paulears

I think that as a supplier, and thus a distanced participant, if asked I'd happily quote and do it. My usual team would also jump at the chance. I've decided that my approach is to trust the organisers, who usually have to take local authority input anyway to get necessary permissions. If the authorities, with their scientific advice input deem an open air event safe, I am confident I can keep myself safe, and keep my people safe too. So often in our events, we 'strand' and operator in a booth or small tenty thing and surround them by barriers anyway as the normal way of operating. I'm not seeing any significant risk as it's rare for technical ev ents people to get close to anyone - perhaps with the exception of people fitting personal radio mics or in-ears. This clearly needs additional protection but we can do this. I cannot think I'd turn down income now unless the event was unsafe - if the participants can parade safely, that's good enough for me. I doubt veterans will be worried about this at all. Those not well will not take part, those fit and healthy will look at what the event is about and make a decision. If a veteran decides they wish to participate, then the tiny risk I face is almost embarrassing compared to what they've been through. Clearly - it's individual choice, but I am not going to just say no without considering the real risks.

The inputs on the ATEM are pretty sensitive, and the outputs on the X-32 somewhat potent - all my direct attempts with 3.5mm to jack into the various outs did not work well at all. In the end, used a DI box with the XLRs wired to 3.5mm and unbalanced. The ATEM seems to compress hot signals quite aggressively but doesn't distort them that much, which is a little odd. Tried the Behringer jack outs very low, but the noise between signals seems to be brought up randomly.

You want new curtains because they're tired. To get them involves finding a legitimate Health and Safety concern, so their replacement cost can come out of a budget designed to increase safety in the college. Is this a rather sad use of public money when a day spent with a cheap sprayer from B&Q and some flamebar would solve your 'public' problem? You're using the system to get new drapes, and I do understand that, but we spend hours trying to prove to over zealous officials that things are safe, and this kind of process makes old tabs become some kind of really scary thing to have around. I perfectly understand how college budgets work and the wangles that have to be done to get things - but I'm not sure H&S is promoted by these scare tactics to the gullible H&S department. I've used the perfectly functional devious plan myself with the daft budget planning system colleges have, but as I'm out of education now, I can swap tacks and wonder a bit ............

I've done a few jobs where schools were adamant they wanted motorised bars to keep their idiotic elfs of safety satisfied, many of whom got the job because they were rubbish teachers and needed to me 'promoted'. The people I was doing the job with sent me back to do some training, and I stuck a sticker across the key switch they had provided for the elf - to stop anyone lowering them without permission. Going back when they did their annual service to advise on something else, my sticker was still across the lock hole, undisturbed. The lights on the bar were clearly different, so the users had just carried on with the A Frame, which meant the entire project was a waste of money! The elf, however was happy and presumably moved on to the sports department. (Different school, but I really had to smile at the Health and Safety Sticker on a long case in the gym store. WARNING - two members of staff or 4 pupils must carry this case for safety reasons. I found that ironic considering inside the case were ....... Javelins!)

No problem with second hand winches, apart from the tricky question of having them rated. I can suggest a firm who are really good, understand the weird things we do and are proper engineers. In fact, they always smile at my requests because my idea of safety is quite different from theirs. Mine do theatres and marine stuff. I worry about wanting to lift 500Kg from a point and then in their workshop they're crimping a cable the size of my arm in a huge machine. Makes my 6mm largest wire rope look feeble. Theirs is used to tow an oil rig! We tend to think about things as purely weight. They think about dynamic loads - the starting, the stopping and the braking. Mole were very common in TV studios for those shorter length bars, and to engineering people easy to verify and install and then give you a rating. You do need of course regular inspections. Let me know and I'll send you a phone number and they're up for general chats about projects. They cover the whole country, but miles matter of course.

I find this one particularly sad as I've known Ian Westbrook since, well, probably the 80s. He's the most talented person I know in his field. The stuff he's produced for QDOS over the years directly and indirectly via places like Plymouth Theatre Royal were always stunning. The work he did for the Palladium pantos was so good. Such a sad thing too happen. He's going to carry on designing, but I think around ten people have lost their jobs and it's just horrible that a perfectly sound business gets killed off so quickly when orders just stop. Looking at the list of cancelled shows, there will be plenty more!

If I needed another - I'd buy that with no hesitation. A good price and they're decent heads - plus the mid level spreader is there. Do keep an eye on ebay though - one of those but without the case went a few weeks back for £650. That's quite rare, but I think a few people need the cash.

Plenty of excellent Vintens, Satchlers and Miller out there around 10 years old for less than a grand - All these have crazily long lifespans. My favourites, the Vintens often come up and a decent set of legs and well looked after grey 5 head often pop up on ebay - I think I paid around £600 for a Vinten 5 in really good condition. The heads ae the critical thing for me. Avoid the 500/501 heads and the Vinten badged versions. They're just not a patch on the proper heads. Mid level spreaders are a bit rarer - but still appear from time to time. I like the Vintens mainly because they're smooth, but no matter the angle of the camera and the pile of batteries hung on them, they stay put when you take your hand off the pan handle. many do not!

One of my Chinese suppliers tells me their theatres have reopened this week where she lives. She also tells me that foreign sales, to people like me have just collapsed and their big sales of ship freight have ceased. The sea journey takes too long for people to risk waiting.

Or an X32 of one variety or another.

I rather like the Atem mini - but I control it by the software, rather than prod the buttons - it does, however have 4 HDMI ins, networking and a USB-c out that can go into your computer for streaming.

Insurance is a snag at the moment, among many snags, but as the other tenant upstairs is an insurance broker, he's doing the donkey work for me. They're scrutinising the pictures on my web site to ensure I am NOT a DJ, DJ businesses are not good for insurance at the moment? It's covered at the moment, but need to get the best deal. I am having some amazing snags appear. Electricity supply the biggest issue. The previous supplier, and the meter owner is Opus Energy, and they will NOT supply me. Minimum consumption is now set at 10,000KWH over the year. so that's around £1800 a year minimum on electricity. I tried a few companies and they all have this magic 10,000KWH bottom limit. I got advised to try a broker. I'd never heard of utility brokers, but one found me a deal with British Gas Lite, which is around the same price as my home electricity - just a tad more per unit. So I went with them. I've just had a letter from Opus saying that as the current occupant, even though I have no contract with them, they are allowed, for safety reasons, to charge me a pound a day (just under) as a standing charge until I find an alternative, and also electricity used in this period will be charged at double what I pay at home. This, with some research appears accurate. Take over date is the 7th next month, so they charge me £30 because I've not gone away quickly enough! Water is also causing me trouble as I have to select a supplier, who will then take over the supply from whoever it is at the moment. Broadband was interesting too - Vodafone have the best deal but cannot supply. Despite a 6 month old BT socket on the wall. Vodafone's cabinet is too farm away. Anyway - despite the bad reviews (which to be frank they all have, as people only review when things go wrong) I have Talk Talk business broadband going in after a BT Openreach visit in a couple of weeks. Alarm is all in and cameras, and at the moment using the friendly insurance office wifi. All the gear is now stored, and I'm setting up a temporary green screen for a job next week till I can get lighting grid up - that is just aluminium scaffolding coming from the staff company, two doors down, and the sign company 100m away is doing the signage. Amazing all the things I need are walking distance. Insurance is a snag at the moment, among many snags, but as the other tenant upstairs is an insurance broker, he's doing the donkey work for me. They're scrutinising the pictures on my web site to ensure I am NOT a DJ, DJ businesses are not good for insurance at the moment? It's covered at the moment, but need to get the best deal. I am having some amazing snags appear. Electricity supply the biggest issue. The previous supplier, and the meter owner is Opus Energy, and they will NOT supply me. Minimum consumption is now set at 10,000KWH over the year. so that's around £1800 a year minimum on electricity. I tried a few companies and they all have this magic 10,000KWH bottom limit. I got advised to try a broker. I'd never heard of utility brokers, but one found me a deal with British Gas Lite, which is around the same price as my home electricity - just a tad more per unit. So I went with them. I've just had a letter from Opus saying that as the current occupant, even though I have no contract with them, they are allowed, for safety reasons, to charge me a pound a day (just under) as a standing charge until I find an alternative, and also electricity used in this period will be charged at double what I pay at home. This, with some research appears accurate. Take over date is the 7th next month, so they charge me £30 because I've not gone away quickly enough! Water is also causing me trouble as I have to select a supplier, who will then take over the supply from whoever it is at the moment. Broadband was interesting too - Vodafone have the best deal but cannot supply. Despite a 6 month old BT socket on the wall. Vodafone's cabinet is too farm away. Anyway - despite the bad reviews (which to be frank they all have, as people only review when things go wrong) I have Talk Talk business broadband going in after a BT Openreach visit in a couple of weeks. Alarm is all in and cameras, and at the moment using the friendly insurance office wifi. All the gear is now stored, and I'm setting up a temporary green screen for a job next week till I can get lighting grid up - that is just aluminium scaffolding coming from the staff company, two doors down, and the sign company 100m away is doing the signage. Amazing all the things I need are walking distance.

Five years ago I sat in a theatre with Graham McLusky and his programmer, Ben Shipway - After panto, he decided he wanted to do something else. Now, he's a doctor! That's a great change of career.

If they really will be only used for private stuff and experimenting with and not distributed, I can possibly help - drop me a PM and we can chat. The problem really nowadays is that people are very protective about their stuff. I got sent some live stuff to re-mix, and very clearly they'd tried to fix the pitch of the singers and the fretless bass, but the spill made doing this so obvious. They swore blind they had not pitch shifted anything, but trying to fix this is good experience I think. I've actually still got the recording I did live of a chart band from the 70s, and recorded in the early 2000s it was so bad we aborted the project as unfixable!

Mark - Floor area 54 m2 slightly tapering over the 12m depth - so 6m wide at one point, 4 at the other end - with a ceiling height of 2.8m. I've been in and measured a few things and I think I'm going to use some of it as studio space - rather than storage, and a few mails today to old clients suggests that there's a local demand for video work. I've got lights, sound and video, and some green screens and black drapes all in cases, so rather than just store it, I can use it. This might work out quite well, because with the space, I can do quite a bit of stuff I can't do at the moment. I'm assuming that the summer theatre really is on thin ice now, so need another source of income. For the price of the storage, I could have an earner? As I have the kit, I may as well try using it. I derailed my own topic here - which was entirely my fault, but back on topic - I don't know if anyone has also noticed shop rents are at a low level too - I wonder if anyone has considered diversifying into selling to our industry. I see lots of comments on Facebook about the financial situation many of the big boys are in, so maybe there's mileage in selling services and products this way? I just can't see that many of my old clients will ride this out. At least all my outstanding invoices are now cleared, I understand this is not the case with some of my friends, who have quite large debts owed from bigger companies, with little hope of recovery as they simply have no income to pay bills with. Anyone else looking for alternative sources of income? Something else to think about if you have a few quid in the bank is look at ebay. There are lots of decent products going at the moment for very low prices - not pocket money prices, but I've just bought another video camera - and there are radio mics, cabled mics and recorders going for well below their normal value. Quite a few from hire companies who seem to be clearing stock. Now is a great time to delve through ebay for bargain quality kit. I'm hopeful us small fry will get through this with better prospects for the future.

Tom - I understand, but this simply won't happen. There are no members of staff who understand these kinds of things. You live in a world where your organisation really understand the legislation, the codes of practice and have systems that are tried and tested. Sadly, this is a very variable feature in the venues I work in. I'll use one that was demolished a few years ago as an example. If you don't know what mercury is, how do you dispose of it. Funny stuff, but after a few weeks it had gone - I suspect it went in a skip to landfill. Sheets of plasterboard, chipboard and funny grey hard stuff all simply dumped. Ancient tins of chemicals, and even boxes of theatrical maroons from the 60s - in the store cupboard one day, gone the next. I provided one venue with a copy of the yellow book. I pointed out a few things they really needed to do. Nobody understood it. They really believed it didn't apply to them, and that's the problem. So many theatres are not run by the big organisations with their policies, rules, handbooks and systems. I copied the handbook I spotted at the Plymouth Theatre Royal - thinking it would help one venue I visited regularly who do front of house terribly. The idea of briefings, reporting and training fell on deaf ears. At my summer venue cleaning staff are mostly non-English speaking. In normal times, if I need something, I have to find a supervisor, explain to them, and they translate. Really nice people but their English is hello and goodbye, and the occasional thank you. If it opens, then they'll see the mess, get the mops and disinfectant out and that will be it. No special procedures, just muck to be cleaned up. They do NOT clean above the ground, so poo in the grid, flys, roof space and other technical areas will be left. There is no way any form of thorough cleaning will be done - no chance at all. I'll clean my gear. Everything else will be left. When some engineering work took place in the grid, the owner went up to see what they were doing. The grid timber floor is not all over - lots of voids and no handrails or protection. I walked in one morning to find the cleaners with their hoovers in the grid. They'd been sent up to remove fifty years of dust! This is the world I live in. Rated, carefully selected approved fixings will be nails, COSHH is about collecting the little slips of paper and keeping them, First aid at work courses offered to part-time staff who might all work on identical shifts. Fire safety courses for people who only work 9-5. They do have immovable rules about some things where perhaps the local authority has patiently explained - but then, because they misunderstood they waste a fortune on unnecessary things. Skips nowadays are priced on what you put in them. The most expensive is a skip you can put anything in, so you use those ones and assume everything IS everything. Recycling doesn't happen. You build a paint store and have a fan running to vent it 24/7, but it's for paint. Industrial solvents and other gassy products aren't paint, so can't be put in there - it doesn't say paint. If people don't understand, it doesn't work. people like me cannot convince them to change - they've been told so nothing changes.

The cleaning will be to give the cleaners some buckets and marigolds and some disinfectant. Scrub till clean.

I just bought a couple of those varytec stands. B stock and even cheaper. They only had one so I got a brand new boxed one at the b stock price for the pair. They’re actually rather good! Thanks for the tip!

No! And worse, on YouTube somebody just posted a video of yarmouth in lockdown including video footage from a drone that flies down the pier and the missing panel in the fly tower is clearly still there. I can only wonder what the mess is like now. Probably time to go and remove more gear once I can put it somewhere!

I've worked from home for ages, but one unfortunate side effect of the shut-down for me has been that all the gear I have that used to live happily in regular client's premises has kind of homed - and my house, my workshop and studios are full of flight cases and boxes. Even worse, we're selling my mum's house shortly as she passed away recently and her garage is full too! I've found a very local office and store that has been empty for a while and the other tenant and the owner don't like the idea of it staying empty. I'm taking it on and should have it finalised in a few weeks. Rent is cheap, landlord seems a nice guy and the other tenant (an insurance broker) needs a key to my bit as that's where the meter cupboard is - I'm happy with this and means he'll keep an eye on it when I'm not around. Looks like if you want some extra space, now is a good time to look around and see the bargains - they don't seem to advertise these places on line - but most agents have these on the books. The agent who I'm going through has nothing on line less than £450 a month, but he had two available for half that, and mine is a tiny bit less than that. Council have 100% rate relief, so the only cost is insurance, electricity and water - all metered. Now could be a good time to expand a bit. Worth a look?

With shows with unskilled or young people, the biggest safety issue is people running under a bar or cloth coming in. We routinely station our people at the bar ends to make sure they come in safely, but grabbing and shoving somebody out of the way is still common. Motors, controlled by somebody out of direct sight of the entire thing are scary - and all these Chinese things and indeed proper hoists are so slow. Training somebody in loading/unloading, adjustments and proper weighting is time consuming, but you don't need to do that for basic operation. Ten minutes is sufficient for some supervised practice and the safety briefing. We can have people safely flying cloths in a very short time. They often over shoot, or stop before it's on the ground, and often go too slowly, but they can release brakes, fly the cloths and re-apply the rope lock safely and efficiently. Not as smoothly or accurately or as fast as the real crew, but the risk assessment finds no issues. I suppose it really boils down to somebody having the courage to say they are safe, and making a note of it.

With shows with unskilled or young people, the biggest safety issue is people running under a bar or cloth coming in. We routinely station our people at the bar ends to make sure they come in safely, but grabbing and shoving somebody out of the way is still common. Motors, controlled by somebody out of direct sight of the entire thing are scary - and all these Chinese things and indeed proper hoists are so slow. Training somebody in loading/unloading, adjustments and proper weighting is time consuming, but you don't need to do that for basic operation. Ten minutes is sufficient for some supervised practice and the safety briefing. We can have people safely flying cloths in a very short time. They often over shoot, or stop before it's on the ground, and often go too slowly, but they can release brakes, fly the cloths and re-apply the rope lock safely and efficiently. Not as smoothly or accurately or as fast as the real crew, but the risk assessment finds no issues. I suppose it really boils down to somebody having the courage to say they are safe, and making a note of it.

The very worst amateur are those who try to emulate professional productions without knowing very much about what happens. Crazy rules that transfer from venue to venue badly. Stupid adherence to hierarchical pyramids. The worst of course is assuming that age=experience. The best amateur companies give the jobs to the most appropriate people, and live with an 18yr olds running clever, expensive and technical resources - simply because they understand it and can do it properly. The worst ones need the 18yr old, but put them working under an older person who simply is out of their depth. They get fed up and leave. The good news over the past 20-30 years is that amateurs are getting better at everything, sometimes even better than the pros, who always have budget ahead of art, yet shout the reverse loudly. Over the past year I've restarted doing jobs for amateur organisations and I like it.

Applied 14th, and the money is in my account today - At least I can now stop dipping into my pension funds! 4 days. That's actually quite good!

Did mine today, approved and payments directed to my bank, within 6 days. Not a lot, but it's all a help.