How far do you go to secure your audio?

[Noa Put]

When I record audio for the speeches or during the ceremony I always secure a backup, but this year it has happened twice to me that I had my dr40 connected to a mixer and a backup in front of the soundspeaker when the venue's soundsystem failed in the middle of a speech so the groom had to start talking loud without a microphone. The only thing I did was move up close to the groom to record the audio with my onboard mike which was far from ideal but I still could understand what he was saying, the soundquality however was much worse then the sound I originally had from the mixer. I should have plugged a lav onto his vest and placed a recorder in his inside pocket but that would mean telling him to stop with his speech while I go a prepare this which could take a few minutes but I didn't do that.

Same could happen when you have a wireless recording during the ceremony and you are monitoring the sound when you hear the receiver at the groom dies, would you go up to the groom while the ceremony is ongoing and replace his recorder and lav with something else? Would you just work with whatever you have or would you disturb a ceremony or tell them to stop with their speech until you got things in order?
How far do you go to secure your audio when things go wrong?

[Andrew Smith]

Anything important in a wireless kit gets fresh batteries. I'd rather pay a few dollars than risk being mortified both at the time and when I later explain to the client what happened.

Andrew

[Noa Put]

But what do you do if you hear that the wireless kit dies because of an empty battery, do you replace it in the middle of a church ceremony at the groom or do tell them to stop speeching while you replace a battery? :)

[Steve Burkett]

I never use wireless for the Ceremony, perhaps civil, but interference especially in some churches makes it potentially dodgy. I use a pocket recorder with lapel mic and only on 1 occasion has it let me down when I didn't connect the lapel mic properly. A zoom H4n is placed nearby as backup.

For Speeches, I have a Zoom H4n plugged into the sound system if in use, and audio recorders placed on tables in front of each speaker. If some are on other tables, I arrange to have them stand by the head table, but place an audio recorder on their table just in case they don't move as have been caught out before. A GH4r with shotgun mic stands close to the head table on wide angle. With 3-5 audio recorders for Speeches, I generally get something I can work with even in cases where there have been issues.

For me the venues sound system is a luxury, but I never rely on it as I've had too many cases of it going wrong or being discarded. Plus quite a few Weddings have the Speeches given sans mics. I do have a guy who works for me who has each speaker pass a wireless mic to the next person after finishing their speech. It works surprisingly well and I keep thinking I should adopt this method.

[Noa Put]

I think I didn't explain my question in the right way, it's not about what you all do to secure your audio, it's about what you do when you loose it completely, do you take it as it comes and use a camera onboard recording or do you interfere in a ceremony or speeches to re-secure your audio so you get the best audio again? Like you hear the audio drop out from a wireless receiver during the vows and the priest is not using a microphone so you are basically screwed if you don't intervene, do you shout "hold on!" or "cut!"? :).

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

But what do you do if you hear that the wireless kit dies because of an empty battery, do you replace it in the middle of a church ceremony at the groom or do tell them to stop speeching while you replace a battery? :)

I would never have a battery die as I always used to use new batteries for every wedding.

[Noa Put]

But again, what it God cursed your battery and it would decide to die midst recording, what would you do...

[Steve Burkett]

I would never intercede or interrupt a Ceremony or Speeches to secure my audio. Maybe in between Speeches I'll jump in, but never ever for the Ceremony. That's why I'm blooming careful setting up audio beforehand, as I know there are no 2nd chances.

[Noa Put]

Ah finally someone that gets my point! :D I know we all do as much as we can to have backups and to secure our audio in the best way we can but even the big players, like Ray Raymon has had his problems with a wedding with no usable audio from the vows like he discussed in one of his workshops. His solution was to let the couple redo the vows after the wedding and try to say it the way they said it at the ceremony and then try to sync it up with the ceremony footage. It was done ok but I noticed that it was "fake".

I was only curious to know how far you would go to fix if it if all went wrong.

[David Barnett]

I would never interrupt a ceremony. Not even an informal one I don't think. Maybe if it was outdoors & informal & then wind etc was just terrible (beach wedding, which I never really do).

Having said that, don't we all use rechargable batteries? Or do some pocket recorders not take AA, AAA etc. Me, I use a wireless lav on the groom, input 2 is my camera audio, and camera 2 has audio so I'd resort to that in post. I get what your asking, 'what if' something went wrong on the wireless. Well then I would just switch to input 2 or camera 2. Not ideal in the least but that's why its a backup plan. If you ask me whats worse, using ambient on camera audio or interrupting the ceremony, in my personal opinion interrupting the ceremony is worse.

Also I really need to buy a zoom or some pocket recorder. Tired of couples talking throughout the ceremony.

[Robert Benda]

I'd never interfere. However, like Roman, I have faked vows after the fact - one of my first weddings, long before I knew pocket recorders were a good idea.

I used wireless last year, and I've relied on the mixer output only. Neither mistake will be repeated.

I also put a pocket recorder on the pastor, which serves as backup for the vows, if the groom's recorder fails.

I've thought about it, but haven't had a problem, but if I couldn't mic the groom and/or pastor, I'd rig a Rode mic on a small stand or gorilla pod, fed into a pocket recorder, on the front pew, if I had to.

For the speeches, recently had a couple want to do the speeches immediately upon arrival. So I put pocket recorders on the Best Man, MOH, and groom, rather than risk a flaky DJ or putting it on the table where ambient noise would kill me.

[David Barnett]

I just reread your post Noa. If it was speeches, and the venue's speaker system which cut out, maybe then I would interrupt a bit, and quickly mic up the speaker. Depends how I currently have it setup to record. Sometimes I have the lav mic simply nearby the DJ speakers. If I was plugged into the DJ's Line Out board, it's a bit much for me to switch over from Line to Mic input, and reattach the mic (assuming it's still in my bag), I'd really start to ruin the moment by getting all this resetup, which to me is a no-no. Plus it's not really my fault the venue speakers knocked out. Therefore as I said before, my 'backup' plan is on-camera mic.

[Clive McLaughlin]

Noa, just so you know you aren't going insane, I started reading this thread thinking to myself 'That's not really what he is talking about...... No, that's not what he is asking.......THATS NOT WHAT HE'S ASKING!!!!!'

So just to clarify... your point was perfectly clear, but as we are often inclined to do online.... people just took the thread in the direction that was of more interest to them.

Personally for me... I've often wondered the same - would the bride thank me for interrupting if it was for the sake of getting what I was hired to do.

I often think that my brides are quite keen and picky in the run up, but somehow when the day itself arrives, most brides tend to shrug and say 'its fine!' on the day itself.

I've never interrupted anything, because I always feel like brides, on the day actually care more about living the current experience, than the quality of the digital capture of the experience.

[Steven Shea]

I would definitely not ever interrupt anything mid-ceremony or speech. MAYBE if the b+g made it clear that really clear vows were of the utmost importance to them.

I'd probably try to sneak in between speeches. Usually one of the backups gets something halfway decent, but audio is always way more nerve racking than video, I find.

[Andrew Smith]

I wouldn't interrupt. I'd just point the shotgun mic at the action and get the best 'fall-back source' audio you can.

Andrew