HOW TO ATTRACT A PARTNER, PART 2
Quite a technical feat
For anyone interested, here’s a glimpse behind the scenes of the Beagle TV recordings. For me as sound technician the “chatting-up course” was a bit like a high-school assignment!
The assignment: filming a chatting-up course for women.
- 3 main characters
- 50 extras.
The situation: an echoing ballet hall with two mirrored walls.
Handicap: simultaneous translation spanish-english and a documentary situation.
In other words do everything yourself, with limited resources.
Because the hall echoes so badly, which is awful for recording speech, the main characters in our story all get their own transmitters (+ microphones). In this case that’s Dirk, the presenter, Bram Buunk, the host of the episode and Paula, the course leader. (= 3 receivers connected to my mixer) Paula speaks Spanish, Dirk and Bram will speak English. To enable us to follow what’s going on (the director, the cameraman and later in the assembly, the editor) there’s a simultaneous interpreter.
I position the interpreter in the hallway, because I don’t want to hear him along with all the other sounds. So the interpreter gets a receiver with an earpiece. (4th station, connected to my "mixer" that only transmits the sounds of Paula and the students, because they only speak spanish) The interpreter also gets his own transmitter with microphone, otherwise we can’t hear his translation (= 4th receiver connected to my mixer). The director, Dirk and Bram all get a receiver with an earpiece so they all hear the interpreter’s translation (simultaneously!). I also record the interpreter, on a separate track, on the camera disc. ("tape"). Joost also gets an earpiece, which he plugs into the camera, so he can hear the interpreter and decide who to shoot and when.
The fact that this works flawlessly is quite a technical achievement in itself.
The real secret lies in good equipment, in our case supplied by the Noyz Boyz. 3 Audio Limited various transmitters / receivers, a single transmitter Audio Limited with 3 receivers, a scanner, a Sony transmitter and receiver, a heap of Sancen transmitter microphones, a pile of earphones (which also look nice). It should sound good, it should also transmit and receive flawlessly without interfering with each other, so no tsssjjj, zzzjjjt, kgkgkgkgkggggg. And that all in a strange country where different (available) frequencies used than in the Netherlands.
Then you need a device that streamlines all the desired input and output dialogue. A mixer. A very advanced mixer, with digital Out (AES / EBU) so I can exploit all four audio tracks on the disc camera XDcamHD (ie digital video). Behold, the Aaton Cantar! A 6-track hard disc recorder (because were so pressed for time in the assembly we don’t use the 6 tracks) where, thanks to the 9 inputs, I can really play around. After that I still have to take track policy into account.
On track 1, the pole ie what anyone says, and tonight that’s a lot of people! On track 2, the S of the stereo microphone, but this time the stereo is sacrificed to the diversity of cackling going on. Track 2 is allocated to Paula, who will do most of the talking in this scene. Then on track 3 I put Dirk and Bram. I have no idea when they are going to say anything. It is certain, however, that they will say something. On track 4, the interpreter.
Its a tiring evening for everyone. The decibels that women generate are inherently exhausting. The interpreter is stressed out and paces up and down. The production assistant gives him water just like a marathon runner gets handed refreshments. He translates non-stop, without a hitch, everything cackled in Spanish into coherent English sentences. Joost peers through his viewfinder and tries to distinguish the relevant comments from the irrelevant and even catches the person in question in an appropriate pose. My eyes and ears work overtime. I keep an eye on the levels of the tracks, the sound quality on all microphones, that everything is intelligible, that nothing is causing interference and I try to be on time with the pole when a student speaks. Whether in the picture or not in the picture depends on who I pole and thus who gets translated ... At the same time listening to the Spanish, which I understand but is hard to follow at this speed and in English, which allows me to follow the whole story. I find it all quite taxing. This technique of filming this evening is an art way beyond the art of chatting-up.
