Fan noise no fun

[Ulf Palenius]

Hi!

Have searched this forum for posts about the noise from the cooling fan, but found nothing? That’s strange as I find the noise from the fan being a BIG problem, especially when shooting in silent indoor environment and close to the actors.

The camera is quite new (#6371, build 20) and the fan operates as I believe it should; I’ve set it on Auto and it decreases in number of revolutions when I hit the record button. It then of course makes less noise, but it’s still very irritating. Changing the mode to “Quiet” or “Silent” makes no difference, the minimum number of revolutions seem to be the same in all settings. Surrounding temp ca. 20 °C.

I know that my Røde mic isn’t the best and I’m planning to by a premium Sennheiser or Schoeps mic, but fear that won’t eliminate the problem totally. And filtering the noise in post doesn’t seems right.

BTW, have you seen the documentary on Ingmar Begman when he finds out that the irritating noise in his headphones comes from the new (2002) digital HD cameras they where shooting his “Saraband” with, the Thomson 6000? He wasn’t glad...
See also http://www.ingmarbergman.se/page.asp...948E8&LanCD=EN.

So... I have at least two things in common with Bergman: I’m Swedish and I dislike camera-sounds...

Part from the fan noise, the RED is super!!!

Any advise from you experienced people? It must be a common problem to a lot of you.

/Ulf Palenius, Falun, Sweden

[jbeale]

It is possible that your fan may have a bad bearing or for some other reason be more noisy than most, but I don't know how you could prove that, except by comparing directly to another R1 camera in the same space.

Do you have the microphone mounted on the camera (hopefully not)?

[Ulf Palenius]

Thanks, John, for your answer.
The mic is several meters – and pointed – away from the camera.

Anyone else? There's a compact sound of silence on the forum about this, I believe...

I try the support and see what they can come up with.

/u

[Anson Fogel]

We've found our R1 to be similar in noise when recording or quieter than most other similar cams. When using a shotgun or short shotgun on a boom, even very close to the camera, we've not had a problem with fan noise. When actors are very close to the lens on some shots though with many cameras it can be an issue.

In those cases, I've heard of some folks using a simple solution with R1 and with Super 16 and even newer 35mm Arri cams when shooting actors very close to the lens - throw a heavy blanket over the thing for the brief periods you are recording.

If you are having fan noise problems in cases where the audio being recorded is not super close (like, 1 meter) to the cam, you are - no disrespect meant - doing something wrong with the audio.

[James Brundige]

Get a good super or hyper cardiod mic, and set it up at least one meter from the camera, pointing away from the camera.

If the lens is very close to talent, pad the camera for that shot, as Anson has suggested. Same drill with every film camera in the world.

[Radim Schreiber]

When I have camera powered through DC - a charger, the fan noise is sometimes too strong, when in quiet environment. Any solutions for that? I have not find a place where the fan could be turned off. thanks.

[Bérenger Brillante]

also fans on chargers are noisy

you should always use batteries, you never know....

Though I agree, even when the charger is away from the set, in another room, mine is pretty noisy and the sound guy can have it recorded sometimes, when walls are thin.

But there's a lot of noisy charger, not especially red charger.

[Stuart English]

We also offer a modestly priced 100W capacity D.C power source which is silent.

[Denis Buhot]

Hi!

The camera is quite new (#6371, build 20) and the fan operates as I believe it should; I’ve set it on Auto and it decreases in number of revolutions when I hit the record button. It then of course makes less noise, but it’s still very irritating.

makes my own fan totally silent, as far as I can judge... Anyway, I doubt even my Sennheiser 816 would hear a thing...

[Stephen Pruitt]

Ours (#791) is very, very quiet while recording when set to "silent" mode.

Stephen