Shotgun mics for theatre

[Jonathan Mellor]

Hi, I'm looking for any recommendations for particular shotgun mics. it's for a musical and we're already going to be running 12 channels of RF, so the shotguns would mainly be used to pick up one liners who won't be mic'd. Looking at a maximum of 6, to be clamped to the rear of the stage flats. Stage is 9m wide (Pros width) by 9m deep.

 

Cheers

 

Jonathan

 

 

 

 

[J Pearce]

My preference is PZMs over rifles, less visually intrusive, easier to find a good placement, and a less comb filtered sound. I generally find I get more level too.

Where I can't use PZMs and need general cover I go for hanging mics. Rifles will never get good cover beyond the front stage edge.

[S&L]

My preference is PZMs over rifles, less visually intrusive, easier to find a good placement, and a less comb filtered sound. I generally find I get more level too.

Where I can't use PZMs and need general cover I go for hanging mics. Rifles will never get good cover beyond the front stage edge.

 

I don't have a particular application in mind, just reading idly today - but was wondering what your recommendation of a half decent budget pzm may be and what sort of radius you would expect for otherwise un-mic'ed actors. as I say no specific application, just thought I would ask while reading the thread.

[StevieR]

We use the Sennheiser K6 modular series with the ME66 capsules. We generally get good results when placement is well chosen.

 

Steve

[Jonathan Mellor]

thanks for the replies. I was thinking about a combination of floors, hangs & rifles. The theatre has 4 AT U851 boundary condensers, and two hangs (can't remember the model off the top of my head). The director is pretty insistent that the sound of the one-liners match the sound of those mic'd but does understand this may not be possible..... hence why I'm thinking of using rifles.

[paulears]

You mention clamping them on the scenery? This would mean they point towards the audience (where the PA is aimed???)

 

Shotguns will appear to work pretty well until you try boundary mics, which work better and suffer from much less comb filtering, and look better. If you have the mics, then go with them. I used them in the 80s when I didn't know better. Since I've been using PCCs, which are directional, unlike PZMs, I've never wanted to return to shotguns. If you are hiring - see what your supplier has. The snag with shotguns for the main, is that if somebody is directly in line, then you can get useful gain, but it drops off rapidly. If you use more mics to fill in the gaps, you start to get the nasty phase hollow noise that is the product of them all interfering with each other.

 

If you really did mean having them pointing at the audience, then they'll feedback before you get any useful volume, and of course you're looking at the back of the actor's heads - so I guess I misunderstood that bit.

[Jonathan Mellor]

Clamping them on the rear of the stage flats/tormentors, pointing upstage. Not at the audience.

 

Would a combination of PZMs along the front of the stage, and maybe a few more hangs going upstage work better than using rifles at all?

[J Pearce]

My experience would suggest that PZMs/PCCs down stay and some hanging mics upstage would give far better results.

[paulears]

You spend ages installing all this, and you shove up the first downstage mic (doesn't matter what type) and when it feeds back, you drop the level a little. When you do the same with mic 2, you have to lower mic 1 a bit, then the same with the others. At some point you have all your mics live. You then do it with the people on stage, and two things happen - first, you think they're not working, and muting them makes very little difference - so much so that you might even be tempted to walk to the speakers to see if you can hear them working because your headphones must be lying, then secondly, that awful woman they put on the back row because she can't sing in tune is so loud, she'd the only one the mics are picking up.

 

If you cannot mic everyone up, then any attempt to get decent level with stage microphones at a distance is flawed. You really can't get real volume out of stage mics. They can help more distant audience locations, boxes, circle, balconies and Gods where there are already extra speakers, but gain before feedback is pretty feeble. Your stage mics will pick up all the noises, and if there is a band, they'll leak into it really well. Mics on the side will also pick up wing noise too. every show I have ever done with some miked, some not, has had pretty unbalanced sound. Very often I really wish I could have persuaded the Director to give the mics to the quietest ones. who are not always the leads, but of course, they NEED them, and the supporting cast don't - until they can't be heard!

[chelgrian]

I don't have a particular application in mind, just reading idly today - but was wondering what your recommendation of a half decent budget pzm may be and what sort of radius you would expect for otherwise un-mic'ed actors. as I say no specific application, just thought I would ask while reading the thread.

 

The most useful current PCC mic is the Bartlett Audio Stage Floor Mic (this is an improved version of the Barlett TM-125). These mis were designed by the same person who designed the industry standard Crown PCC-160 but the Bartletts are both cheaper and better.

 

How many of them to use depends on the width of your stage, use too many and you will actually reduce your gain before feedback. Barlett recommend:

 

20 ft stage: 1 mic center stage.

24-30 ft stage: 2 mics 12 to 15 feet apart.

35-40 ft stage: 3 mics 15 feet apart.

45-50 ft stage: 3 mics 17 feet apart.

 

In terms of shotguns they require great care to use. The two big issues are that they are only very directional at certain frequencies and they tend to have very unpredictable lobes to the side and the rear of the mic. So you have to study the polar plot and try and make sure the lobes aren't pointing somewhere problematic like at the FOH PA or into a wing with actors in it, who you can never stop whispering even if you tell them the whole house can hear them.

 

You end up having to pay a lot to get a shotgun that is less trouble than not having it at all. For example Rode NTG8, Audio Technica BP4071, Shure VP89 then there's another step up to things like Sennheiser MKH 8070 all designed for the broadcast industry.

[laolu]

OK, I seem to be in the same boat as the original poster. I work with university students. I can commiserate with all the other posters, and the only reason why I get away with shotguns (Rhode NTG-2) is the fact that our theater is relatively small (holds 200 max) and has a (relatively small) thrust stage. I've had bad experience with boundaries; they mostly pick up footsteps. In our place the audience "looks down" on the stage, so the actors tend to speak up, not down, where the PZMs would be.

 

 

If we have a musical, then the actors / singers have to be close-miced, no way around it.

 

 

Norbert

 

 

[azlan]

for foot noise on boundaries, try putting them on a small piece of eggbox/flightcase foam, and gaffa taping the whole assembly down tightly (white gaffa ideally so the mic is more obvious to the people on stage and less likely to be stood on!) it can help reduce transmission through the actual stage surface and clean things up a bit

[Shez]

for foot noise on boundaries, try putting them on a small piece of eggbox/flightcase foam...

I've never found putting them on any kind of padding to make any significant different as the capsules are well isolated - they pick up footsteps acoustically rather than through mechanical transmission. In fact, from Bartlett's website:

 

Do floor mics pick up a lot of footstep noise?

No, no more than your ears do. Stand close to the stage with the P.A. off. If you can hear footsteps when actors walk, any mic will "hear" them too. You might ask the wardrobe people to put rubber or felt soles on the actors' shoes (unless felt is too slippery). Or carpet the stage floor.

 

Can I reduce stage-floor thumps by putting the mic on a foam block or other padding?

No. In fact, if you lift the mic off the floor while it is picking up footsteps, you should hear no difference in the loudness of the footsteps.The Stage Floor Mic is not sensitive to floor vibrations. That's because the mic diaphragm is perpendicular to the stage floor, so it doesn't move in and out when the floor vibrates up and down.

 

Carpeting isn't exactly all that practicable but if the actors sound like a herd of elephants, no amount of damping will stop any distant mics picking them up.

[azlan]

Fair enough, ive always had success using the trick with sm91's, so I thought it would be worth passing on

[Bobbsy]

It depends a bit on the stage. I've worked in venues where the stage floor was pretty reverberant and there WAS mechanical pickup as well as acoustic. In those circumstances, I found thick foam rubber mouse mats did a pretty good job.

 

As for the original query, I've resorted to short shotguns (or even just cardioid condensers) sometimes for specific lines delivered in a remote part of the stage. However, I've usually worked with the set designer to find a place I can get these as close a possible to the action--for example one production had a high balcony with a balustrade. A couple of lines were delivered there and I was able to hide a short shotgun in the balustrade supports only a couple of feet from the actors up there. Hanging is often on of the worst places--you either end up pointing at the floor instead of the actor--or too far away in order to get the angle right.

 

What mics? If close enough, AKG 451s or 391s (not shotguns but small enough to hide in a balustrade!), Sennheiser 416 (just because I had them) or Rode NTG1 or NTG2 (again because I have them).