Wolfs Questionairre for Oct 14th-Oct-18 on SOUND.

i have a problem in that i am doing a show with s 150 strong cast (sweeney todd) and my sound man has only 4 AKG C1000's and 8 Nady Wirless Lapel mic's, his problem is that the singing is gonna be too loud, with 100 people in chorous its going to drown out anything else and he wont be able to control their levels. what do you do when you have a huge number of chorus people (lol apart from shoot half of them!) that are only picked uip by rig-mounted mics, because often theyre louder than the principles without having to use any mics, i can't ask them to sing quieter either.
 
plug_in_baby said:
i can't ask them to sing quieter either.

Why not? It would make everything easier? Otherwise, just get the lavs as close as you can on the principles, and don't amplify the chorus at all.
 
i doubt my school would be cool with buying condoms for mics, and i know from a prank i played on a girl in one of my classes that immature actors would be disgusted by the thought of a condom touching them, we also are not allowed latex in skool because of allerglies. what could we do instead of condoms? baloons and latex gloves are prohibeted too.
 
Matt - you could try using a small plastic bag in this case.
 
I've never had a problem with condoms at my high school. The tech crew has used them for a number of years and we have never encountered any problems. Sometimes they provoke some odd jokes in the green room, but the actors accept them as being part of the process. Unless any of the people involved in the production are allergic to latex, I wouldn't worry about allergies. Just make sure that the condoms aren't left lying around. Check with your director about this and try to sort something out. If you promise to make sure the condoms aren't used for anything other than protecting the mics, you should be able to convince them.
 
thanks for your input, ill try that and it will probably help that my principal is a musician and is really into sound stuff.
 
Verry cool essay. in addition to your mic placing ideas I have one other in my bage of tricks. A head set made of #14 black wire. Picture a hook over one ear, a run around the back of the head and up and over the other ear with a boom that extends about 1/ 2 way to the mouth. I will usualy tape the mic to it (Shure hair mics in my case) and tape the cable along the wire to the back of the neck. Skin collored gaf works great for hiding it. I have a spool of wire in my gig box and a head set made of hanger wire (very hard and uncomfortable) that I use to show the actor what I want. I cut them a bit of wire and let them shape it so it is comfortable.

Also I had one show (an xmass story) where one actor never took off his glases. I taped the mic to them! He was able to sit in the audience and not have it seen.
Tom B
 
Always be sure to watch in what order you press the set and mode buttons on Shure ULX transmitters, if done in the wrong order twice in a row you can change the frequency!
 
I have no experiance with these, because the accoustics in our aud are so good you can hear someone's normal conversation at the back of the stage from the back of the house. :)
 
I've read a lot of good stuff, nice ways to improvise attachments and whatnot. My own method of operations in condensed form is this:

Always do a five minute seminar with everyone wearing a mic, even if they've done it before. I always tell the performers to switch on at the beginning of the overture, that way I can watch the indicators and still have time to chase down the laggers before anyone takes the stage. Never EVER trust actors to switch on and off as they leave. Do whatever it takes to get the muting done back at FOH.

If there's enough advance time (I usually show up on Monday for a Friday opening) I just hand the mics out and let the actors figure out where to put them and then give notes and make adjustments for the next couple rehearsals, it helps them feel more involved in the process instead of like lab rats being hooked up to equipment.

And no matter who it is, kids, adults, pros... some are going to take to it like nothnig and always be on and ready to go, and some you're going to have to chase them around and hold their hand the whole way. It's important to use everything at your disposal to help the mixing along so you can concentrate on the cues. Even if all you do is compress all the body pack channels as a group so you don't have to ride faders as much.
 
Here's what I'm doing...
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The string on the mic goes around your head and the mic is right on your forehead. The string is very stretchy. It's elastic thread which I bought from Jo Ann Fabrics. I also bought some clear stuff which didn't hold a know well, so I went with this. It seems to work well, you just gotta make sure the actors don't put it on top of your head.
 
the seminar is a great idea. its nice to let them know what they are doing and why
 
wolf825 said:
I use sennheiser 300 series bodypack mics. For theatre, I will place the pack on their back and run the lead up. I will tape it at the base of the neck and run it around the hair line and loop over the top of the ear and stick the actual mic halfway between their mouth and ear.
I take the mic with skin/medical type tape so as it can not be seen, if it is a black mic. and tape on top of the ear, then at the top of the neck but i leave slack inbetween there and the base of the next so it gives them room to turn around, sometimes i ask for the actor to turn then stick it on to get an idea.

Ouch! Would you use all those taping techniques on a hairy guy?
 

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