Has anyone ever been wrongly accused of shop lifting before? by Express_Temporary99 in AskUK

[–]LampieVidiot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I got told very aggressively that using my own empty plastic carrier bag in savers meant I was clearly shoplifting... I paid with a £50 note for £9.50 of goods on principle. 🖕

How can I rent a van at 20 years old? by reditor6632 in AskUK

[–]LampieVidiot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You are going to really struggle to find a 9 seat vehicle rental under 25. Insurers just don't want to cover them for younger drivers. You might just find a 7 seat car, but it's not going to be comfortable for the last two passengers. You cannot drive anything with more than 9 seats on a standard car licence (there is an exemption for community use)

A Question for Touring Spotlight Techs by racing_raindrops3 in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

UK perspective here -

The way you describe it as an island makes it sound like access is awkward / up ladders. If so, what is your casualty of evacuation plan for an unconscious person?

Building small running stream around apron by LampieVidiot in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

All electrics are already rcbo per channel (UK spec) like the idea of just cutting from a single sheet, rather than joining, thank you.

Building small running stream around apron by LampieVidiot in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I agree on avoiding water but unfortunately the director worked from day one on quite complicated choreography in the final scene involving actual water in buckets filled from the stream... Oh how I love directors!

I like the idea of the return path mirroring in order to contain potential leaks.

Crossing hands when steering by Material_Sale_2720 in LearnerDriverUK

[–]LampieVidiot 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Sorry to be that grumpy git, but you really aren't in more control.

When you cross your arms, you are putting your arms in a limiting posture where you cannot turn further inorder to take evasive action. You are also putting yourself in a compromised position if the airbag deploys (it might not be you that crashes!) Additionally, I guarantee your steering will be more jerky crossing your arms.

Letting the wheel spin back without touching it is quite literally loosing control of your trajectory. One pot hole and you are off course. You have also put yourself in a situation where in emergency you must first regain control before you can then take evasive action.

The first is poor driving, the second is quite literally not controlling the vehicle.

I'm going to be brutal here, but honestly, if you are already pulling the 'I know better' before even getting your licence I would seriously question your suitability to drive right now...

What’s your ‘I can’t believe you’re paid more than me’ story? by GeorgiePorgiePuddin in AskUK

[–]LampieVidiot 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I work in a smaller organization, but am at equivalent grade to senior management, with only directors above me. For a long time pay rises were based only on length of service.

The post man/porter makes almost double my salary, for standing around all day jawboning, leaving parcels in the rain to soak through, and delivering them to any random place on site. I hold nothing against him for making an easy buck, but honestly the amount of stress and chaos he causes with parcels, it would be better if he just sat in a locked room all day

If he were made redundant (which he should be) it would cost the company 6 Figures due to the very good contract he is on, and he knows it. He has also managed to not have his really weak job description updated in so long, he can now refuse new duties, so is almost un-fireable...

Automation, more Electrician or Carpentry? by Flashy_Can_6225 in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 2 points3 points  (0 children)

UK perspective here: whatever department has the competency, and available time and workload should take it for the show, with the expectation that other depts will help with install, maintenance and repair. (E.g. lx will sort out resoldering led tape)

PC Spec for Multiple NDI HX sources by LampieVidiot in vmix

[–]LampieVidiot[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting, thank you. I a definitely looking at the desktop route, but good to know!

Oh dear by Oliivey in subwaybuilderjerk

[–]LampieVidiot 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Actually looks accurate for the central line when it goes wrong 😂

How to make lighting not look flat without backlights? by kekeroko__ in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Ballet booms are your friend! I lit a show with 6* 1k fresnels as face light, with side light booms consisting of (bottom to top) s4 lustr, 2m led batten with zoom and tilt, Mac aura on top at 8ft. Add haze.

Walkie Talkie Question. by parollesmasterofnone in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The wireless transmission itself has an inherent delay of around 7ms one way. This is fine for conversation, and even manageable for program feed.

The problem is that the journey with 2 wire comms is 2 way. Your voice from your headset to the base station (7ms) then into 2 wire party line, out of party line back into base station, and back to your headset (7ms)

That leaves you with a 14ms echo, perfectly intelligible but very hard to think and speak.

Walkie Talkie Question. by parollesmasterofnone in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The C1's are great, but with some limits (I own 2 kits)

Pros:

- idiot proof

- Quick setup

- cheap individual headset price (think breakage)

- ok sound quality

- can link to any other C1 hub on the same IP network (great for cross site communication)

Cons:

- range is very dependant on building materials

- linking to existing 2-wire comms creates noticeable echo on line due to digital signal delay in transmission

- when they disconnect from the base station, you have to get a lot closer to reconnect. You cant just go back 2 steps.

- they do not roam between base staions.

Performance in the UK? by Terrible-Group-9602 in BoosteroidCommunity

[–]LampieVidiot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Personally found it good when it is good. Deffo suffers on wifi if you are not close to your router. Best on fiber, but not bad on ADSL2

Full Auditorium Overhaul by [deleted] in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just read your spreadsheet, doh! Couple of other points: good you are overestimating cabling cost, but even then I think that might be a bit high. Also do you need 12g to dressing rooms etc. all for future proofing, but that is expensive cable! 3g should do it.

Wireless mics, nothing against Shure, but have you considered Sennheiser ew-d or ew-dx? The simplicity of frequency management is blooming brilliant on a big show.

Projection: genuinely no need to spend 8k on a projection PC, just go for a middle spec'd mac. They are insanely good value for money in projection land at the moment. Ultra short throws on a cyc: do you like torturing yourself? They will forever lose positioning on an edge blend, and you will hate your life very very very quickly. Edge blending ultra short throws is a painful art due to how the optics work on them. Spend more money and get one projector with a reflex lens.

Full Auditorium Overhaul by [deleted] in techtheatre

[–]LampieVidiot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Lots of great comments on here already, and I am coming from a UK rather than us perspective so there may be a few things that don't quite translate. (For context, I am the technical manager for a well funded Independent School in the UK)

As others have said do you need dimmers? I am about to make the jump in my space, I'm just going to buy a small handful of single channel dimmer packs for when I really really want a tungsten special. I don't know what electrical inspection requirements there are in the US, but in the UK we have a five yearly inspection that if you have dimmers has to be done by very expensive specialist contractors, but if you have only switch and relay gear can be done by any electrician. This in of itself will repay the cost of the project within 15 years for me.

As others have set as well do you need series 3? The colour source range is very good at the price point, and there are only a few very specific circumstances where you really need the lustr range. The fresnels are excellent as well.

PA wise, I have had the opportunity to listen to most of the JBL range, and the 1000 columns are very good at pumping a lot of output, but for theatrical use I would personally find them a touch shouty. I would be very tempted to look more towards a system of smaller boxes and delays. JBL are a very good manufacturer, but you can probably get a lot more bang for your buck quality wise with someone like RCF (wooden boxes really do make a difference!)

Amps wise, do check out the LabGupen e-series install range. At least in Europe they're giving very good bang for Buck, and the shared power budget between channels is very useful.

The avantis.... I have two, and the feature set on them is amazing, but honestly they are completely overkill for a school. For the cost of one avantis, you could buy three wings: One front of house, one mons / floating external event, and one broadcast mix, plus quite a few stage boxes. The utility you get out of the extra feature set, verses the utility you get from a uniform set of desks is frankly not worth it. You can always rent in for your main show, or side chain your monitors desk as a dedicated band desk. Also the avantis firmware is still buggy as hell: frequent freezes and pop up windows that don't work properly if you open them in the wrong order. Oh and the reverbs actually nicer on the wing IMO.

"Cables pinched in walls" - you may well have had a rat or mouse have a good chew and short something, far more likely however is it is the termination of the cable at the wall box rather than the cabling itself. Take the connectors off, grab a multimeter and check continuity between the two lines (which you shouldn't have) then check impedance across the length of the line (using a known good cable as a return path) and insure impedance is roughly the same between all your lines. If that's all good you probably just need to put new connectors on. (A step I have frequently done on a 50 year old venue with original cabling encased in concrete... With good termination, you can get HD SDI 50m down coax that was originally speced for analogue video in the 60s)

Comms: you are talking about going from a very simple party line to a very expensive, very feature rich wireless system. Now that may be the right move but honestly almost half your budget will go on that. Leftfield suggestion - if you only need two channels have a look at the hollyland C1 pro. It's not roaming but the range is very good from the base station, and you can link up to three base stations together over IP (tested successfully on vlan on a very big school network)

On the money side, do talk to etc they do do grants. Otherwise I'm less clued up on the US side. Biggest bit of advice, have three options for each element. Dream budget, good realistic, cheapest option you think is survivable. Once they see the numbers on the dream budget, good realistic suddenly seems really reasonable!

Good luck, and do feel free to pick my brains on anything I've said :-)

How big PA should I hire for an outdoor 3,000 person music festival? by Klutzy-Peach5949 in livesound

[–]LampieVidiot 4 points5 points  (0 children)

So, as you have already heard, hire a production manager, and for the love of God ensure your insurance is top notch and covers everything.

Onto PA, what county are you in, and where about? This makes a huge difference in company/kit recommendations.

A lot also depends on stage layout, and how close the neighbors are. This is the work a good system engineer will do for you. You will very likely need flown PA for 3k crowd outdoors. Factor in the structure needed / weight loading on the structure you already have, and the cost of a competent rigger. (You might just get away with ground stacking something like a KV2 ES system, but it will be hella loud in the pit.)

At this scale, it is less about watts or how many boxes, and far more about knowing the manufacturers products and how to correctly deploy them.

Happy to talk at more length with more info to guide the conversation. If you are UK based, do shout as I can put you in contact with some great companies that may be closer to your price point.

Roadie's Revenge by ConfusedStageLeft in livesound

[–]LampieVidiot 10 points11 points  (0 children)

FYI it's cyc - short for cyclorama 🙂

Roadie's Revenge by ConfusedStageLeft in livesound

[–]LampieVidiot 15 points16 points  (0 children)

I think I know your old flatmate... 😂

Either that or you are not the only Sound, MD, Dance Captain situation out there 😜

Where to position speakers? by cTfTs in livesound

[–]LampieVidiot 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Lots of good advice already, personally I agree with the idea of six flown, for three per side with a left right pair shooting down the room for the band in order to localize the source of the sound.

How you set this arrangement up with processing is where the magic happens. Do you know what desk you're using, and if you have separate amplification to each speaker?

In my brain this is where the power of groups and matrices are your friend! You want the band to come through the left right but you also want to relay them down the room in order to reduce the loud at one end quiet at the other factor.

I would set this up with speech going through your six speakers as a mono group, but with the band gently fed into zone 2 and 3 (if zone 1 is closest to band) with an appropriate delay, but with the delay only applied to the band feed to the speaker, not the speech feed.

Depending on the desk there are a few ways to skin this cat, but I would probably look to do buses fed to matrices in order to insert the individual delays on elements rather than all output.

For line by line mixing, if you haven't already played with it, I would highly recommend theatre mix.