http://www.frontendaudio.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=7178

Most of my gigs are commercial jobs where I’m controlling and monitoring audio with one interviewee, so that’s what I’m used to. If I did more live events, I might switch, but my fear is fluctuating sound levels that need to be adjusted in post. But I could see it working for someone who does a lot of live events where you can’t control audio.

That is excellent Jesse. That’s exactly what you should do. In fact, you should do that with all the key vendors (e.g. photographers, hotel staff, etc.)

Oh man. That sucks! It’s very frustrating when I arrive at a gig and need to work with a staff member at the location who has no idea how the location’s set up works. You not only have to know your gear, but in many cases you have to know all kinds of audio sets too. The bright side to your story is that I bet the client won’t notice the shotgun mic audio as being less than ideal.

Thanks for sharing.

The last outdoor press conference I photographed had an audio feed that was set up by a custodian. Needless to say he’d didn’t have any headphones. Long story short, he took in a line level signal From the podium into a microphone input on the box and everyone in the press pool was being feed a horribly distorted signal, just seconds from the start of the event.

As technology get “easier” or “foolproof” it seems the value of professional work is being diminished. We had to fall back to the shotgun camera mic, which I had setup and was working fine. It was nowhere near the quality that a direct audio feed would have been. A great message from a worthy cause suffered as a result. Sadly it seems that no one seems to care about quality in this new, digital age…