Stereo wireless

[Carlos E. Martinez]

Has anyone tried a pair of wireless mics for a stereo recording?

My idea is you can't do it because there might be micro delays that would make the stereo image fluctuate from one side to the other, or even have sync problems between channels.

Is that so?

Are there any wireless stereo mics around?

[Carlos E. Martinez]

why?
If for stealthing, you'd have to have a big bundle of outboard gear to get that signal to a preamp/recorder.
If in open recording, you expose yourself to tons of rf/emi interference possibilities.

Never for stealthing.

RF/EMI interference may be a problem in lower priced wireless mics, almost certainly not in Lectrosonics, Sennheiser or other pro brands.

My idea is to be able to feed a stereo signal, wireless sent, to a moving video camera. The mic combo would be static, as it should be.

[MattD]

Wireless receivers are also very frowned upon by some bands.

[Carlos E. Martinez]

Wireless receivers are also very frowned upon by some bands.

I woudn't be hiding from the bands. In fact I might probably be using a purposely placed mic stand with the two mics wired to two transmitters at the stage itself.

The other option would be to pick the sound straight from the show mixing deck, sending it to the camera.

In fact, in both cases, I am thinking of using a small recording deck, M-Audio or Edirol, to record my main audio, using the headphone or line outputs to feed the wireless transmitters.

In that way I would be using the camera audio track as a back-up. 

[Todd R]

Wireless receivers are also very frowned upon by some bands.

I think this is a different thing, though.  Bands don't like tapers using IEM receivers to make illegal "soundboard"-type recordings.

The wireless thing though does strike me as having some interesting potential for bands that allow soundboard recordings.   Set up some wireless mics on-stage and do a 4-channel mix with the soundboard to make an on-the-spot matrix recording.  Gets around the delay issues with having your mics back by the board and avoids needing to put traditional condensors on-stage and routed back to the board area through the house snake.

[wbrisette]

Wireless receivers are also very frowned upon by some bands.

I think this is a different thing, though.  Bands don't like tapers using IEM receivers to make illegal "soundboard"-type recordings.

The wireless thing though does strike me as having some interesting potential for bands that allow soundboard recordings.   Set up some wireless mics on-stage and do a 4-channel mix with the soundboard to make an on-the-spot matrix recording.  Gets around the delay issues with having your mics back by the board and avoids needing to put traditional condensors on-stage and routed back to the board area through the house snake.

While doing a search, I stumbled onto this thread. I just wanted to comment on the idea of using a wireless to get around the delay issue.

Wireless units inherently have a 2-3 ms delay, so you don't get around the delay issue. In fact, depending on location, you can exacerbate the issue.

Wayne

[beefstew]

Wireless receivers are also very frowned upon by some bands.

I woudn't be hiding from the bands. In fact I might probably be using a purposely placed mic stand with the two mics wired to two transmitters at the stage itself.

The other option would be to pick the sound straight from the show mixing deck, sending it to the camera.

ive done this before
SBD>CAM [wireless reciever]
then as a backup: MICS>HI-MD

[willndmb]

i think thats a great idea, go mics > cam and have no dubbing after the fact
i could see where you might still have a slight delay or even the poss of a small difference in delay between the mics

at any rate i have seen bands use single mics placed around the venue wirelessly and record
but i have not seen 2 set up in stereo

[bdasilva]

I've had up to 16ms delay and the show turned out ok... 2-3 is nothing. It could have this delay from a guitar cab to  stage mics.

My heart skipped a beat then a "wireless" TL was mentioned... I dream about this.

[wbrisette]

I've had up to 16ms delay and the show turned out ok... 2-3 is nothing. It could have this delay from a guitar cab to  stage mics.

My heart skipped a beat then a "wireless" TL was mentioned... I dream about this.

I've had up to 50ms of delay. The deva has a limit of 40ms of delay on each channel, but sometimes that isn't enough for outdoor venues. But it usually isn't a problem because I do things in post anyhow. The 2 to 3 ms delay isn't the whole story. You'll probably have more delay than that. This is a starting point for short cabled vs. non-cabled (aka wireless) runs. If you have a wireless lav on an actor, for example, and you're also booming, typically you mix them and send them to a camera. In order to sync up the audio, you have to add 2-3 ms of delay. In the case of trying to use wireless microphones in a venue, things get tougher. There is a lot more space we're talking about, so range is an issue, plus there are no phantom power units on the transmitters, so you would have to run to a preamp, then to the transmitter. The problem is virtually all transmitters are designed for mic inputs, not line inputs (the exception is the Zaxcom TRX900 series with the stereo adapter). I would guess you would still have to add in some additional delay in addition to the 2-3 ms I mentioned earlier. Maybe I'll have some time to play with this a bit more at some point.

Wayne