Your questions?

[David Morgan]

Tom
Rent a Beachtek box for line level into your GL-2. The company has all kinds of interface boxes that will work for you. Check them out online and try to find a rental house near you.

[Shaun Roemich]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

The December issue is already out? News to me, wish I had a copy. I didn't think it was coming out for another few weeks ;-) I wonder if they come out earlier up there? It's possible. The publisher doesn't always send me copies and it seems that my local Borders always gets them really late.

Dan

Sorry, just saw this.

Bought them both from an independent bookseller (2 or 3 location chain) called McNally-Robinson. Great little find and an informative series (based on the two I've seen).

[Marco Leavitt]

Dan, one article I'd love to see would be about tips for hiding lavs, dealing with chest hair, avoiding cable rumble, etc. That's the thing I think I struggle with most these days. What do you do about the guy in the tight t-shirt? The actress in the tiny mini-skirt? The guy with chest hair so deep I can hear it scratching his clothing from three feet away?

[Dan Brockett]

Originally Posted by Marco Leavitt

Dan, one article I'd love to see would be about tips for hiding lavs, dealing with chest hair, avoiding cable rumble, etc. That's the thing I think I struggle with most these days. What do you do about the guy in the tight t-shirt? The actress in the tiny mini-skirt? The guy with chest hair so deep I can hear it scratching his clothing from three feet away?

Hi Marco:

Already in the works although this will be a Ken Stone article with a ton of pictures. There is not enough room in the HD Video Pro column to do this the way I would like to so this one will be for Ken's website. I'll let you know when it goes live, probably sometime in January.

Dan

[John Willett]

Originally Posted by Marco Leavitt

Dan, one article I'd love to see would be about tips for hiding lavs, dealing with chest hair, avoiding cable rumble, etc. That's the thing I think I struggle with most these days. What do you do about the guy in the tight t-shirt? The actress in the tiny mini-skirt? The guy with chest hair so deep I can hear it scratching his clothing from three feet away?

Avoiding cable rumble (1) - loop the cable and trap it with the croc. clip (some clips have a slot to put the cable in (eg: Sennheiser MKE 2).

Avoiding cable rumble (2) - if used on the body, use a sticky on the cable as well as on the mic. any cable noise after the sticky should not get through to the mic.

Tight T-shirt - always a difficult one and you need to run the cable where is most unobtrusive. Rycote undercovers can be useful here.

Tiny mini-skirt - this brings back memories of the BBC guy describing how he did this with an actrwss with a very short skirt and bare midriff. She basically had to pretty well strip naked for him every day (and I still remember his face as he told me). Transmitter was on the inside leg pretty will tight up against the crotch - the mic was hidden in the bra and the cable tucked and hidden round the strap - the cable came down the back and was hidden by covering with flesh-coloured tape.

Chest hair - probably best here to stick to the chest and use a Rycote undercover to minimise rubbing noise.

Sweat - if used in the hair-line put an upside-down "V" with Vaseline on the forehead with the peak on the cable just above the mic.. Any sweat will then run along the Vaseline "roof" and drop off the ends, rather than going into the mic.; just make sure it's long enough so the sweat doesn't drip into the eye.

I hope this helps.

[Tom Blizzard]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

Hi Tom:

In a live music situation, the optimal way to record the program is always to get a tap directly off of the sound mixer's board. Trying to record live music through speakers will never be too successful, generally the SPLs will be too high and you will also pickup the actual distorting of the speakers themselves.

My advice would be to buy some long XLR cables and run a tap from the church's soundboard (line level) to your GL2 (I assume the GL2 will accept line level inputs?). If I was shooting this with two cameras, I would get a tap off of the board for one camera and I would just use camera mic on the other camera. Most of the time live sound mixers will mute open mics once a performance has ended in anticipation of the applause and you probably could use the camera mic's pickup of the applause and for other times when the master output is muted from the board.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

Dan

My thanks to Dan and everyone else for your suggestions and comments.
This was by far the very best audio we have had from this location. I was given a section on the main board with 2 XLR outputs to my cam and the freedom to adjust the inputs from all the mikes that were set up. Two outputs to my cam but both were identical mono. That way I could set my two channels at different levels to cover unexpected peaks and other things.

I could control the mix to my cam. For example: one mic for the solos, one for the piano, several for the main choir, one for a trio, etc.,etc. So I was free to do my own adjusting. Thanks so much. This is the way to go. excellent suggestion

[Chris Swanberg]

I think we are starting to use Dan's thread as a Q and A thread, instead of a suggestion thread for his column.

[Tom Blizzard]

Originally Posted by Chris Swanberg

I think we are starting to use Dan's thread as a Q and A thread, instead of a suggestion thread for his column.

Chris, Is this good or bad ?????

[Dan Brockett]

Anything that results in subjects I can write the column about are fine with me.

Thanks all.

Dan

[Shaun Roemich]

Dan: I haven't seen the mag up here since I last wrote. I assume it is still in publication from the discussion on here...

[Chris Swanberg]

Hey if Dan is jiggy with it, who am I to say anything... I just felt it needed to be raised is all... carry on...

[Dan Brockett]

Shaun:

As far as I know, they are still around. Since you are in Canada, might be glitches in getting issues up there. I will ask my editor what the deal is. Hopefully they are healthy, I keep expecting to receive that phone call since so many of the trade magazines are going belly up and digital only. The are a paid subscription magazine, not a freebie like all of the other industry mags.

I have two articles in the upcoming February issue and have already turned in my articles for the April/May issue. Hmm...you do know that they only publish every other month, right?

Dan

[Shaun Roemich]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

Hmm...you do know that they only publish every other month, right?

Dan

Perhaps that's the issue since the last issue seemed to be particularly early... Thanks for the insight Dan. Quite enjoy the mag in general and you articles specifically.