[Richard Crowley]

Now you know why it is uncommon to use video/cine production audio for radio spots. The audience accepts some amount of “room tone” as part of the complete audible/visual experience when experiencing picture and sound together. But sound by itself, AND ESPECIALLY short commercial spots (adverts) are expected to be well produced to high production standards, or they come off as “amateurish” and lack credibility. Even your client immediately recognizes that. Turn that reaction back at him.

Others have suggested that there may be some limited amount of remediation you could to to make them sound a little better. But I would bet you a nice dinner that even if you find a high-end audio production resource to work on the files, it would end up being cheaper, faster, AND better) to just do a special session to record the dialog in a studio-like space and edit the radio spots.

[Richard Crowley]

Have you tried your camera outdoors? What kind of video do you get on a bright overcast day? What does the picture look like when you keep the zoom at a conservative setting (i.e. not all the way out at 42x) Many lower-cost cameras produce remarkably nice pictures when what they are shooting is well-lit. The video I saw had bright white backgrounds which will make even the most expensive camera produce muddy images because cameras (and humans, for that matter) don’t tolerate bright back-lighting interfering with the primary subject.

I assume that the distortion I heard in the audio is from the YouTube compression? Does your original audio sound OK?

I wouldn’t automatically jump to the conclusion that you need a new camera when you appear to have lighting issues to remedy first.

[Richard Crowley]

FW = FireWire = EIA1394 = iLink(Sony)

What does your current video product look like? Sound like? What are the major deficiencies? Maybe lighting or microphone or even set dressing are more “low-hanging fruit” than replacing the camera.

You have asked our opinion about a specific camera, but you have given us no context in which to evaluate it. What do the people at the uplink say about your video? I suspect that people here are reluctant to answer your question because from our perspective you are asking it in a vacuum. You haven’t even identified your current camera or what kind of video you are shooting? Are you doing “simple” interior talking-head? Or are you producing worship services? Or are you making on-location documentaries? Where are you?

[Richard Crowley]

To my way of thinking “IFB” (and monitor or foldback in general) is something used by/for the “talent” (actors, musicians, conductors, etc.)

A boom operator should be monitoring the signal from their own microphone exclusively, else they will never know if what they are doing is causing what they are hearing. Now if they also need to be in on the “production intercom” that may be in addition to the clean feed of their own microphone.

And communication among the crew (behind the camera) is “production intercom” in my book. It is NOT the same as IFB and it is typically duplex (two-way). In some cases, the program audio (or at least a “scratch mix”) may be leaked into the production intercom at a low level so that crew members can hear what is happening where they might otherwise be completely isolated from the program itself. My perspective is mainly from multi-camera live-switch video production. I believe that other kinds or productions (like Broadway stage plays, etc.) use very similar systems.

Again, IFB is a concept or a technique. It is rigged up however works best for the particular production. There is no single golden definition that applies equally everywhere. You seem to be wishing that “IFB” is a well-defined monolithic topic and I don’t think it is. IFB is more pragmatic and situational than that.

[Richard Crowley]

“IFB” is a concept. Foldback (aka “monitor”) is used in many different places from local newsreaders to rock musicians.

“Interruptable” foldback is a technique where the director (or whomever) can insert information and/or instructions into the audio that the “talent” is hearing. If the monitor/foldback feed is interrupted, it is done “in the mix” before it goes out to the earpieces or transmitter.

Foldback (or IFB) isn’t required to be wireless. There are no good examples of any kind of system that uses two transmitters for one receiver, IFB included. In many places still today it is done with wired earpieces. (Hard-wired is ALWAYS more reliable than wireless, whatever you are talking about.) Now you could make the argument that hard-wired may be more vulnerable to tangling and tripping, less mobile, etc.

If you are considering IFB for some particular application, it would be good to reveal it here so that we can respond with relevant information. Perhaps you haven’t found much information because your question is too broad and unfocused.

[Richard Crowley]

It looks like it is in rough shape. The capacitors are probably leaking. Who knows how much time (if any?) the heads have? As soon as it breaks (maybe even before you get it home) you will have to find somebody that still works on it, and THEY will have to scrounge old, used parts to repair it with. No honest and conscientious repair operation would even look at it, because it will cost more for them just to evaluate what is wrong with it than it is even worth.

It is analog Standard Definition in a digital HD world. Even if it produced phenomenal SD pictures (which it doesn’t by modern standards) what would you DO with SD video???

As soon as the remaining tape supplies (if any?) have dried up, it will be very expensive to find tape for it. Then, once you have a recorded Betacam tape, where are you going to play it back on when 99% of the planet’s Betacam tape decks have died? There will probably always be one or two places that keep old tape format machines running and provide dubbing services for archives, but that will be very expensive and inconvenient.

There are probably a dozen more equally compelling reasons to run away from this. It would be a money pit even if they paid you $60. It seems unfortunate considering its cost and performance back in its day, but that is progress for you.

[Richard Crowley]

“what’s the practical usage of RF signal strength for wireless mic system?”

The “RF signal strength” is probably an indicator of how strong the signal is where the receiver is. It is used to show the effect of distance, obstacles, etc. on the reception from the transmitter.

“What level/setting should I use?”

It is typically not something that you adjust. It is a number that you can read.

“I understand that AF-RF are Audio Frequency-Radio Frequency, but how are they related to each other?”

AF is the sound that you can hear with your ears. RF is the radio signal that carries the audio (or video or whatever) through the air. Wireless and cell phones, computers, television and many other things use various parts of the RF spectrum. Note that wireless microphones were banned from the 700MHz band last year and are no longer legal to use in the US.

“it’s saying that AF indication appears whenever the output audio signal is stronger than the reference level. What does this refer to?”

“Reference level” may refer to the input level of the transmitter (guitar vs. microphone, etc.) or maybe to the output level of the receiver (mic vs. line level, etc.) It is hard to say without seeing the rest of the information.

[Richard Crowley]

There could be many different specific things that are killing your equipment. It would be helpful to know the make/model, age, previous treatment (abuse, did you get it used/donated?) of the equipment that failed. And it would be VERY helpful to know exactly what failed (what they had to do to fix it.)

Peavey does not have any particular good reputation either for products in general, or specifically for making rugged equipment that is more tolerant of abuse or adverse conditions.

Unless your users are very careless and/or you are in the middle of a swamp or something, there should be no reason to expect such a high failure rate. Does one particular staff member “own” the equipment? (in the sense that is their responsibility to see that it is properly used.) If not, then it may be a case that: if “everyone” is in charge, then NOBODY is in charge.

From the limited information you have told us here, it is not really even possible to tell whether the failures have anything to do with the ambient conditions. They may be due to abuse or neglect or simple ignorance of how to take care of it. Or, if the equipment was acquired used (or donated, etc.) prior abuse could be contributing to a higher failure rate.

What happens to the equipment “off-season”? How is it stored? Is it cleaned and examined at the end of the summer so that it can be brought back up to good condition for next season?

[Richard Crowley]

As the other people here have already stated, the ONLY connection between the camera and the CCU is the 26-pin connector. And 26-pin camera cable is frightfully expensive. However there are at least two ways around that problem.

1) Sony has TWO major camera interface cable standards, the 26-pin kind like you have, and the 14-pin variety. There are adapters that allow use of 14-pin cable on 26-pin cameras (and vice-versa). Your cameras will operate on 14-pin cable.

The bottom line is that the camera only needs a few basic things to operate: DC power; the video from the camera to the CCU, the video from the CCU to the camera (gen-lock and viewfinder), and the remote-control command signal (1 wire). All the other wires are extra features that you may or may not need. For example intercom (which most people ignore in favor of 3rd party systems like ClearCom, et.al.) And separate RGB video for high-end encoding, chroma-key, video for teleprompters, etc. etc.

2) In many parts of the world, there is a massive sea-change from old-school analog Standard Definition equipment to digital High Definition. This has made all the old equipment, (including the cables) surplus (“redundant”). You have not told us where you are, so we don’t know whether this is happening where you are or whether you could take advantage of that phenomenon. It is likely that the kinds of cables you need are sitting in dark corners of surplus dealers and recyclers waiting to be melted down for a few dollars of copper content. That is, the cables that haven’t already been buried in land-fills across the globe. I myself have a few hundred feet of 14-pin cable that I would give you for free, and even re-wire for 26-pin (if we can still find the connectors).

If you lived in my area (Portland, OR) I would help you with your cameras. Perhaps there are retired broadcast engineers in your location who could help not only get things connected, but who would know where surplus camera cable is languishing. And other standard-definition equipment like monitors and even switchers, etc. I just discarded a perfectly good (but obsolete) Sony monitor this week.

Note that there is nothing magic about power for CCUs or cameras. A good-quality DC power supply is the same whatever it is operating. I have used 12-volt wall-warts from Radio Shack and put 4-pin XLRs on them. The only reason Bescor can get away with charging $130 for a 4A 12V supply is because that is what broadcast people are accustomed to paying. Cameras in particular are designed to operate properly on a range of voltages (to support battery operation, or over 100s of feet of camera cable, etc.)

[Richard Crowley]

That cable was for “CueTV”, part of the “CueCat” debacle. CueCat was a barcode reader scheme that would enable sponsors to collect interest and query data on individuals for targetted marketing. (Something they do with cookies today.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CueCat

https://www.digitalbroadcasting.com/article.mvc/NBC-launches-CueTV-to-connect-PC-TV-0003

There was an ancillary scheme to encode TV commercials with sub-audible codes that could be collected and deciphered by your PC so it would pull up the advertiser’s website on your computer while/after the advert ran over the air. That cable was provided as the method for collecting an audio sample from your TV and routing it into an audio input on your PC. I vaguely recall that cable was pretty long so that it would reach from your TV to your PC.

Note that “declawed” CueCat barcode readers are readily available on eBay, etc for <$10 each and make handy inexpensive USB barcode readers. (“Declawed” because the original products were encrypted to keep them used only for the original purpose. But soon hacked to make them output plain-text, and remove the unique ID code that enabled the personal preference database.)