Monitoring Sound

The local high school I volunteer my services at is looking at putting in a new sound system. It's a proscenium stage w/out a balcony. The problem that I'm running into, is that the control booth is sealed, so there is no good way to monitor sound levels, or adjust eq during performances (currently they have 5 lavaliere mics that get passed around to different actors during musicals). They aren't looking to do any structural remodeling, so making the booth open is out of the question. The only thing I can do is remove windows, but the way the current speakers are set up, the booth ends up being twice as loud, and muddy compared with the house. Any suggestions on what we can do? I was thinking about a couple area mics in the house to use via headphones, but wanted to know if anyone else had any experience before I recommend that to the school board.

Thanks

Can you relocate the sound board in the house? That would be the best option, but does involve quite a bit of wiring.

I my case, we ended up with an open window, that isn't that bad. Speaker degree angles happened to work out so the booth was in the main field of the speakers. I'd much rather be mixing from the house, because it is very difficult to set eq and certain other processors from the booth. I use the iPad app for those things, and again works out well for us, because there is usually a student sitting at thee board anyway.

I'm curious to hear suggestions around your muddy sound in the booth. That is hard to overcome. The headphone setup you suggested might be viable if there is no way to move the board. I would feel weird mixing a show that way, however I'm sure people do it.

therjparsons said:

The local high school I volunteer my services at is looking at putting in a new sound system. It's a proscenium stage w/out a balcony. The problem that I'm running into, is that the control booth is sealed, so there is no good way to monitor sound levels, or adjust eq during performances (currently they have 5 lavaliere mics that get passed around to different actors during musicals). They aren't looking to do any structural remodeling, so making the booth open is out of the question. The only thing I can do is remove windows, but the way the current speakers are set up, the booth ends up being twice as loud, and muddy compared with the house. Any suggestions on what we can do? I was thinking about a couple area mics in the house to use via headphones, but wanted to know if anyone else had any experience before I recommend that to the school board.

Thanks

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Mixing behind a window is really nothing more than guessing. You have already found the problem with opening small windows - it often makes it worse than closing the window. You can do an ambient mic, but that never transfers very well. The best way, if you can't move the board, is to get a pair of monitor speakers for the main mix in the booth that translate well to the house speakers, which might require some equalization. Over time, you will gain experience on how to best make something sound good in the house based on how they sound in the monitors. This is, however, a lot more difficult with students and people who don't have time to get used to the system.

There are a couple options during the remodel - you could buy a mixing console with an iPad app and sit in a seat in the house, or you could add an alternate mix position with a digital snake split to plug in your board and kill seats when you need to. Most theaters have a decent flat spot that isn't a handicapped seat or exit row. The split is possible with the A&H boards like the GLD or QU if you use a simple Layer 2 Ethernet switch on the dSnake protocol, or is much easier on the Yamaha systems with Dante between the snake head and the board. I dislike mixing on an iPad, so I would want Option 2, but some people find it to be very intuitive.

You'll want to drop a window out and move the mixing board into the house. It's the best to really hear what your audience is hearing.

I was afraid that moving the board would be the only real option. Unfortunately the school will barely be able to make the money needed for the equipment, and install, let alone relocating the board. Plus, there is just no place to put it. The house is wall to wall seating with two aisles, so they'd lose too many seats (they sell out every performance for musicals, and have to livestream concerts into the commons (again, not an ideal situation at all). I recommended a board with an iPad app, so I can at least sit in the house during sound checks, but I'm frequently the lighting guy as well, so sitting there during the performance isn't an option at this point. I'm hoping as they grow their performing arts dept, I can train students how to do the lighting especially, and at least do sound effects, that way I have more options, but that won't happen for at least another year or so, they just don't have kids interested in the tech aspect.

I just closed off my control room from the auditorium mostly. I leave the windows partially open. Anyway, I purchased monitors for the control room and after setting the proper levels for the auditorium sound with someone else helping me out, I then tried to accurately recreate the same audio volume for the control room. I don't EQ as I really don't have the ears for it, but when I have students running the board for the musical, I have another student who stands in front of the glass and relays back to the booth if there needs to be a boost or decrease in a particular microphone. It's not exact since the speakers aren't pointed towards the balcony, however the last 2 performances, I didn't have to run to the balcony to complain much about levels and most of the time, the person in front of the glass wasn't having issues either with the levels.

One thing I've had to do a lot to overcome mixing behind a window is (during rehearsals) constantly going back and forth between the booth and the house. Trying to make adjustments then run away to listen is annoying, but you'll start to get better at telling how the booth sounds different. I also spend time trying to learn how to tell what a comfortable level outside sounds like inside the booth, so that during a performance I at least have an idea of what the house sounds like (although I still like to check, or have someone help). Obviously none of this is ideal, but it's significantly better than just sitting doing nothing and hoping for the best.

5 body mics? What/how many other inputs are you looking at?

Whatever you end up with, you need a console that can first, be completely controlled via an iPad, and second, be easily moved.

My 2 cents, you are looking at an X32 w/ an S32 stagebox. Put the stagebox in the booth. You get all the IO there. When you can, setup the console in the house with a well constructed and compact tech table setup. At most you would kill 4 to 6 seats. Not a big deal if you want a good product for your audience. All you have to do is throw a 50' cat6 cable out the window and you are off to the races. Leave your bodymics recievers and processing in the booth. If you went with a smaller X32 you could probably go with 4 kills. For the shows that you don't want to move the console you can just sit in back on an iPad and mix away. I've had major acts come in and mix totally on an X32 rack with an iPad. It can be done. You get all your outboard gear, an automixer, a great iPad app, USB recording, DCA's, scenes, and a huge amount of other stuff for not much money. Save the money on the monitoring thing and just go with the X32. You are talking 3 grand all in WITH the remote pre's. That is INSANE.

OK, well since he can't relocate the mixer, I do recommend getting at least some form of monitors. I've been very much into Presonus lately and they make a pair of decent studio monitors called the Erin 4.5 for approx. $200. If your school can afford a high-tech upgrade like the mixer, then you definitely want something with an iPad app. I have the Presonus Studiolive 32.4.2 AI which you can also have a stage box through ethernet cable with the RM series. They have since come out with a new mixer called the Studiolive 32 with motorized faders, however I like the spread out nature of the 32.4.2.

How big is the room? How big are the windows? (I've had to mix from inside an ex Projection booth in the past - not a fun experience) What sort of lighting do you usually run? (Moving heads and stuff or just some basic theatrical lighting?)
Based on personal experience I doubt you'd be able to mix properly from inside a booth - Unless perhaps the windows/openings are so big that it's not really a booth anymore. Very small openings act as a high pass filter (large wavelengths won't go through) and small booths will create weird modes in the low end - and maybe even introduce ringing in the mids & highs, depending on how they're treated.
Then there's the design of the room. I've been in theaters where actors sounded just perfect (Volume and everything) in the very back of the room with no mics what-so-ever, yet you could barely make out what they were saying in the booth. Problem gets even worse if you're dealing with live music (drums, guitar amps, etc) I've been in other venues where I'd walk all over the audience area, set my FOH eq, A/B it in on and bypass, then go into the booth only to hear unbearable bass and non existent mids.
What I would recommend is the iPad approach. I've got no idea what your budget is, but if 5 lav mics is all you have to manage, even a Behringer xAir (or the new Midas mAir) would work like a treat. M32R if you have the budget to get something more "Pro" looking with better build quality and more expandability. You don't even need a $700 iPad, any cheap but decent android device should work just fine. I've even used my HTC One.
If you need to trigger Audio cues from you laptop or whatever, you could just get a cheap 4 channel snake to run back to the console. Or maybe use that app Figue 53 makes? (No experience with it)
As for lighting; If you don't need to manage a particularly complex rig with moving heads and such, perhaps something like Luminair 3 could work? (Again, no experience with it) Or maybe some software/PC based solution with a remote app. There's certainly more than one option available, you'd just have to search a little.

Just my opinion... If I were a film colorist I wouldn't strap a CTB filter on my monitor. And I certainly wouldn't get a second monitor with a CTO filter to try and guess what's sort of right - Just get rid of the filters. If the only way to do it is by moving out into the audience with an iPad, then I say move out into the audience with an iPad.
Cheers!

First best option is to set your console up in the theater. Preferably a digital console with stage boxes in the booth to pick up your analog inputs and a data cable punched through a cable pass-thru in your wall to drag the necessary data, power, and intercom cables out to your mix position in the theater where you would probably have to remove 3-4 seats to make room for a small table and the console.

It's not ideal to mix from a booth but it can be done if you have a pair of monitor speakers.

Trick is you don't want to EQ them flat. When you output L/R to them from your mix console, you want the output EQ's driving your monitors to reflect how the main system in your theater sounds. If your room has a 2K notch to avoid some awful feedback, you want to reflect that in the EQ on your booth monitors.

To be clear, I'm not saying you should EQ your booth speakers with the same EQ settings as your mains. That 800Hz boost on your system EQ may serve a very specific purpose to your main speakers that doesn't apply to your booth monitors. What I'm saying is if you listen to a music track on your mains, then walk into the booth, mute your mains and listen only through your booth monitors, it should sound approximately the same as when you were in the house but maybe a little quieter.

You also want to delay your booth monitors to time align them to your mains. Not a big deal when you have the window closed, but when you have the window open you definitely want the booth monitors to behave as an extension of your main system, time aligned to your mains, and with a proportional level to your main speakers.

For your less-experience techs, I would also put a chart near your console in the booth that gives a sense of purpose to your output LED meters. This way if your booth monitors are turned down and the window is closed, someone can look over at the output meters and get a sense of just how loud it is in the theater.

An example, with numbers I've pulled out of thin air:

-12dB Uncomfortably loud
-15dB Good level for music, or speech on top of music
-18dB Good level for speech by itself
-21dB Really quiet

As for a pair of decent booth monitors, I'm a fan of the Klipsch R-15PM's, which will run you about $350 new for a pair. They sound great out of the box, but that doesn't matter. You're going to chop their EQ up in your console to make them sound just as great or as terrible as your mains.

Desperate times, desperate measures, you can repeat this same process by putting a pair of quality headphones on your sound op. However, what you hear from a pair of headphones is unusually clean -- you don't hear any of the left signal in your right ear and vise versa. This gives a false sense of pure stereo that no main PA system in the world can offer and should not be used for trying to craft some kind of stereo mix nobody in your theater can discern from your effectively mono PA system.

As @MNicolai pointed out, you have the luxury of sealing your booth- you don't need to worry about setting a delay on your control room amp.