Nick Flowers Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 The question I asked here has been answered! Here is the answer: http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/all-things-audio/130695-bazooka-mics.html And the question really still stands...does anyone else apart from me remember these bazooka mics from the days of President Reagan's press conferences? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mirror Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 This thread is useless without pictures. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 13, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Well, of course if I had any pictures I would have posted them. But the brief description in the original post must suffice. For those of us who can make a mental picture from a verbal description I will try to sum it up from the brief views I had on the TV screen. About 4 or 5 feet long, operated over the shoulder and pointed at a distant speaker. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Philip Perkins Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Yes, I remember them. They were as you say and "sighted" along the top tube. They were a kind of desperate measure and didn't sound very good, as I recall. In addition to the reporter asking the question you'd hear lots of paper shuffling, camera clicks and murmer of other speakers at nearly the same level as the speaker. If the speaker was near the front they worked better, of course, but speakers in the back were just noise--the anchors would have to repeat the question (if they understood it). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomBoisseau Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 I think you might be refering to the Electrovoice 643. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 13, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Thank you, thank you guys! This is something I have been trying to track down and find out about for years. And now I know. Really grateful. Nick F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomBoisseau Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Here is where you need to go. Lots of info here. http://www.coutant.org/ev643/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 13, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Wow Tom, that's fantastic. I doubt that there are any here in the UK, but I would love to play with one and see how it compares with an 816 or one of the newer gun mics. Thanks again, really appreciate it. N. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomBoisseau Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 I remember some years ago seeing one of these on ebay. I sure wish I had bought it. Probably would have looked great on my wall sitting in a gun rack (although I suspect my wife might have felt differently). Definitely a real good discussion piece. Shortly after seeing the unit for sale on ebay I called EV and asked about it. Apparently the outer "sleeve" (windscreen) was made of a similar material to the foam windscreens we use today. As a result you can be quite assured NONE of them would have survived. They just deteriorated over the years. Tom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 14, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 14, 2015 We'll have to ask Rycote to make a wind gag (plus windjammer) for the EV 643! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pindrop Posted December 14, 2015 Report Share Posted December 14, 2015 Early 1960s: The EV 643 “monster mic” is introduced. Six feet long, it is highly successful in picking up distant sounds and becomes a standard at presidential press conferences, political conventions and athletic events where conventional mics can’t handle the distance problem. The EV 643, a shotgun mic measuring 6 feet long. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikewest Posted December 16, 2015 Report Share Posted December 16, 2015 I had the great task of standing on the roof of the Arsenal Stadium pointing one of these beasts at the ball for the full duration of a football match! mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 16, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 16, 2015 Ah ha! Most interesting. So there is a chance that there may be some of these leviathans lurking still somewhere in the UK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Philip Perkins Posted December 16, 2015 Report Share Posted December 16, 2015 In the USA various EV shotguns were used for all sorts of work up into the 1970s. The one the guy has in the video is missing its foam outer sleeve, which is probably not avail from EV any more. All the EV shotguns I used or saw in those days were dynamic mics, and pretty noisy by today's standards. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rachel Cameron Posted December 16, 2015 Report Share Posted December 16, 2015 17 hours ago, mikewest said: I had the great task of standing on the roof of the Arsenal Stadium pointing one of these beasts at the ball for the full duration of a football match! mike There's still the question looming, Mike, as to whether that's you in the advert. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikewest Posted December 17, 2015 Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 Lovely question Rachel!! I was working for ATV Network in London not ABC Good try Regards mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rachel Cameron Posted December 17, 2015 Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 Damn! Okay then, another question: I quickly snapped a few pictures on a job recently where this one was used as a prop. I plugged it in to see if it did anything at all, but I assume it needed a power supply and/or was long dead. It had a series of aluminum tubes, all banded together, of decreasing lengths, in a spiral to the bottom, where it felt 'weighty', and had a short crusty old XLRM coming out of the tail of it. It felt like it was about three to four pounds, and looks a bit like a Gatling gun. I never saw anything like it. Does anyone recognize this mic, or know anything about it? Rachel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 17, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 I have read about these, Rachel, but I have never seen one in real life. Those tubes do the same job as the slots in the tube of the sort of the shotgun mics we use now. In other words the pressure waves from your audio source enter the tubes and combine at the diaphragm. Those arriving from straight ahead are in phase with each other and those from an off axis source begin to get out of phase as the angle increases. The slots in our present gun mics do the same thing except that the slots allow the pressure waves into the one tube. I started in the business in the early 1960s and Sennheiser, AKG and Electro Voice gun mics were well established then, so these Gatling guns things must have been out of date at the latest in the 1950s, I would have thought. I speak out of ignorance here, and under the correction of anyone who knows better, but I would have thought that the mic you show would have been a dynamic microphone and would not have needed a power supply. Although Germany used Neumann condenser mics during the Second World War I don't think that they really caught on for film use until Sennheiser brought out the 804. PS I've just seen some information that suggests that condenser mics were in use in the USA before they were popular in the UK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 17, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 PS. I have been looking with more concentration at your photos, Rachel, and on reflection the microphone has a rather home made look to it. I wonder if it was reconstructed at some point, or even botched up from scratch? Those tubes just don't look quite right. PPS. I found this: In 1937 WE introduced the D-99098 tubular directional element,which converted the 618A omnidirectional unit into a "shotgun" or "rifle" microphone.This design was used for long-distance pickups. I snipped that from here: http://users.belgacom.net/gc391665/microphone_history.htm And there is this http://www.moosenose.com/MachineGunMic/MachineGunMic.htm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Manzke Posted December 17, 2015 Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 Colin Hart built one of these some time ago. At the end of his article you'll find a pdf with some more in depth information:http://hartfx.net/newtest/2010/03/131/ And the finished mic with some recordings:http://hartfx.net/newtest/2010/03/how-my-sound-snooper-turned-out/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Immoral Mr Teas Posted December 17, 2015 Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 On 13 December 2015 at 4:09 AM, TomBoisseau said: I think you might be refering to the Electrovoice 643. I've just requested my demonstration. They're coming round after lunch on Christmas Eve if anyone wants to attend. And yes, there WILL be a Super Softie available by BVE. Jez Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rachel Cameron Posted December 17, 2015 Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 4 hours ago, Nick Flowers said: PS. I have been looking with more concentration at your photos, Rachel, and on reflection the microphone has a rather home made look to it. I wonder if it was reconstructed at some point, or even botched up from scratch? Those tubes just don't look quite right. Quite honestly, the 'mic' looked so crude, it could be home made. The aluminum tubes looked like they could have been repurposed from old TV/RF/FM antennas we used in the U.S. ~ referring to those 'fishbone' styled ones people used to put outside their homes, some ten feet up or so on a mast (I still use one, as I seldom watch tv, so I've my flatscreen wired to it for broadcast). And come to think of it, the tubes were roughly the same diameter, too. Also, the black bands looked like old fabric friction tape, even though I noticed no characteristic loss of adhesive or gooey-ness happening on the bands, as usually does with old friction tape, whether the fabric kind or the plastic kind. Interesting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rachel Cameron Posted December 17, 2015 Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 4 hours ago, Michael Manzke said: Colin Hart built one of these some time ago. At the end of his article you'll find a pdf with some more in depth information:http://hartfx.net/newtest/2010/03/131/ And the finished mic with some recordings:http://hartfx.net/newtest/2010/03/how-my-sound-snooper-turned-out/ Thank you, Michael. I had to clip and repost the advert here. Patty Hearst would have been envious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nick Flowers Posted December 17, 2015 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2015 And behind the microphone, please note the camera with no zoom lens - boom operating was easier then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nicko Posted April 3, 2016 Report Share Posted April 3, 2016 These mics are fantastic, is there a collection you could take a look at anywhere in the world? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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