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Worse place in LA for wireless


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Well. I think that I have found the worst place to film as far as wireless goes..

 

The helo-pad in elysian park.  A beautiful near 360 degree view of downtown, LA shooting range, Dodger stadium, the Hollywood hills, etc.  A virtual nightmare for wireless.  Lucky to find 3 freqs, and the thought came up that I might have to drop my wireless boom in order to sacrifice to a lav.

 

Shortly after sweating all the wireless issues, then came the news helicopters.. They enjoyed just circling the spot, probably to show morning news watches, wow..look something we've never seen before, a film crew.. Thank gawd it's $50 bucks a minute to stay in the air, or they would do that all day.

 

Had to boost every lav to 150, raise the antennas, switch out packs over and over, and cross my fingers, these guys are not taking second shots for lost sound.

 

Then it started to rain.. oh boy.

 

I would say a great runner up for worst in 2nd place, would now be Disneyland, or Pasadena on Tuesdays. 

 

Infi_shoot.jpg

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Hey Richard,

 

There's only 360 degrees in a full circle.

 

I thought I'd mention that before the Senator got to you...

:ph34r:

 

Sorry about your day of wireless hell...  I'm in the Yukon this week and I'm luxuriating in the blissful glow of empty Lectro 411 RF scans.  But I feel your pain from three thousand miles away...

 

Cheers,

Brent Calkin

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I feel your pain sir! I've worked on a number of projects where I have experienced the same hell in the same blocks plus 25, and after the first experience pleeded with other productions to choose somewhere else to shoot, but to no avail.

Another horrible place is in la crescenta. Right up against the mountains next to those radio towers that Elysian park has a perfect view of as well.

Key West Florida isn't very pleasant either.

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That's the way we had to do most wireless shots in the old days...

 

I just watched a demo tape for WTVT in Tampa that I worked on around 1976, and I remembered a flashback of a PA walking with a Vega receiver just out of the shot while the talent walked forwards, towards camera, for about 20 yards. The range of the units we had I think was maybe 30-40 feet, tops, and the batteries ran maybe a couple of hours. Those were not fun days. 

 

There's a lot of "black art" with RF where interference is unpredictable and mysterious. I once went on a shoot in a downtown LA building where we were stellar for the first half of the day, and then suddenly after lunch, I began to get some hit (block 19). I did a scan and was stunned to see giant bricks of interference throughout the band. I found a few places to poke through, but it was hit and miss. At another location a block away, the band was damn near wide-open. Go figure. 

 

Military bases and aircraft carriers are among the worst I know of. I also once had a bad experience right next to one of the main AT&T buildings downtown, but that was on block 21. 22 in LA is iffy, in my experience.

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There's a worse one. Top of Mount Wilson. Wireless Hades. There are more antennas than trees up there and every conceivable frequency. Had to stand next to the actors with a remote antenna and even then it was hit and miss, so to speak.

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