Playing the Field

Oct 1, 2005 12:00 PM, By Nick Peck

           
 

Four on the Score

Al Nelson was sound-effects recordist on such films as AI and The Hulk and is currently recording effects for the upcoming Pixar film Cars. Al was also the sound designer on the recent Sony Classics release, November. He used the R-4 in the field and was impressed. His favorite aspect was simply the fact that it was tapeless.

“Despite a number of critiques that I may have, let's remember this: no more DAT tape. No $40 runs to the pro audio store before we go on that little recording adventure. No unraveling the little tape from around my Tascam DA-P1's insides after getting the one great take that I was waiting for. Just power up and start recording. And with 40 GB, you can keep the past month's stuff without fear of running out of space. Transferring my recordings to the computer was easy. I plugged the R-4's USB port into a Mac and it showed up on the desktop as a drive. Dragging and dropping was as simple as could be. It was way better than loading a linear tape.”

Al also liked the R-4's layout and user interface. He said it was “an easy ramp-up to use. To start recording, it's pretty straightforward. There are not many menu items overall, and it's intuitive as to where you need to go to set up to record. The first time I had to go to the manual was to figure out how to monitor input without recording, which is achieved by pressing Pause while in Record mode.”

Al thought that the preamps were clean, though he heard “a little bit of that hissy air with a quiet source and high gain. The device itself is very quiet, perfect on the Foley stage.” He thought the input metering was reliable enough, but that the clip indicator was “not obvious — it was just a black dash. I would really prefer to see green, yellow, and red LCDs.”

Al played around with the onboard effects as well. “The EQ seemed useful for auditioning whether or not a particular recording situation could be fixed in post, but I wouldn't choose to process internally if I had better outboard options or plug-ins. Things like emphasis and compression would probably be useful for vocals, though. Great for that indie film editorial team who might be recording voice-over or maverick-style ADR.”

The R-4 does have its share of drawbacks. Al noted that the phantom power “comes in banks of two. What if I have three dynamics and a condenser?” In addition, Al would like to see a mid-side (M/S) decode headphone-monitoring mode, which is useful for field recordists. The only unit in this roundup that does offer such a mode is the Sound Devices 722. He felt that the preamp “gain is clean, but I could use a bit more.” Ultimately, he didn't think the R-4 was an appropriate choice for field recording, because “the thing is big and kind of clunky. It's set up like a desktop device. For what I do, it needs to be streamlined. It's really designed to lay flat for easy use. The transport is on the front, but all other menu options, switches, and so on are on top.”

In summary, Al said it was a great tool for low-budget film projects. “For all of those spare-bedroom editorial departments making documentaries and indie movies, the R-4 will be a lifesaver. Small productions can now buy a decent shotgun mic and an R-4 and prep most of their track. There's no timecode; by recording guerilla-style to picture, however, they can shoot narration, maverick-style ADR, simple Foley, and so on. They can record sounds while they shoot, spend a few weeks hunting and gathering, and actually create their project's sound library for cheap.”

He also said, “For music, it looks to be a great tool as well. It's clean and quiet enough to take to your favorite room, empty lecture hall or church; plug in a few mics; and record for hours. Those extra two inputs could make a huge difference in allowing you to record close- and distant-perspective versions of the music.”

SOUND DEVICES 722

The Sound Devices 722 ($2,650) is the unit that most pros I know either own or are planning to buy (see Fig. 6). Though it is the priciest of the bunch (costing $1,250 more than the excellent Fostex FR-2), it is loaded with features that would make any sound recordist drool. The 722 is small and lightweight, sounds great, and comes loaded with a 40 GB internal hard drive.

FIG. 6: The Sound Devices 722 delivers great sound quality and professional features in a sleek package.

For protection, the 722 is built from solid aluminum plates all the way around. Because it has no controls on the top or bottom plates, you can operate it easily within a protective case with just the front and sides exposed. The front panel is loaded with bright LEDs and an LCD, with a relative paucity of knobs and buttons — 13 in all. A knob on the side lets you control most functions by giving you access to the 722's menu system.

The 722 records WAV files as high as 24-bit, 192 kHz. It can also encode to MP3 format, providing a maximum record time of 1,422 hours at 64 Kbps. The unit has a CompactFlash port that you can use instead of the hard drive. If you're concerned about the reliability of hard drives in the field, you can record to CompactFlash and the hard drive simultaneously, ensuring redundancy in case of failure.

The 722 is crammed full of more features than space permits me to describe; suffice it to say that flexibility and detail were clearly the intentions of the design team. Some examples are flexible routing between inputs and recording tracks and the ability to route input, track, or postrecord (confidence monitoring) to the headphones. You can adjust the meter ballistics, LED brightness, highpass-filter knee and cutoff frequency, and the output level of the warning beep. Presets let you set your favorite recording and headphone configurations, a reference tone oscillator, and a VCR-like time and date auto-record feature.

Special kudos must go to the 722's battery system. Rather than using AA batteries, the 722 uses 7.2V lithium ion (Li-ion) cells that are compatible with current-generation Sony camcorders. The included battery stores a relatively paltry 1,500 mAh, which will power the 722 for two hours, but larger batteries are available through consumer electronics and camera stores. The included AC-to-DC adapter will run the 722 and charge the battery simultaneously. For serious excursions into the wilderness, you can connect large-capacity lead-acid batteries to the DC power input.