Posts by Tom Glover
CIRCUS: Location Sound
0Another day, another circus Session this time we were learning about location sound. this is what i wrote about it for my Circus Report:
Locations sound works hand in hand with location camera’s providing additional sound capabilities to the single camera, for example an interview situation that required two personal mic’s could be mixed together before being fed to the camera as stereo or mono line level mix. Location mixers often have 2-4 inputs and can either mix in stereo or dual mono. Location mixers normally have better Microphone pre-amps than Camera’s, which in turn provides better sound quality, as the mixer is outputting at line level (0db) and the camera won’t apply any more amplification to the signal.
Some microphones require batteries or phantom power (+48v) to operate; these mic’s are a form of capacitor mic’s are much more sensitive than standard dynamic mic’s that don’t require power to operate. Most cameras and mixers can supply phantom power to these microphones.
When setting up for a shoot, you can use the tone that the mixer is supplying to the camera to help setup the record levels on the camera. Tone should be set just below the 0db mark as this allows some “head room” before the camera starts to clip the signal should you go above the tone volume.
CIRCUS: Lighting
0Today we started the BOP (Broadcast Operations) Circus, which is designed to teach us the basic in many operational roles. Today, my group started on Lighting with Graham Jaggers, an industry professional Lighting Director.
With lighting already being my specialist subject, after transferring from a theatre environment, I found I was only looking out for the differences between live theatre and live broadcast. The main difference i found was the huge requirement for Backlight, this isn’t such a requirement in theatre world.
Other little tips and tricks I have picked up from today, include:
- 3 Point Lighting / The importance of shadows
- How to use a Pantograph
- The idea of bouncing a hard light of something white to create a large soft light
LECTURE: TV Systems & Signals
0Optical Fibre Links
Today we looked at optical fibre links and how they now power the internet age that is now upon us. The amazing power of fibre is slowly being understood with new theoretical limits being constantly found, the current tested theoretical limit could handle the worlds current internet and phone traffic, and more in a single fibre.
Fibre’s are the back bone the UK broadcast industry, as they link all the Studio Centers with the 1000+ Transmission sites in the UK. The Fibre links are mission critical for all Analogue and Freeview transmission, as they provide the 17 Main and 1000 “Fill” UHF Transmitters, with the signal to broadcast.