View Full Version : My cams a FREAK


Steven Davis
April 26th, 2009, 09:30 PM
Ok, the thread title is supposed to be said in a 70 jive radio DJ voice. Maybe like Venus Flytrap off of WKRP. At least that's the way I heard it.

But here's what happened this weekend. I'm filming with my V1u and Z1u out door wedding, roughly about 95 degrees. Total time in the sun was about 45 minutes or so.

We did our sound check, every thing sounded good, then all the sudden the left channel on my V1u went into a buzz/whine sound, like it went out. The shotgun on the right channel had no problem. My lapel was still registering so I'm assuming that it was recording. After the ceremony, we bring it inside, and it's still out even with a shotgun plugged up, there's nothing, but after about 20 minutes inside, it started working again.

I have no idea, unless it was a heat thing, but I've filmed outside in the same heat and never had that issue.

So I post here, just a little stumped. The cameras are under warranty, but I doubt it would do much good if they can't replicate what happened.

Marcus Marchesseault
April 29th, 2009, 01:07 AM
I once had a loud buzzing across the audio for a couple of minutes. I have no idea what caused it and it has never happened again. The only guess anyone had was interference from a low-flying aircraft as I was in the approach zone for Kahului airport. I'm not so sure that was it but it never happened again. It was only about 80-85F that day.

Steven Davis
April 29th, 2009, 03:45 PM
Well, I talked to a dude at Sony, and he suggested that I turn the camera off before plugging in my lapel, and usually I do. He said if it does it again, to turn the camera off and that should fix it. It was freaky and annoying, but like a pc, I guess I should have tried rebooting. Thanks Marcus.

Robert Koster
May 1st, 2009, 08:27 AM
Steven. i recently experienced the same thing on my V1 when using a wireless on the left channel and having my camera mic plugged into channel 2,( even though Ch. 1& 2 swith was dedicated to the wireless). I ended up having to turn the camera off several times and it would stop when I turned the camera back on ...but as soon as I pushed record......whiiinnne.
So I came to the conclusion that if you have a mic, specifically wireless in ch 1 and the ch. switch on 1&2, there is some sort of conflict or feed back with a mic being plugged into the ch2.
let me know if you finally figure it out. cheers.

D.J. Ammons
May 2nd, 2009, 01:41 PM
I expereinced the same issue with my V1 three times. I finally figured out that it had something to do with possibly plugging in the XLR connectors while the camera was on and when I made sure the cam was off when I do the problem disappeared.

The first real gig I have had since it happened those few times was a wedding last weekend and thankfully the audio was flawless with my dual channel UHF wireless lapel mic set up. I was sweating bullets!

Zsolt Gordos
May 4th, 2009, 01:04 AM
Never had such problem with my V1E.
For wedding shots I suggest backup audio recording always which I do (for avoiding the above mentioned issues with missing audio): digital recorders. I have two of those apart from the shotguns and wireless I use regularly.
They record the same thing simultaneously, so in case of any recording problem I simply replace the audio with the one recorded with these guys.
They can replace wireless if there is a problem with the signal, simply attach one to the clothing just like a wireless transmitter (only thing: you have to start recording on the device right after that, but given the long recording times possible, you wont run out of space even if it records 4 hours continuously.)
I use SAMSON Zoom H2 and H4. One of them has XLR inputs and both record superb sound quality, running on batteries and recording on SD cards.