Decca tree outdoors ??

[Bob Hart]

Postscript to the above.


The audio guy was gracious enough to give us a mono feed to the second camera, so this in not representive of final sound. The operator was having a hard time getting the kids choir audio up.

The Araluen Botanic Park ampitheatre offers some challenges to the audio guys.

I did rig the Decca tree for crowd singing but it was just an exercise. The crowd got stage fright and did not sing at all.

For curiosity sake here's what a small Decca tree with 900mm approx arms sounds like outdoors. The setup was centre front mike switched to omni, the wing mikes to figure 8. Low frequency attenuation was selected and that was not sufficient to suppress the boom of the speakers which were two rows of two, one pair at the stage, the second pair halfway up the hill.

ROLEYSTONE COMMUNITY COLLEGE CHOIR AT ARALUEN 2014 - YouTube

[Bob Hart]

As luck would have it, setting up the Decca Tree or any other mike system for that matter, was a lifesaver as it turned out. One can never have too many redundent recording devices it seems.

I discovered the line level feed to the second camera had dropped a few times, so it was bacon saved. Audio is obviously ambient but not too bad. The sound system must have delay to the rear ( closest ) speakers because there is not a strong interaction against the front speakers.

Things look to have come a long way in sound systems. It is something I have not examined in 29 years since I experimented with dolby surround with extremely separated speaker systems as a triangular arrangement in a outdoor cinema.

[Gary Nattrass]

So have you ended up with a mono feed that is un-useable and a decca tree that is picking up all the sound via the PA system?

Not exactly ideal and go back to my initial idea of an M/S mic pointed at the choir as it would give you a far better stereo image of the natural sound.

When recording audio for video it is always important to bear in mind that the audio needs to fit what the camera is seeing and not what is being heard in the auditorium. I have done many a recording with just a mono feed of stage audio and then have post produced the auditorium depth in post production. Adding a stereo recorder just picking up audience reaction to add during transitions or when applause is needed can also give more flexibility in post.

[Bob Hart]

Gary.


There is the old saying. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

This old horse baulked at the trough and learned a few lessons in the process.


One of the issues I faced was that the venue folk were adamant that I could only set up on a patch of mulch right at the far rear of the audience and to the far right. There were to be no structures or hardware anywhere within the audience area or between audience and performers. I did take a stereo pair of C74s on a mount plus a tripod and decided not to erect them because of the restrictions, plus people and kids also moving into the closer allocated side camera's work area. All the more fool me for not having set it up.


Thank you for your inputs. All advice is muchly appreciated.

[Christian Brown]

I'm a bit too late, but yes, you will find trees outdoors. Here is the National Christmas Tree Lighting in Washington DC two weeks ago.

[Bob Hart]

Christian. Better late than never. Now that's not the volcano state but presidential Washington City isn't it. The suspended array of mikes in your image is probably what the soundies should have had over the College kids choir instead of miking them from the front with a row of three on stands.


I actually took along some Christmas string lights to wrap the Decca tree with so no innocents would pass rashly close, scone their cruets, draw blood and leave samples of dandrufff, skin and hair.

It transpired that we were only allowed to set up in a patch of garden mulch somewhat out of reach of the subject by our modest 17-75mm cine zooms.

ENG lenses would have been better but you make do with what you have. Must try to find a sponsor and do it properly next time round.

[Benjamin Maas]

Missed this thread earlier... I use trees pretty regularly when working outdoors with large ensembles. This tree uses DPA 4006 mics with 50mm balls on the ends. It's from a festival that I do the sound for every summer that involves high-end recording and amplification of major classical artists.

This is a picture of a rehearsal of the Kurt Weill 7 Deadly Sins with Storm Large, Hudson Shad and The Knights.

--Ben

[Bob Hart]

Benjamin.


Thank you for your kind response and sharing of your setup.

[Bob Hart]

A vote of thanks for all who have advised me on this forum over a few years.

At another outdoors music gig tonight, I used the blumlein pair. Much better.

[Bob Hart]

The shoot was not all beer and skittles. The wide master cam which was to take the desk feed decided to dummy spit. The camera's sound section went down and then it was databogging, filling the buffer, then closing the clips.

So I took the desk feed which was mono into one of three channels of the SD302 mixer and sent it to left and right channels of the remaining camera which had been set up with two mikes as a Blumlein pair.

Okay, so it's not perfection but one of the bands wanted their footage to use in a promotional so it was not as disastrous after all. They also took a desk recording so we were covered. You can never have too much redundency.

RMC CONCERT IN THE PARK SUNDAY 1ST MARCH 2015 - YouTube