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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Fan Noise A Problem?

The camera noise is an issue when you are running long takes with dialogue, if you have to turn the fans on. We were shooting 10min takes in about 80 degree weather. It was a real fine line between getting the take and having a camera overheat, which led to a corrupted take. Under a typical 1-5min take there shouldn't be much of a problem. If you have to turn the fans on because of heat, then no sound guy I've worked with would be okay with it. I wish they would retrofit a top vent or something in the system that you could open when you knew the takes were going to go long.
 
Dr. Sound,
Is it more of an issue that the frequency varies with the speed of the fan, or is the sound itself covering a wider range of frequencies, making a traditional notch filter less effective?
Is it more readily apparent in a post environment, where audio monitoring is more critical and detailed than on set?
Is there anything we, as camera department personnel, can do to mitigate the sound, other than move farther away and change to a longer focal length (which I doubt will happen very often, since that would pit a creative choice against a technical one)?
Do you have a recommendation to the Red Team on the fan hardware? Is there a better vendor, perhaps a more friction-free fan motor design?
I'll of course continue to be my usual conscientious self and double-check to make sure our sound department on set is happy. But honestly, not a one of the top-notch guys in New York with whom I have had the privilege to work with, have complained about the fan noise during a take.
Cheers,
Harry
 
The sound guy who often works the features I work on; the pacific northwest is a pretty small community, doesn't complain when the fans do not run during takes. i.e. auto or silent. If it were a problem I am positive I would have had him talking to me about it.
 
Harry Clark said:
Dr. Sound,
Is it more of an issue that the frequency varies with the speed of the fan, or is the sound itself covering a wider range of frequencies, making a traditional notch filter less effective?
Is it more readily apparent in a post environment, where audio monitoring is more critical and detailed than on set?
Is there anything we, as camera department personnel, can do to mitigate the sound, other than move farther away and change to a longer focal length (which I doubt will happen very often, since that would pit a creative choice against a technical one)?
Do you have a recommendation to the Red Team on the fan hardware? Is there a better vendor, perhaps a more friction-free fan motor design?
I'll of course continue to be my usual conscientious self and double-check to make sure our sound department on set is happy. But honestly, not a one of the top-notch guys in New York with whom I have had the privilege to work with, have complained about the fan noise during a take.
Cheers,
Harry
Click to expand...

Harry,
In my previous post I stated it was more "broadband noise". Especially when you mix with TWO Red cameras in the room (or 4 in some shots) for 3D. I won't comment on other Post Sound mixers unless I know their names other than to say, a lot of guys in Post just get poor location sound and don't know good production. You can PM their names and I'll let you know if I know of them or their work.
I want to make a point that I am NOT asking for the cinematographer to change their ways, I am just asking for more thought (about the sound coming from the Red) to make this a better product for the whole picture.
 
Gotcha.
I'll assume that by "broadband" you mean it's not likely to be fixed by a notch filter.
The sound department members to whom I refer are all location sound recordists. I have never met a post production sound mixer in my life; I work on-set, not in post.
The Red Team will have to chime in on camera design. I was specifically looking for input on the camera department side of things for steps we can take to mitigate the sound.
Cheers,
Harry
 
I just love when people tell me about fixing it in post. It's about the last thing I ever hear them say.

In certain situations the fan is to loud, even at 25% it makes enough noise. Hopefully we will have a firmware to disable the fan completely when needed.

Andrew Rowe said:
the audio will have to be sorted out in post.
Click to expand...
 
Same here. My R1 was much quieter in short takes than my Epic. Never really noticed the R1 fan. Noticed the Epic fan right out of the box, in fact, the FedX lady was wondering what the loud humming coming from the package was.

She's loud, but she is the future, I'll adapt.

Nick Gardner said:
I am somewhat confused by peoples reports of loud fans, every Red I have worked with went dead silent the minute you hit the big red button.

Nick
Click to expand...
 
yes, it's a problem.. but we'll roll sound anyway

yes, it's a problem.. but we'll roll sound anyway

I am both a location sound mixer and a camera operator.
I also have 20 years experience as a producer, shepherding projects from prep to delivery.
I have worked with both R1 and Epic.
You flat out can not avoid hearing the fan in an Epic. On an interior set, you will be recording it, esp in boomed closeups.
When recording, I have taken to trying the notch filter on my Zaxcom recorder, and rolling off low frequencies on my Sound Devices front end.
This is not perfect, but the audio post budget has been enough that the projects I do are delivered... and some of them are not able to loop.
I do think that so far, the "real" environments (as opposed to sound stages) on which I have worked have been distracting post sound from complaining to me.. but I know that it any interior track I record for an EPIC shoot will have fan noise audible...
I do not see any way around this..

so.. don't kid yourself..the camera is louder than an SR... not louder than a 535 (worked with both)...unless they needed service. but there's a point where the location recorder has to deliver a track, even an imperfect one.

I wondered if even larger heat sinks and a modified housing might help.. but I don't work at RED, so have no idea what it would taketo keep the processors cool enough to keep working..

As I live in Georgia, I am also wondering how the humidity here is going to affect DSMC system bodies, which have rather large fan vents..

When I get my camera, it is NOT going to the beach or the desert...

Good luck, all!
 
I posted on an earlier thread about the Epic fan noise - definitely louder than the RED One. I think I can live with the fans running at 33% during takes but the camera does start to get warm quickly. In our office which was quite cool, the camera hit 70 degrees in just under 17 minutes in record mode, so I guess in typically filming environments with lighting, the camera will hit that temperature much sooner.

One look at the footage and I can forgive anything BUT I've always wished RED would give the audio side of the camera a wee bit more attention - a RED Sound Devices IO module would be really nice :o)

For once the chilly Scottish climate will prove useful!

Scott
 
Christopher Mills said:
When recording, I have taken to trying the notch filter on my Zaxcom recorder, and rolling off low frequencies on my Sound Devices front end. This is not perfect, but the audio post budget has been enough that the projects I do are delivered... and some of them are not able to loop.
Click to expand...
I think this is throwing the baby out with the bath. The problem (as Marti said above) is that the Red Epic fan noise is broadband -- you can't just notch it out because it's multi-frequency noise.

What can be done is to have a good re-recording engineer or dialog editor sample the noise, then use a program like iZotope RX to subtract this noise sample from the dialog. This, plus some finessing with dialog levels and careful microphone placement, can help salvage otherwise bad audio. There's lots of tools for this kind of thing; Cedar is another high-end processor that does wonders with noisy environments.

I suspect that it's possible to reduce the noise level with better fans, but Red has not publicly commented on this, as far as I know.
 
Harry Clark said:
... I have never met a post production sound mixer in my life; I work on-set, not in post. ...
Click to expand...

Sorry, no offense, but I had to LOL at this one. Spoken like a true director or DP.
 
Marc, I do understand that.. and will propose it on the next project I work.. I have given "fan tone" without the notch and roll off, and "fan tone" with them... I so rarely am given an opportunity to interface with audio post, which I find impedes my ability to deliver most useful tracks...
Many of my clients perceive the notched and rolled off frequency audio as "better sounding" in the field, without considering what they might have done later...
and some of them barely want to pay their picture editor, let alone book a sound post session...
sigh...
 
Will Keir said:
I just love when people tell me about fixing it in post. It's about the last thing I ever hear them say.

In certain situations the fan is to loud, even at 25% it makes enough noise. Hopefully we will have a firmware to disable the fan completely when needed.
Click to expand...

If you disable the fan, the temperature will rise and invalidate your black shade leading to more noise.

The only hope is a fan speed that keeps it under the threshold of turning on full blast, and maybe that fan speed will go down once power management gets implemented.

BTW - I've used Izotope's RX2 for fan noise with some degree of success.
 
I had noticed the hum of the fan on the Epic X when viewing one that someone had for sale. My only hope was that sound were to disappear when the recording started. Otherwise, major design flaw, with a tedious task ahead in audio post.
 
Brian Hughes said:
I had noticed the hum of the fan on the Epic X when viewing one that someone had for sale. My only hope was that sound were to disappear when the recording started. Otherwise, major design flaw, with a tedious task ahead in audio post.
Click to expand...
I think power management (when implemented) will only be really noticeable when not recording.

While it's recording, the internal chips are eating a lot of power and generating heat. My best guess is that the fan is going to need to be on to some degree.

So, zero fan noise is probably not going to be an option.

I'm hoping that the Scarlet/Epic will have the ability to keep the internal temperature constant, while running the slowest speed.

It seems like the only way to get low noise is to black shade at the temperature you're going to be recording, and if it fluctuates very much from that (that would be an interesting test to see -differences in noise level at different deviations from black shade temperature!!!), the noise level is going to increase.

I'm planning on making some kind of rig with acoustic sound deadening foam, to try to muffle the noise and keep the camera as far away from the boom as possible as I'm not shooting a movie with ADR.
 
Les C. said:
I'm planning on making some kind of rig with acoustic sound deadening foam, to try to muffle the noise and keep the camera as far away from the boom as possible as I'm not shooting a movie with ADR.
Click to expand...
In the old "film days," people would often take very noisy film cameras -- like an Arriflex IIC -- and put it in a barney, which was a large plastic box filled with foam in order to deaden the noise. But you can't do this with a digital camera, because it needs air flow to cool it. The air flow is what's making the noise; if you put more stuff on the camera, it's going to tend to overheat. I'm not sure there's an easy solution to this.

I think choice of fan, number of blades, and the vents on the outside edge all contribute to mechanical noise. I'm curious to see how people shooting multiple cameras in interiors are dealing with this problem.
 
Marc Wielage said:
In the old "film days," people would often take very noisy film cameras -- like an Arriflex IIC -- and put it in a barney, which was a large plastic box filled with foam in order to deaden the noise. But you can't do this with a digital camera, because it needs air flow to cool it. The air flow is what's making the noise; if you put more stuff on the camera, it's going to tend to overheat. I'm not sure there's an easy solution to this.

I think choice of fan, number of blades, and the vents on the outside edge all contribute to mechanical noise. I'm curious to see how people shooting multiple cameras in interiors are dealing with this problem.
Click to expand...
I was thinking something more like 'flags' made of foam. Instead of blocking light to the camera they would block some noise to the mic?

Probably hopeless, as I've got hard wood floors, would have to stop all the reflections by putting a tarp down (which I do around the 'talent' anyway to block light and sound reflections) - but ... it might lessen the sound a bit?
 
So, with my plan to record long interviews at 33% fan setting with a steady rise in temperature from around 45 degrees to upwards of 70, I'm going to also see a rise in video "noise" along with the camera temperature rise? Is this going to be a big problem? Constant black shading when we're shooting is not a realistic option for us due to time constraints.

Best wishes

Scott
 
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