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Do mixers use Neve 1073's and other gear more known for their musical capabilities in the non-music sound space?


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My primary background in sound thus far is from being a studio recording engineer. I'm currently borrowing a friends Neve 1073 Preamp and am simply wondering if using this on a production set is practical? What about for Post? Feel like I could definitely run all dialogue thru this and yield a richer sound? Does anyone have experience or heard of anyone doing something like this?

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In a word ... no.  Yes, we have rack-mount carts, but we are kind of past carting around massive racks of equipment.  Plus, everything is wireless, so the pre-amps are all built into the transmitters anyway.

The pre-amps on the standard recorders are just fine if you want to stay wired.  Get a Sonosax if you want really high quality pre-amps.  The only reason to use an out-board pre-amp is if you run out of analogue inputs, and if you do, there are smaller, DC-powered options that fit an on-set workflow much better.

 

For post ... what are you doing running the pre-recorded audio through a pre-amp anyway?  I'd believe there are post mixers out there who do this so they can run up the bill and make their clients believe they are getting "richer" audio.  I wouldn't take them seriously though.

 

Seriously.  If you happen to need a rack-mounted pre-amp, I'm sure the Neve is great.  Pricey, but they have a reputation.   But it's not a practical piece of equipment on set, and there's zero reason to use it just for the name.

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6 hours ago, Samuel Floyd said:

My primary background in sound thus far is from being a studio recording engineer. I'm currently borrowing a friends Neve 1073 Preamp and am simply wondering if using this on a production set is practical? What about for Post? Feel like I could definitely run all dialogue thru this and yield a richer sound? Does anyone have experience or heard of anyone doing something like this?

No battery operated, no a big improvement in sound  = useless 

 

In other hand now, usually the booms are wireless

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I would love to be able to use a 1073 preamp on set for the booms but, as said earlier, not practical at all.

In post definitely for post-synchro (ADR) and foley recordings that could be a beautiful tool in a studio.

I have used some (the ones from BAE audio) quite a while ago for music only so far and even did a day of comparative listening with friends, between a good dozen of preamps including my recorder at that time (Sound Devices 744T) a my old Nagra 4.2. The 1073DMP did beat every single one of them, listening blindely we were all agree on it and we did not have same taste in music!! The Nagra was very close second but the 1073 had more bass and dynamic.

Nowadays if I really feel like I wanna go higher than my 888 preamps I get a Sonosax M2D2. But Sound Devices did a pretty good job with the preamps of their 8 series.

 

 

 

 

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No, but…

 

I come from music as well. Although I spent a lot of time in the studio, my discipline was live and on location. So from that perspective what others have commented is spot on. Think of it this way: sound capture is only as good as the weakest link. Using a high class front end is just going to dumb it down to that weak link. In our case it may be wireless, or ground noise, or analog to analog connects. So many variables that make the Nevé (a stellar pc BTW) pointless. I have been here exactly, not Nevé level but have used designed-for-bag Grace Designs, Benchmark, Apogee, etc.
 

Here’s the “but”:

Some projects are music centric (a-list singer or a band) so being able to offer high fidelity raw audio to post is a value add. (If they haven’t brought in a sound engineer to manage the music). This reduces dubs and ADR, both big cost savers. Most studios don’t care bc the audio is so processed by the final cut it marginalizes any of this equipment. But some producers out there know my ability to offer this so they’ll seek me out or as 2nd unit or day play for that specific scene. That’s when I bring the front end goodies but I’m usually running digital from that to recorder and avoiding wireless if at all possible. But this is very very niche and mostly overlooked and undervalued. 

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One of the nice things about being an independent location sound recordist is that usually you get to build up your own working rig anyway you want that you can afford.  So if you want to use pres like those mentioned for location dialog work, build up a system, deploy it and tell us how it goes.  As has been said, most location soundies would prefer gear that is lighter, smaller, less power hungry and less expensive than a vintage pre, where you are paying a premium for the name and rep.  Location soundies have so much gear to buy that studio folks don't have to deal with, especially wireless mics, monitoring and time code gear that most would prefer to not sink so much money into name-brand mic pres.  The other issue is that a whole lot of on-set mic booming is done via wireless anymore: there are huge advantages in mobility by doing this, but that would let out using this sort of pre.  But if you can manage it on your jobs--have at!

 

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Nope.  Here in the US, if you show up to set with a duplex cable and they are going to wonder what decade you're living in as everything is wireless on set these days.  One exception might be some Euro mixers who insist upon wired boom only, even in a narrative setting.  The dude that mixes all of Ridley Scott's films uses wired booms but he has a crazy sound team (I want to say 8ish members?!?!) and if they can't get a shot with a wired boom, he has them record wired into a mixpre with the boom then wirelessly transmitted BUT insists post use the mixpre's boom recording vs the wirelessly transmitted stuff.  There's a behind the scenes video that Simon from URSA posted about that whole workflow a while back on YouTube.

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Aside from the above arguments, we also use equipment that is as transparent as possible. Neve 1073s have a lot of harmonic distortion, which gives a lot of character to your signal. Not practical for dialogue recording. If you ever had to match re recorded dialogue with dialogue recorded on a 1073 they wouldn’t sonically match. This could work with SSL mic pres but again, you still have all the above arguments to contend with. 

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59 minutes ago, JonG said:

Aside from the above arguments, we also use equipment that is as transparent as possible. Neve 1073s have a lot of harmonic distortion, which gives a lot of character to your signal. Not practical for dialogue recording. If you ever had to match re recorded dialogue with dialogue recorded on a 1073 they wouldn’t sonically match. This could work with SSL mic pres but again, you still have all the above arguments to contend with. 

 

I didn't mean to say it, but you are absolutely right 🙌, that "color" (Aka character) is usually distortion, noise and non-linearity (although sometimes it is what you look for in the musical world)

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Schoeps would be one of those mics that are great for music and also see them in the music world. The 221b tube mics are stellar, though we obviously use the more modern variations for location sound. I don’t see Neuman 184’s too often in the field but I’m aure they would rock dialogue too. 

I am with the rest of the gang on the mic pre front. Maybe if you had a scene where you’re capturing a performance on film but even then it’s a tall order for something that is fragile and between $8-$12k. I personally like the 1084’s better

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Neve (analogue) desks were a common sight in broadcast in the UK when I started out. They certainly weren't thought of as a 'music desk' although certain items catered differently for the film, the broadcast and the music markets. (I later mixed on the AMS Neve Logic (broadcast) desks which developed into the DFC (film) desks when other AMS desks serviced the music industry). Back to the pre-AMS Neve days (?) there used to be a really great looking 'on-set' location mixer used if I remember correctly by Nelson Stoll among others? I can't find a picture but I expect someone here either has an image or perhaps the unit itself ...?

 

J

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I have Nelson’s mixer. It is an amazing sounding unit but it needs a lot of upkeep, and everybody that used to service it has retired so I can’t really use it anymore. Plus it has been modified so much that some technicians just don’t want to touch it. Sad really because I really enjoyed using it. But it is very different than 1073s or other more musical Neve mic pres. The 5422 and other 54 series mixers are made for broadcast, and although they have a nice big sound, they are a lot cleaner and meant for dialogue. 
 

IMG_1643.jpeg
 

IMG_2987.jpeg

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