording studios with it. Good stuff. D.

But Glen, yer old. :):):):) D.

Glenn. You gotta get with the plan. It seems that sound perspective has gone the way of the Model T. D.

This is a few years back but when I contacted the IA local in Vancouver to see about their requirements for working, the woman I spoke with talked to me with such utter contempt and nasty aggressiveness that I was completely taken by surprise. One IA member to another. I took it to mean that they really didn't need any help up there As it turned out, I was okay with that. D.

So even on the lowest budget project, no boom operator, no boom (well, hanging it on a stand is okay). Mix all of it on wires (make them rent from you or somewhere else, enough to do the job) and call it a day. DO NOT HURT YOURSELF PHYSICALLY for a show that doesn't have, or won't pay, enough to hire the proper crew. If they won't rent you the extra wires to cover all the scenes, you have just gotta let one of the actors (or two, or three) go. Hard to say to someone in the "early years" but if they won't protect you from abuse, you need to protect yourself. It's called self-care and it is important. Just say "no." Someone else will give you a job. REALLY! SERIOUSLY! D. I wondered why I didn't see the offensive post in question. Then was reminded that I put that guy on "ignore" long ago. Good riddance. All on the forum can do the same and he will, like a he should, disappear. D.

Whomever DID wire your mics should know about their mistake. Let them know. D.

Also from Pete who told me that alcohol and the components inside the amplifier don't play well together so to clean the amp with the contacts facing down. D.

Just used the Cable Techniques lo-profi XLRs on some SD cables for a friend. These are the easiest XLR connectors to solder and get "right" of any I have ever used! Well-built as well. I have zero complaints about them. Curious about the lo-profi TA connectors now. D.

Verbal contracts have been found to be legal many, many times. But after that, since you don't live in the same state as the employer, it will be hard to enforce. No easy small claims court solution. I am sorry. If there is any talk about bearing responsibility for legal claims against the production in the "deal memo," DO NOT SIGN IT. You might not ever get paid, but one day's work is a small price to pay to avoid a potentially huge lawsuit down the pike. But it is bullsh!t and if you don't get paid in as fast as your verbal deal said you would, pass along the name of the company so no one else will ever need to go through your pain. And talk to the person you made the verbal deal with and tell him/her how outraged you are by this trickery. D.

One thing comes to mind. Two actually. Not enough hardener and/or old epoxy. I have had this result with both of these situations. If not either of these, I don't know another reason. This is the brand I use and it works well: https://www.amazon.com/Devcon-Epoxy-4-25-Ounce-Bottles/dp/B005K091ZU/ref=zg_bs_256244011_29?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=N5JMEJ4M94FFNK9NE7Q4 Plastic model paint (like Testors) makes a great color additive. D.

I have heard that Sennheser is changing to Cam-lok connectors on all their new SDC mics. They thought that using XLRs was boring. :):): D. PS. I am selling custom-made Cam-lok to XLR adapters for those who need them.

WTF is wrong with people (companies) these days? Gawd, I'm glad I'm not in it, fighting these stupid fights, any more. Good luck and God's speed to those who are. D.

Mac or PC D.

I went looking through the XLR bin in my shop and pulled out one that was labeled with my NYC address from a time far-far away. That particular Switchcraft A3M is probably close to 40 years old. I unsoldered the cut-off (the wire was from my "Purple Era") and soldered it onto a new piece of Belden 1505 for some little project and reflected on what else I had that was that old. Mics, of course; Schoeps CMC5s (and even some converted CMC4s), Sennheiser MKH, EV dynamics from my earliest days in sound. A Shure FP11 and FP12 box from my days in sports TV. More than a few Fibrecase Adapt-a-cases, also from my earliest days. An Atlas round-based straight stand hat has lived in my shop foreva. No electronics to speak of, the Shure boxes being the exception. A few sound books and AES docs from way back (remember Jim Tannenbaum's Time Code in the Reel World?) and a CAS Radio Mic program when HMEs and Microns were da bomb.) Lots of Canare mic cable that I bought from Posthorn (Jerry Bruck) in NYC when I put my first kit together. They have Cannon XLRs on them; Jerry thought they was the best XLR going and spec'd all the Posthorn cable with them. So it's obvious that I don't hold on to obsolete technology; not a Nagra or a DAT or a Mini-disc machine left. No Shure mixers, no Vega wireless (although I'd love to have a few back to smash with a sledge in just repayment of all the grief they caused me.) I have a fine Fostex DV824 on consignment at Trew for about ten years if they haven't put it in the dumpster. I have a 788T that will probably make it to 40 years, my mics which just never lose their value and a whole new Dante 24-track rig that will need to get updated every couple of years in major ways if the current history continues. And to all you who go through the Red Cam, Black Magic, Pro Tools, MacBook churn, I feel your pain. Perhaps it's time to make a little time capsule, bury it in the back yard. Dig it up in 40 years to see what still works. D.

Unfortunately, the auction format makes this tricky. You need to wait til it's over to buy it back which gives the seller plenty of time to get spooked. If it were me, I'd make a Phoenix police report right now, providing applicable serial numbers and let them start the proceedings. This way, no matter whom the gear finally gets sold to, or if the seller bolts, you will already have a plan in place. Unfortunately for someone who might buy the lot unsuspectingly, they will need to give the lot up as receiving stolen merchandise is also a crime. You might have to wait to get it back but I wouldn't take the chance that the seller will pull out and then try and sell the lot in a different market, sending you off on yet another search. It's all in one place. The seller is not very smart trying to sell immediately, selling on an easily monitored site, and showing serial numbers. BTW, a similar posting on another site got me off my ass and I have just finished taking photos of all my mics along close ups of serial numbers, pairs of mics in boxes, photos of groups of mics in their appropriate cases and a full .pdf of each case's complete contents. I feel like I have proof of ownership covered pretty well. I have put this information in my Dropbox so I have it anywhere that I might travel. Best of luck getting it back but to see it all in a lot on eBay must be both so damned maddening and also so relieved at the apparent ease in recovery. Wow! D.

16mm compared to the crap we see from three handheld cameras today? No comparison. I said a silent thank you to Chris Nolan for having the balls (and the commitment) to shoot on film. 70mm to boot! God bless. D.

Oooooh. I remember those!!!! Commercial bumper music on the sports trucks. Ah, those were the days. Oh, they failed all the time with spectacular results. Lots of shouting from up front in the comms. Haha! D.

Maybe he'll get a nice intern with a Shure FP31 and a couple of SM57s. D.

Who Needs The Peace Corps. D.

The 12VDC makes this hard. There are plenty of Dante mixers with fair to midlin' preamps and lots of routing capability with Dante out there. I wonder how many new-development products of the type you describe would get sold. It's a pretty specific product. That is asking a huge R&R commitment for no real guarantee of sales. The control surface that runs one or two recorders has appeal but those recorders aren't Dante enabled, AFAIK. A Presonus (or Yammy) panel and a JoeCo Dante would work well but it involves a fairly sophisticated inverter and an efficient battery. I used to run a Yammy 01V96 but the Lithium big block batteries and the real sine-wave inverter cost almost as much as the mixer and took a large commitment to field the rig, D.

Sorry for being short. Your profile shows San Francisco so I just assumed. . . . And we all know what happens when one assumes. D.

Stop by your local pro camera store and take a look. D.

As Reg says, there are often negotiations that make multi-camera work for sound, but not nearly often enough. That's why TV sounds like shite these days. No perspective to the sound; everyone on lavs. The guy across the room sounds like he's a foot away and like everyone else in the scene. Gotta say, a couple of seasons of TV was enough to show me that it was time to retire So, so happy now recording sound that almost never has a camera in the area and if it does, what I need to do is always more important to the client. Mic stand in the shot? Move the camera! D.