Scott Smith

I have encountered similar situations with the B6. A lot of it has to do with "grunge" blocking the cap, or the protective screen on the mike itself, which is a very fine mesh. I have used isopropyl alcohol and a sharp q-tip to lightly clean the mesh, which helps to some degree. However, I think that it's tough to get the worst of the dirt out that very fine mesh they use on the capsule. It's tempting try a small brush (like that used for cleaning cartridge styli), but I haven't been that brave yet. Regarding variations between mikes-I have found significant differences between mikes when they are right of the box (this applies to almost all lav's, with the Sonotrim being the best in this regard). A number of years ago, I took quite a few new lav's into the anechoic chamber at Shure Bros. to see what the response was like. It wasn't pretty....,. Scott D. Smith C.A.S.

Doug, You've hit on a subject that has long been a pet peeve of mine. There was some discussion around this issue at the (very excellant) grounding seminar done by Bill Whitlock at 695 recently. You certainly did the right thing, and the fact that your mixer was enough of an idiot to ridicule you for standing up for you're safety says a lot about the ignorance exhibited by many crews working within the industry are when it comes to basic electricity. I still don't understand why this isn't dealt with as part of the "Safety Pass" classes. It should be a basic requirement for at least the Mixer, but ideally the full sound crew, as well as the video assist crew. I have witnessed more than a few occassions where a camera operator was nearly knocked off the dolly because the camera body was hot, due to the fact that it takes it's ground from the video assist cart. Before the time that I completely isolated our cart from video assist, I once had a 65 volt difference in potential from the video cable send to us, which needless to say didn't sit well when it was connected to our cart! These days, I carry a ground rod and cable that we can ground our cart with, and if we take power from the genny, I have a jumper that we can remove to isolate our ground from the generator ground. All you have to do is think about the amount of leakage that can get into the distro ground from various sources, and you will think twice about ever using the genny ground at all. I am still at a loss to understand the thinking regarding not grounding the production gennies; especially in wet weather situations, when all kinds of leakage occurs from the power distro and lamps. I have had this discussion with a lot of genny operators and electricians, and it amazes me that many of them still just don't get it. When we have no choice but to take power from the genny, I always check to make sure that it's grounded. (I actually walk over to check it, as I've been lied to about it in the past). Although a couple of guys have complained initially, after I ask them to put one hand on their ground conductor, and their other hand to a convenient earth ground (sign post, fence post, etc), I see their attitude begin to change. There are plenty of ways to get a healthy dose of electricity on a set, which should be obvious to anyone who takes a few minutes to think out the grounding paths between camera, sound and video on a typical set (at least if a hard wire connection exists between them). This is one area where a lot of ignorance still exists, and I don't see it getting better any time soon. In the meantime, follow your best instincts. Scott D. Smith C.A.S.

Hi Courtney I have done (sometimes extensive) editing to music tracks that were used for playback on various films over the past few years, as well as dialogue for phone calls, etc. Not every project requires this, of course, but having the option to perform edits where needed has been a great help. I have done this quite a bit for music projects where we have been re-tracking new vocals comped with an existing pre-recorded track. I have also been in situations where we have pre-recorded a track on set, and need to edit it for subsequent playback. I actually used to hand splice 1/2" and 1" master tapes to accomplsih this back in the day. A real nightmare when it came to sync! While it used to be that I would not want to touch a pre-recorded sync track, the realities of how films are edited nowadays has changed much of that. When we did the movie "Roll-Bounce" recently, I probably edited at least half of the tracks we used for playback, mostly to accomplish the segues between music sequences within a shot, extend a vocal sequence, or shorten a piece within the track. I usually send the re-cut file to the editor (as well as recording it on the production track for dailies). Obviously, the edits have to be duplicated on whatever master material the tracks were originally sourced from. --Scott

Jeff, We just shot over at that location today. The fountain is gone, but it's still a great place in hot weather. --Scott

Just a minor correction: It's Ray Cymoszinski (I not Y) A good friend for many years.... --Scott

Bruce, For the past couple of years, I've been using Adobe Audiition along with a Digigram Pocket VX card on a PC laptop. It has allowed me great flexibilty with editing and other chores, and doesn't seem to hog a lot of system resources. It saved my sanity during the shooting of "Roll, Bounce" where we had a lot of tricky music playback cues. BWF-Widget Pro has the nice feature of adding cue beeps as well, but doesn't do editing within the program. I am experimenting with a couple of ideas that will allow for outputting SMPTE code to a slate for music video style shooting as well, where the edtors prefer to see the source TC at the beginning of the take. Scott D. Smith

Hi Jeff, While I'm not really sure we need yet another production sound forum, I do like your current breakdown of topics. I will certainly be checking in to see what shape the board takes. Best of luck (do you really want another project?!) Regards, Scott D. Smith C.A.S.