Laurence

The 100 days pertains to getting on the Roster, which is a list maintained by Contract Services. The union membership is the money part with Local 695. Yes, if you pay your money to the Local to join the union but don't prove your days to get on the Roster at Contract Services, you may have problems getting union work. But it sounds like you may be able to achieve both requirements... union membership and Roster placement. It probably depends mostly on being able to show that the music work you did was film/television production work.

Contract Services is very particular but they really only require one thing... proof that you have experience doing a job that is covered by the contracts. If you have clear proof, the path to membership, though filled with paperwork, is actually quite easy. If the proof is not so clear, however, neither is the path to membership. Regarding Robert's comments, it's unfortunate to hear him say that the union has done nothing to improve lives when the opposite is so true and you will hear that from the majority of union members. Also, it pains me even more to hear someone reduce the discussion of whether to be or not to be in a union to nothing but a comment about needing to be in the union in order to work on the bigger shows. While that may be true, the reason to be in this union... or any union... is so much greater than that.

Tig, the IA doesn't actually dream of people joining the union and then failing to qualify for health insurance. But what that comment does refer to is the reality that by simply paying perhaps $50 per month for dues, the IA will not provide you and your family with something like $500 per month's worth of health insurance. Nice as that would be, the math is impossible. The health insurance is backed by payments made by the Producers, some of which are based on the hours that you work. If you don't work much, then the contributions made on your behalf are miniscule and you won't get the insurance. But if you work a couple of days a week, you will qualify. Try finding another job with the bar for health benefits set so low and the quality of the health plan... for both you and your family... so high.

Tig, the comment that was made about money was just a cynical way to express something not relevant to your question. And the advice about the feed to camera not counting towards your days may very well be wrong, since production sound mixers provide feeds to camera on a pretty regular basis. If it was a concert filmed for television and were in charge of audio.. microphones, mixer, monitoring, feeds, etc.... then you may be fine if the employer letter describes it as providing audio for production as well as more a live audience.

Why not a Fisher boom? I'll hazard a guess that may not be the answer in this particular situation but would apply to many. It's a dying art and there are many top-notch sound mixers and top-notch boom operators who have never used one or even seen one up close and have an unrealistic understanding of how they work, what they do, how much they cost, etc. etc. That's not a very good reason but I think it is the reason that they are overlooked in some situations where they might have been very helpful.

Courtney and I have a good Richie Havens story. Fifteen years after Woodstock, we were both at Max Yasgur's farm prepping our (world's first computerized) teleprompters for a live NBC news show on a Sunday night (competing against 60 minutes) with Linda Ellerbee and Andrea Mitchell. The theme, of course, was a Woodstock retrospective and the guests were William Kuntsler and a few others representative of that era. As we finished the prep on the afternoon of the shoot it began to rain like a mutha. We left for a long lunch and when we got back to the field late in the afternoon, no one else was back yet so we just sat in the van while huge rain poured down on us. A limo pulled up, dropped off Richie Havens, and took off. Richie's just standing there in the rain holding his guitar so we open up the door of the van and invite him in. Super nice guy so we just sat there chatting for a while. Very suddenly, the rain stopped and the late afternoon sun burst through a dramatic mass of storm clouds, sending bright rays streaking across the rolling fields. It really was an incredibly striking image... and so reminiscent of the rain during the Woodstock concert. We were in awe and no one said a word as the sun brightened... and Richie reached for his guitar and started to play "Here Comes the Sun". I looked around and wondered if I would always be able to remember that moment.

For those who have never seen a Fisher in action, it would be nice to see an entire scene to demonstrate how the cuing capability exceeds what can be done with a fishpole.

In sitcoms, cameras are on the move all the time and these things can easily happen. And especially when they're shooting on peds, camera placement is haphazard and not easily repeated. They probably saw it and just didn't worry about it. And why should they? With a crowd of 200 people laughin' and scratchin' outside of view of the cameras and with a half-dozen microphones specifically intended to capture all that extraneous off-camera sound, the illusion of reality is thinly protected in this type of production. With only a few takes to choose from, I've often seen them go with the one with something unintended in the shot.

Exactly. Take the job and then help to flip it union. If you are a non-union worker, you'll probably be invited to join the union at a greatly reduced fee.

Crew, I had a similar experience as you. Like you, it was a commercial in the late 80's and we were still getting set up when in walks Jonathan Winters through the big stage doors, all by himself, carrying all his wardrobe changes over his shoulder. He stood there for a moment looking at us and taking it all in, and then without even putting any of his stuff down, launched into what turned out to be a non-stop 45-minute hysterical and sad and amazing riff on everything and anything that popped into his head. The entire crew had stopped what they were doing and gathered around him, smiling so hard that jaws would ache. The AD finally herded him off to makeup but when he returned, it just started all over again. Continuous improv after each take would break up everyone on the stage and destroyed any possibility of establishing a shooting rhythm. But one thing that was really weird was how he'd go off into something and then after a while you'd wonder where the joke was. But the joke never came. There wasn't any punch line. We'd all have huge grins on our faces but then realize he just got dead serious and this wasn't for laughs. At one point he suddenly went into great detail about how much he hated his dad... he's not kidding... this is serious... long silent pause... and then right back to the comedy. At another point he was talking about the time he was "in the insane asylum" and they were looking up at a TV mounted on the wall and it was an episode of The Twilight Zone "with me and Klugman" and the guy sitting next to him said "Hey, isn't that you up there?" and he said "Yeah" and the guy said "But... if... that's you up there... then... what are you doing down here?" and then he just looked at us and shrugged and shook his head and didn't have an answer... and then after a long and awkward pause, he launched right back into the funny stuff. Clearly a troubled man... perhaps an example of how genius and madness can come so close... but he was utterly brilliant and a whole lot of fun to be around that day.

It doesn't have to be Florida, of course.... might just take place in Florida. Doesn't the guy over on the far left look a bit like Daviau in the 80's?

Rumble comes from the rollers inside the main tube. If the noise can't be rolled off... and even if it can... it may be time for a trip to the shop, where it's standard operating procedure to change out the rollers from time to time.

Sure, do that.

It's not common and it's most likely not a function of operator handling unless they have a habit of cranking it in and out ridiculously fast all the time... which would seem highly unlikely. Do you know what model boom it is and from where it was obtained? Do you know what mic they're using and if they're using the proper Fisher cable and mic mount?

I think perhaps he meant that joining the union would offer him access to a category of jobs that would otherwise be unavailable to him. If that were perceived as the only reason to join, however, it would represent a misunderstanding of the value of a unionized workforce in helping to protect rates and conditions for all... both union and non-union. And it ignores the better pay and conditions far more commonly found on union jobs. And it overlooks the health care and pension and better safety and work conditions, too. But I suspect that TC Sound is aware of some of those things... and will benefit from all of those things... if he does join a union. (Tom... I like your signature.)

Damn... now I'm overpaying by 87 cents a month! ...Although it looks like 9cube only lets you put one website on the account, whereas Lunarpages and many other hosting plans allow multiple additional sites per account. When your hosting plan supports multiple sites at no extra cost, you'd be surprised how you suddenly find ways to take advantage of it.

How does the sound compare to a decent sounding laptop?

Something that we go over in Local 695's soldering class is "eutectic" solder. Tin and lead have slightly different melting points but when you get the right proportions... 63/37 tin to lead, rather than 60/40... the solder is eutectic, which means the melting points are in sync... which allows it to go directly from the melted to solid state without experiencing that mushy not-quite-cooled state. Better solder joints. Try 63/37.

...although to be fair, you might want to also factor in how much you get back... like among other things, the potential for higher wages and health insurance for the whole family and a monthly pension until you're dead.

Membership requirements vary for different locals. Contact the local in the region you are interested in.

This article talks about 2 medications that can both protect against hearing loss during exposure to loud sounds. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/07/hearing-loss-loud-noises-noise-levels_n_2632499.html

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(I misspoke by transposing .com and .org.) Yes, the page you provided gives a good explanation of the difference. And not having to get your own hosting is a lot easier for some people. For others, getting your own hosting has benefits beyond what was mentioned on that page, like being able to setup up multiple email addresses with your domain name and FTP for large files and stuff like that... and, of course, build a non-Wordpress site. Just a matter of preference and personal need.

Yes, the Lunarpages has a one-click Wordpress install... although even without that, Wordpress is pretty easy to install manually on almost any web hosting account. Were you referring to Wordpress.org, which doesn't require that you get your own hosting plan? Yes, that's an alternative, but Wordpress.org is very limited in terms of plugins and customizability and it almost always turns out best to get your own web hosting plan and install Wordpress on that. Especially when you can get a plan as cheap as the one above.

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