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Always nice to feel appreciated


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A producer I have worked with before wanted me to cut my rate to do some "Simple Sit down Interviews" and she also wanted to feed audio to 5D and not run double system. I told her no to both and this is the email I got today.

Remind me to never again do an interview without you there.  I just uploaded the footage from yesterday and it's totally unusable.  God knows what the camera op did, he said he knew what he was doing, but the audio sounds like the people are 100 miles away and we're in a wind tunnel.  It was this wealthy couple who totally rearranged they're schedule to do this for me.  I'm mortified.  Anyway - just want you to know I've always appreciated your talent, but do so now more than ever!

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Wow! I salute that producer for admitting defeat. I had to do a little 5D project a couple of weeks ago, and I drove the cameraman crazy by stopping down every hour or so to check to make sure the audio was OK. It was just a quickie for the web, so they opted not to use the backup I made -- but I had one just in case.

It's maddening that neither the 5D nor the 7D have any audio monitoring. Why, it's as if it was designed just as a still camera...  notallthere.gif

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I have looked and looked and I can't find where you feed it timecode.

There is no dedicated tc input on a 5 or 7d. You could feed tc into the audio input but I don't know how that would work in post. I've always hung a wireless on the camera or used the internal cam mic to create a scratch track for post syncing mostly with plural eyes.

Eric

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There is no dedicated tc input on a 5 or 7d. You could feed tc into the audio input but I don't know how that would work in post. I've always hung a wireless on the camera or used the internal cam mic to create a scratch track for post syncing mostly with plural eyes.

Eric

I was making a joke referring to Marc's still camera comment.

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I honestly don't know whether I should be happy or angry about the Canon craze. Unless we start shooting films on phones (don't laugh, you know anything is possible), I can't think of a worse camera to make a movie on. They simply aren't very tough; it overheated repeatedly while on location in Temecula. I've also heard many complaints from the post department as well. Granted, they are very affordable, but they're cheap for a reason.

On the other hand, the 7D has finally made a lot of people realize the importance of sync sound, and made my gear and my services more in demand. I used to get so angry when someone would make me run sound right into an HVX, if for no other reason than they didn't want to take the time to sync it!

So please, someone tell me if this fad is hurting the sound department or making us more appreciated?

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I honestly don't know whether I should be happy or angry about the Canon craze. Unless we start shooting films on phones (don't laugh, you know anything is possible), I can't think of a worse camera to make a movie on. They simply aren't very tough; it overheated repeatedly while on location in Temecula. I've also heard many complaints from the post department as well. Granted, they are very affordable, but they're cheap for a reason.

On the other hand, the 7D has finally made a lot of people realize the importance of sync sound, and made my gear and my services more in demand. I used to get so angry when someone would make me run sound right into an HVX, if for no other reason than they didn't want to take the time to sync it!

So please, someone tell me if this fad is hurting the sound department or making us more appreciated?

I have more than a few clients who have joined the DSLR bandwagon. They know that in camera audio is a reference/scratch track at best and insist on a real audio recorder. I send a feed to the camera via wireless record on a CF card and at days end the card is downloaded to their computer for post syncing via Plural Eyes. They're happy, I'm happy and the check is $150 bigger than it used to be. So to answer your question I don't see it hurting us at all as it gives us the opportunity to charge for a recorder that we never could when audio to a video camera only was the standard.

Eric

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They know that in camera audio is a reference/scratch track at best and insist on a real audio recorder.

I try never to feed the 5 or 7D any audio the camera mic is good enough for dailies and to hear the slate clap. I enjoy renting production my recorder and leaving my snake in the truck.  I have more issues with RED productions trying to use on camera audio instead of my recorder tracks. Bottom line as long as client is happy and continues to hire me I don't care which audio they use.

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. Bottom line as long as client is happy and continues to hire me I don't care which audio they use.

I think you should care. Supposing they go with the camera scratch track for whatever reason and someone comments on the lack of quality audio to the client. The client will no doubt say it was done by Whitney the sound guy. Now doubts have been raised in the clients mind about your abilitys and the other person who brought up the subject will make a mental note not to hire Whitney the sound guy.

Now if it's the kind of project where you get screen credit and the above situation happens, there isn't a place far enough away where you can hide. I know the sceanario I described is somewhat far fetched but it's your reputation on the line. We all have the same tools so to speak, the only thing that we have to sell is peace of mind.

Eric

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