FCC Decision May Impact Your Work!

[Dan Brockett]

Originally Posted by Nick Flowers

Wayne, is the radio transmission of the TRX digital or analogue? I heard a few years back that digital radiomics had synch problems because the A/D and D/A parts of the system introduced delays, a headache when mixing in with other sources. Presumably this has now been sorted out?

(Dan, did you get my email about my trip on African Queen?)

Hi Nick:

Yes, I did and thanks. There is a lot of lore about that boat(s). Very cool that you were able to touch movie history.

Dan

[Bill Davis]

Originally Posted by Wayne Brissette

The Zaxcom TRX units have been adopted and are currently being used by several of the big mixers in NY and CA working on major features. So you theory is very flawed from the outset. In fact because of certain things, it's the professionals who use these rather than the casual practitioner, this becomes evident when you understand how these units work.

SNIP

Because this system relies on time code and aligning the audio in post, the casual user isn't going to like it. In fact, I've worked on many projects (some with fairly large budgets) that didn't use time code because they want to run audio directly into a camera. This is going to be the major shift people are going to have to understand. They are either going to have to deal with the new FCC rules and more RF hits if they choose to go wireless into a camera (common), or go wired from the mixer to the camera. But then they still will have to deal with any wireless lavs, or they are going to have to start using post audio a bit better and not relying on camera audio all the time.

Wayne

Clearly my understanding of the system was flawed.

The passing notice I read did not emphasize that it was both a transmitter/receiver and a simultaneous recorder in one package.

I'm a little confused, however, since I thought the original idea of full digital linkage between the Zaxcom transmitter and receiver eliminated the kind of analog transmitter "hits" that we all associate with traditional systems. And that if you were within signal range, you were assured of a pristine recording.

Is that not the case in practical use?

[Marco Leavitt]

"This is going to be the major shift people are going to have to understand. They are either going to have to deal with the new FCC rules and more RF hits if they choose to go wireless into a camera (common), or go wired from the mixer to the camera. But then they still will have to deal with any wireless lavs, or they are going to have to start using post audio a bit better and not relying on camera audio all the time."

You know, there's a part of me that feels like maybe there are some positive things that will come out of this mess. I'm frankly tired of being forced to overuse wireless by lazy producers and getting underbid by people with little to no experience and cheesey, low-budget equipment.

[Wayne Brissette]

Originally Posted by Bill Davis

Is that not the case in practical use?

In most cases that is true. However, I still hear that awful cell phone beeping on occasions, which I'm not sure is truly the issue of the signal, but more EMI related to the transmitter or receiver.

Yesterday I had the privilege of recording one of the local orchestras, which was being filmed. I fed them a stereo feed from the Deva in the control room to his perch in one of the boxes with a TRX900 with a stereo adapter. He was very impressed with the signal. Since I used four mics on stage, I still have to mix the project, but he got a nice guide track. ;-)

Wayne

[Bill Davis]

Originally Posted by Wayne Brissette

In most cases that is true. However, I still hear that awful cell phone beeping on occasions, which I'm not sure is truly the issue of the signal, but more EMI related to the transmitter or receiver.

Yesterday I had the privilege of recording one of the local orchestras, which was being filmed. I fed them a stereo feed from the Deva in the control room to his perch in one of the boxes with a TRX900 with a stereo adapter. He was very impressed with the signal. Since I used four mics on stage, I still have to mix the project, but he got a nice guide track. ;-)

Wayne

So Wayne,

Am I correct in thinking here is that the Zaxcom units, while qualitatively the top of the heap in field recording, are really the province of those recording double system - and do not make good single unit wireless solutions? At least for those of us who want to capture muxed audio/video files directly to an NLE timeline in post without the need to sync anything?

[Wayne Brissette]

Originally Posted by Bill Davis

So Wayne,

Am I correct in thinking here is that the Zaxcom units, while qualitatively the top of the heap in field recording, are really the province of those recording double system - and do not make good single unit wireless solutions? At least for those of us who want to capture muxed audio/video files directly to an NLE timeline in post without the need to sync anything?

??? I'm not sure I understand the question. Is it that you still get cell phone interference or that I sent a stereo signal and still have to mix the project, so my feed was not everything? In this particular situation, we had four mics for the orchestra, the two main mics in the center were fed to the camera because in a musical multi-track situation like that, the final recording needs to be mixed properly in post. That's true for just about any musical project. More true where the video is done on multi-cameras where things will be spliced together, like will be done on this project. But now we're getting off topic. Maybe we should break this out into a new topic and we can discuss the merits of various wireless systems.

Wayne