paulears

Over a hundred kids, chaperones and chaos. A few boys, but the majority female. Quick changes everywhere because there will be thirty kids on stage, 30 in each wing, and probably more upstage waiting. Fellas on the crew struggle with just being around them, and worse, we have people left and right to stop them getting flattened as cloths come in and out. So sometimes kids have to be physically moved out of the way, when they take shortcuts in blackouts. Mic fittings can be managed, that doesnt bother us too much, but you need somebody who can push through hordes, crash into dressing rooms, and sometimes grab somebody by both shoulders and pull them out of harms way. Girls work better than fellas at this kind of thing. Otherwise you get a crew member come up and say, paul, I need to get into the gel room and there are girls changing in it (having found an empty, private space with a door). chaperones are normally non technical, being a mum. Id not trust any of them to do mic fittings. I have always been the type who would say to the chaperone what I need to do, and how I intend doing it and then doing it myself under scrutiny. Always asking the child if it’s ok for me to do x and y, but my younger guys no longer want to do this. Worse we now get more issues, with adults. I have had both sexes complain about a sound 2 touching them because they are trans. In all my years doing this kind of thing, I have only started to have problems since we started being more open? I have fitted radio mics on females for ever with zero issues if its done appropriately, but now its just too much of a risk. I also have little faith in the standard of amateur chaperones, either being useless, or totally over the top, but with a poor understanding of what the role entails. In these kind of shows, were not talking about sound really, we are talking about safety. The stupid stuff like a kid being too close to a cloth going out and the conduit lifting them off the ground, or hitting them on a head, or on one notable night, a girl standing in the wings getting her skirt over the top of the counterweight brake lever, and as she made her entrance, it flipped the brake off, and the slightly out of balance bar made a very slow entrance of its own. None of the stage crew could get through the throng to stop it. thats the kind of issues we have. 10 am arrival, 6pm show. My role is always, as technical manager, toilets, toilet paper, spillages, mopping up wee on stage. Just going into their toilet is tricky for a bloke. for me, dance shows like this NEED female crew, and that’s covered by the equality and discrimination law.

Im not too well at the moment, and instead of being on stage for a forthcoming dance event, I shall be sitting glued to a chair in the sound box. Im the only person with a an enhanced DBS check, something oddly that has never, ever been asked for! Ive been really struggling to find females on stage. I had a girl from a school, who had been ‘sent’. She declared on first meeting that she didn't do kids, ropes, lifting and headphones. I pointed out this rather meant she didn't do theatre at all? She thought for a moment, nodded and never came back.

We’ve had the same topic posted as new, since 2003. Nothing has changed, despite technology going crazy. The other thing that never gets enough emphasis, is the operators. The thought goes into the kit and rarely the people. I cringed through one memorable school show where they had spent a fortune on hiring in lights and sound. I was in the band. After the first rehearsal the hire company were slagged off for giving them rubbish equipment. The girl mixing the sound wasn’t good enough to act, sing or dance, so got given sound. She was sitting behind the mixer, too scared to touch anything. Faders in a row where the hire company had tested everything and left. If you have mics, they get given to the people who dont need them. That is quite normal. Stage edge, or hanging mics pick up the loudest sources, exactly as the audiences ears do. The kid with the pale pink voice doesn’t get made better by a mic, they get more exposed and if they hear their voice, they get quieter till they can’t hear it any more. What is needed is a teacher like the old style shouting dance school principals. Those that scanned the group and could yell EMILY, SING!!! dont forget too that personal mics means touching the kids. Twenty years ago, I felt comfy doing this, now, I hate it. I have some dance shows coming up and I am really struggling to find girls for the crew. the advice to not get involved seems sadly, to be very good advice. Poison challice for so many reasons now.

I'm old now, and discover my ways of thinking and working have changed from finding ways to get around obstacles, to be pointing out the obstacles I used to get around. Worse, I'm frequently working at the totally responsible end of the safety spectrum, and also forced to work at the ignorant end. This is worrying me more and more, because very often I'm now the oldest person - and I'm noticing enforcement and litigation constantly links age with responsibility. When something goes wrong, age points EVERYONE to me. It is now 20 years since my last FAW training. Yet every time something happens, a real first aider isn't available. People come to me because I will know if something is dangerous, and who they need to sort it (even if I have no expertise in that area). The crazy councils in my area fight with each other, let alone applicants. Schools believe all sorts of ridiculous things nowadays, I suspect it's because as academies, everything complex and buildings related is handled outside the school. It leads the staff to be unaware and untrained outside teaching. They won't know about the rules for outside activities. My personal experience of attempting to sort things is met with disbelief. When I get worried by events I have no control over, I have contacts who can 'accidentally' get involved early enough to sort them - as in the phone call from an 'organiser' telling me an official has been in touch and is asking for X, can I sort it, when they actually ignored me when I pointed it out. I now have my own test. The Judge Judy one - I imagine me standing in her court, with her common sense over-view. When presented with being senior as in the person to ask. I just do what I could justify afterwards if it went wrong. So far, it's working. Do it, justify it, forget it. (sounds like a railway message?)

Oh yes, ⅔" mount lenses are on ebay in all sorts of ages and prices all the time. The only snag is that they too are designed for the optical system of the day - so ⅔" lenses may well fit on newer cameras, but the limitations of the glass resolution can be awkward. My studio has 3 JVC HD cameras - I have my old SD very expensive lenses, and a couple have built in 2X converters. I can tale off the standard and wide angle HD lenses and put the old mega expensive lenses from the 90s on the modern camera, and it effectively makes the lens have a VERY long focal length. If I do something like a parachute video, from the ground I can see the jumpers exit nearly full frame. However, on a white cloud background, around the edges of the dark objects in the frame are coloured artefacts. Like you see when trying to project gobos on older lighting gear with rougher lenses - coloured fringing. For the few times I use these lenses I get away with it. The cost of HD long focal length lenses is crazy. I'd definitely think about camera and lens separately if you sell, because the cameras are probably not a draw at all, but you could get interest on the glass - depending on what you actually have.

The valuable bit is the glass. The cameras, frankly are just too old. SD and composite video limits any form of connectivity with modern gear. A few people still collect 2/3" glass

Short shotguns are nowhere as narrow as people often think. Critically, it's the rejection at the rear that's important, so making sure the rear faces the unwanted sound sources is good. You might discover from the lighting bar position, that the stage sound creeps into the side lobes. Maybe you could hire/borrow some different types - Sennheiser 416, Audio technical (the longer and shorter ones) and simply try them out and record their output to assess. They might work better lower down, so the rear faces the amps and drums, PA etc. Don't expect too much, they'll be much better than boundaries - but the usual caveats apply - unless they sing out, it doesn't work that well.

The Twins FX - but as Tom says, radio gear is not cheap, plus the motors and control. That said - your local model aircraft club have the radio experience, and the rest depends on the size. How big is it? Second hand or death bed disabled scooters are great sources of batteries, wheels and drive components. If it's much smaller then model racing clubs who race those big wheel things might work, like robot wars.

Still less than a happy meal?

For me, HDMI and HDMI converted to SDI is always a punt. Even worse, so many computer monitors are locked to very precise frame rates, and TV's that have HDMI inputs are much better at producing a picture. You grab a camera, it says 1980x1080 and you discover it has SDI out, so grab the blackmagic converter and stuff a short (because they're more reliable than long)HDMI cable in to the monitor, and get a framerate mismatch message, or worse, nothing. You plug a camera with HDMI out into a monitor with HDMI and it doesn't work - maybe 1080i not p, or maybe the length of the HDMI is just a tad too long? I've never found the answer, but it's infuriating.

Over the panto season I made a series of youtube videos, and I picked one to share - somebody asked me what I put in my show reports. Might be interesting to newcomers, and old lags too!

Over the panto season I made a series of youtube videos, and I picked one to share - somebody asked me what I put in my show reports. Might be interesting to newcomers, and lags too!

'Takes' sort of works, but we'd also use clips - but using your example, if I'd recorded them I'd probably describe them as Capture 1 close, capture 1 medium or capture 1 distant, or capture 1 position A etc. Describing them I would be happy with "listening to clip 3, distant perspective" or Clip 14, position 6 ..." Personally, I'd probably use clip or capture almost interchangeably In my head, I'd use 'take' for clips that are re-recorded over and over again - so take 3 would be the third attempt. I have 'capture' more as a good word for a process, so the microphone in the recorder would capture the sound in the room, and stick into a number of audio clips that can be collated and used later? So for me 'capture' would be really a verb? Does that help? Other may well have other terms they'd use. As it's all digital nowadays a file could be a good description, but I don't think I'd use in in your context? 'Takes' sort of works, but we'd also use clips - but using your example, if I'd recorded them I'd probably describe them as Capture 1 close, capture 1 medium or capture 1 distant, or capture 1 position A etc. Describing them I would be happy with "listening to clip 3, distant perspective" or Clip 14, position 6 ..." Personally, I'd probably use clip or capture almost interchangeably In my head, I'd use 'take' for clips that are re-recorded over and over again - so take 3 would be the third attempt. I have 'capture' more as a good word for a process, so the microphone in the recorder would capture the sound in the room, and stick into a number of audio clips that can be collated and used later? So for me 'capture' would be really a verb? Does that help? Other may well have other terms they'd use. As it's all digital nowadays a file could be a good description, but I don't think I'd use in in your context?

None of my expensive or cheap LED gear flickers - a thing of the past really. Garden or workshop floods are hardly that useful for event lighting - but most of those are flicker proof on video now.

None of my expensive or cheap LED gear flickers - a thing of the past really. Garden or workshop floods are hardly that useful for event lighting - but most of those are flicker proof on video now.