J Pearce

Thomann also sell a fairly cheap solution. I'd use them for making use of house tielines, but I don't think I'd use them as a stage-snake solution, if only due to the mechanical handling properties of CAT5/6. I might use them for installing house tielines, as there's more labour used to pulling/laying network cable and it is smaller and easier to route. We use CAT6 (shielded) runs for mic lines with in-house made adapters from flown mics in our concert halls without issue (wired as two lots of one pair doing hot/cold and one pair as ground - to allow phantom power, so only stereo over the 4 pairs). This setup may have even been broadcast on a national radio station...

Hi folks. Had a request come in that I think I know the answer for, but wanted to consult the wider wisdom. Live radio as house music - if the venue is already PRS/PPL licensed, am I ok to use live radio as house music? It'd be incidental music for PRS purposes. Next - how do I then do the PRS return? Keep tabs on what the radio station played and return that, or just return that we played Radio 2 from 7pm to 7.30pm on the nth of month?

Optikinetics kit is what you want really, rather than theatrical kit. New is probably pricey, but there's likely quite a bit of used around (though used is likely to be halogen), it's built like brick outhouses...

In jobs where you're running your own cables I'd agree. SDI or HDBaseT or DVI over fibre are all far superior options, not least because of their much better support of EDID and consistency of image on longer cable runs. However, in venues where you're stuck with the house cable runs, VGA can still be a useful option. Older/poorly installed CAT5 that won't support HDBaseT will usually support VGA baluns, older BNC lines that won't support SDI will usually support RGBHV, and many venues have VGA lines pulled and terminated. VGA does have the advantage of degrading on a poor connection rather than failing, which while not always desirable in image quality will at least get the show up. That said, I've just bought a load of BNC and Cat6, HDMI/SDI converters, and a HDBaseT kit; with a view to abandoning VGA and moving to using venue network and BNC lines for our video setups when we're out and about. The enhanced definition, EDID reliability, and lack of smearing/peak level issues are great advantages of proper digital transmission.

I'm still holding out for the .1, or at least a list of the discovered bugs, being the safe and reserved person that I am. I tend to avoid .0 releases unless I have a non-production platform on which to test.

Some of the tablet/phone fear can be lessened by how you sell it. If it's an 'inexpensive securely locked down multi purpose hardware platform' that sometimes is easier to sell to technophobes than 'a cheap android tablet'. As highlighted above, most of the actual hardware platforms are tablets/phones inside, it's very hard to compete on manufacture cost with the phone makers. Delete all unnecessary apps, move all undeleteable apps to second home page, then it is unlock and press the only app available to press.

The two 10"s are probably plenty for your vocals and bit of backline reinforcement, I tend to prefer 10"s on tops for the extra clarity (probably achieved by having the crossover point outside of the main vocal intelligibility band around 1-3kHz) You might want a bigger sub or two. Perhaps another 12" or a single 15" or 18". With a bigger sub and ensuring you high pass your tops, you should get plenty of volume without working the 10"s too hard. The best method is to take it out on a gig and have a go, I don't think you'll be so short as to risk losing the gig. For comparison I've quite happily done metal bands mixed at 97ish dB on 4 10" tops and 2 18" subs in a 200 cap room.

We regularly use Tracks Live for recording multitracks over Dante. Our only crashes have been due to the storage medium not keeping up.

The SSE quick releases are great, especially on a festival stage, where you can keep a forest of mic stands good to go and just throw mics on quickly as you set the stage; or do very quick mic swaps on changeovers or on a failure. They have a hexagon shape to them, so resist spinning. Can't find them listed online, but I'm sure SSE would sell you a set if you asked.

Robannas in Brum stock them. There’s a few rehearsal studios around Nuneaton, ask them too.

It’s not been an issue yet actually, and if a lamp is getting weak I’d rather it pop on fitup when the bar is in than in the show. As also pointed out lamps are cheap compared to Lustr power supplies.

At the shiny new Royal Birmingham Conservatoire building we have everything on 16A outlets, with Zero88 bypass dimmers, where a switch on the dimmer bypasses the triac. As the house rigs are all LED we leave every circuit on hard power mode, then only switch to dim mode after we’ve rigged any extra tungsten units. Counting the tungstens go out makes it quite easy to see if you’ve picked up the wrong circuit. Circuits are then restored to hard power on the getout.

Something from the Palco range perhaps? P5 or Q7 perhaps?

I’ve had 3 of my regular venues try to update their houselights in this fashion. On every occasion the result has been unworkable and we’ve had to rig production lights to use as houselights. Venue 1 eventually splashed the cash on a very nice GDS install, venue 2 went back to halogen lamps, venue 3 only discovered the issue this week and are now back to the drawing board as halogen lamps for their fittings are now discontinued.

A size holders for S4s fit in the effects slot, whereas B size holders fit the gobo slot immediately adjacent to the shutters.

The new Midas DP48 may be of interest...

I can recommend the route Alister has suggested. We've made a couple this way, though haven't needed the gauze for our shows. It works best if you keep the light source out of view, so LED tape round the sides, as close to the front as possible. That way you get the diffuse bounce off the back rather than any direct light. Black modelbox card works well as a front on smaller boxes (and usually has a white back too, so helps the internal reflection), saves the effort of routing into mdf.

The Pulsar dimmers came with IEC as an option. They were popular in Bedfordshire schools, with matching IEC patchbay.

I'm aware of the frameworks, but my experience has always been of suppliers very much setup to install things in lecture theatres, not suppliers setup to deliver a flightcase setup as a touring package. I'll give it another go...

Hi folks, We're quoting for a proper projector, and have a quote in from the lovely folks at AC-ET but need some more quotes. Who else is good for supplying projectors with all the gubbins needed for live event use (fly frame and bracket, flightcase etc.). For university reasons, getting all the bits from different suppliers isn't really an option.

Zoneminder or MotionEye are cheap open-source candidates, assuming you have a suitable server with storage etc.

Powercon panels can be a nice compact way of enabling amps to combine onto one supply, or take independent feeds. Say a 32/1 to 4 powercon outlet distro, then a panel with 4 powercon inlets. Keep 4 powercon links and 4 13-powercons with the rack and you've got a lot of flexibility.

Some of the new mini hearing aids don't have a T loop option as they are not physically big enough to contain enough coil to receive the signal. These types are not usually issued by the NHS, but by private providers.

Smaart and a good audio interface ought to make a reasonable job of most tests, though not sure if it can do THD? Most interfaces now can do 24 bit, so I doubt you’ll find anything sufficiently flat response with 16 bit, and I’m not aware of anything 20 bit.

Impact will send a tub via courier, they've done this for a kabuki hire for me before. Hawthorn are probably closest for you though.