Robert Poss
July 11th, 2003, 09:15 PM
I just finished a shoot with three XL1Ss. The DP had asked me prior to the shoot if I knew about the XL1's "sound overload issues." I did some research, primarily using this newsgroup, and the Canon site, since I usually only work with DigiBeta, PAL format.
I ended up going from my 442 into the MA100 (I think that's what it's called) via XLR at mic level, and setting tone (nominal 0 on the 442) to -20 on the camera (mic level). Seemed to work fine for the interviews we did.
BUT...I had a very strange intermittent hum/buzz problem. Maybe someone can shed some light on it. It was not a power supply/ground loop problem. I was using isolation transformers, and A/B'd the set-up (both mine and the cameras) with and without AC power. The buzz did not diminish even with all pots on my mixer set at zero, i.e., no audio input. It was heard only in the camera audio return, not in my mixer. I also checked audio with my headphones plugged directly in the camera's headphone out, and the buzz was the same.
The noise modulated when someone walked in front of a camera.
We were shooting on a brightly lit sound stage in which the background was bright white (painted floor and walls).
An experienced cameraperson suggested that the buzz was being generated in the video itself -- too much "white" or too much contrast (or something) for the XL1s's electronics. And this seemed to be confirmed when the buzz changed as the operator adjusted the camera's iris. Could I have experienced some sort of bleed-through from overloaded video electronics? Any way around this?
The lighting was a combination of Kinoflows and other things, which of course, I had switched on and off to see if the buzz was lighting/dimmer-related.
Can anyone give me some guidance on this? I have another date with this set-up coming up shortly.
Thanks very much. I find this Prosumer stuff confusing....
I ended up going from my 442 into the MA100 (I think that's what it's called) via XLR at mic level, and setting tone (nominal 0 on the 442) to -20 on the camera (mic level). Seemed to work fine for the interviews we did.
BUT...I had a very strange intermittent hum/buzz problem. Maybe someone can shed some light on it. It was not a power supply/ground loop problem. I was using isolation transformers, and A/B'd the set-up (both mine and the cameras) with and without AC power. The buzz did not diminish even with all pots on my mixer set at zero, i.e., no audio input. It was heard only in the camera audio return, not in my mixer. I also checked audio with my headphones plugged directly in the camera's headphone out, and the buzz was the same.
The noise modulated when someone walked in front of a camera.
We were shooting on a brightly lit sound stage in which the background was bright white (painted floor and walls).
An experienced cameraperson suggested that the buzz was being generated in the video itself -- too much "white" or too much contrast (or something) for the XL1s's electronics. And this seemed to be confirmed when the buzz changed as the operator adjusted the camera's iris. Could I have experienced some sort of bleed-through from overloaded video electronics? Any way around this?
The lighting was a combination of Kinoflows and other things, which of course, I had switched on and off to see if the buzz was lighting/dimmer-related.
Can anyone give me some guidance on this? I have another date with this set-up coming up shortly.
Thanks very much. I find this Prosumer stuff confusing....