[David Turner]

Hi Tony,

Thanks for your response. I’m not huge on the Marantz for 2 reasons. One it is hard to see levels, especially if it is in a side pouch, and two it only has 2 channels. In my ideal setup, I would have 3 channels and a mixer (also with 3 channels). This would allow me to run 2 Lav mics and a boom/omni/other general mic without combining their signals (and thus not being able to lose one in post).

Thanks for your time!

– DT

[David Turner]

Hi Bouke,

Thanks for the response. I somehow signed up for this thread without email alerts (like my other ones) and so thought no one was responding.

When it comes to “a few threads down” how do I find that? I am not an expert on navigating these forums. I normally just use the search bar until I find threads that have topics that I think touch on what i am looking for. Can you post a link? Or the title? Or educate my feeble forum capabilities to be able to easily find what you were talking about?

Thanks again for your time.

– DT

[David Turner]

Hey Bill and Jeff,

Thanks for your responses. Jeff 2 questions:

If I sent a DVD to this person, how would they go about copying it? Is that an option with BurnAware? Or is there another program for copying the DVD I send them?

I like the iso option too. How do I create an iso? Is that with DVD Studio Pro or Toast Titanium? Or is there some built in mac way to do it? Also, if I got he iso route, do they still need to use DVD software like BurnAware, or are they burning the iso onto a DVD like a data disk?

Thanks again for your time!

Best,
David

[David Turner]

Hi Guys,

I appreciate your time and answers. Still, these are exactly the answers I could have found in any random search through this forum. I understand forums often come to a place of airing your principles and philosophies of production, but no one specifically addressed the questions I was asking. This is frustrating.

I entirely agree with all of you. Is DSLR filmmaking ideal or even great? No. But it is a tiny fraction of the price when projects are scarce, and does pose a significant benefit when working on documentary footage where people are more nervous around bigger cameras. It also is a benefit when traveling abroad shooting short form doc. And it is a further benefit when doing some editorial photo work… no new gear… Right now it is the setup that makes sense, so I am using it and asking advice. When another setup makes sense I will get that one, and seek advice on optimizing that setup.

I would love to pay a professional sound person who has their own gear to work for me on every shoot for $4-500 a day. Sure. But again, reality strikes. Some of my productions I do alone, because they are simple and controlled… I need my own gear for this. Many of the larger productions don’t have large budgets, so I can pay what I can. If it is a large enough budget, I will hire a sound professional at their rate every damn time. Seriously. I get it.

And when I hire sound people for $200 a day, they are aspiring sound professionals… This is the reality of the production world. When budgets aren’t there, you hire young ambitious people who want to learn. This is how I learned everything I know about production. I was hired young and learned.

In fact, in the past I have worked sound for many a documentary shoot when they are recording low budget into camera… These documentaries are shown on network television. I was paid $200 a day. So please don’t tell me these things are impossible. I see it done every single day when budgets are tight, and I’ve seen it for years.

While the ideal production world is great, you will always find someone on some side of the production with a great argument why more money should be spent on ________ to really get quality. And a lot of the time they are right… but this goes on forever until you are into commercial production budgets. This is independent documentary!!

I am asking for advice on gear. Specifically a recorder/mixer. Can someone please weigh in on that?

[David Turner]

Thanks for your input Fred. I wanted to come on here and just say quickly how I fixed it in case anyone stumbles upon this thread. I bet what Fred suggested would have worked, but I was able to get it to work with a little less hassle:

I realized that there were more than one clip that somehow got corrupted. It was hard to tell this because the timeline would only freeze on the first clip, not the others. It was just a few clips in the same area.

So I just dragged the raw files into Final Cut again off my harddrive (that is always connected to run this project) and then re-cut the four clips (that would give me problems if they sat next to any other clips), from these newly imported (if you can really call just dragging the files back into a Bin importing). It was a pain to recut them exactly like I had them before because of course there is no reference as the old clips won’t play. But with this only affecting 4 clips, I considered this an easy fix.

I still don’t know why this problem arose in the first place, but it’s solved.

[David Turner]

Hey Neil,

Thanks for the response. I am guessing it would be possible to accidentally buy an XLR to mini jack without the specs you are talking about? I purchased it on the run at a music store which may have been my problem. The bummer is I’m out $40 (music store prices). Is there a way to check & know if it’s the cord before I buy a new one? And just know I shouldn’t be looking at other parts of the connection for problems?