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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 :)

Red Noise

Okay, I almost hate to ask...but is anyone noticing a noise from the Red LCD panel? Like a high pitched buzz? Having booted up my camera today, it's still cool...so fan is SILENT. I mean NO NOISE at all. But I'm really hearing a rather loud sound from the LCD. Noticeable from 10 feet away.

Edit: I see there was a thread on this problem in December: see thread here.

Additional edit: increasing brightness of LCD to brightest level possible removes the buzzing completely. But it MUST be on the BRIGHTEST level the LCD offers.
 
Sean said:
Okay, I almost hate to ask...but is anyone noticing a noise from the Red LCD panel? Like a high pitched buzz? Having booted up my camera today, it's still cool...so fan is SILENT. I mean NO NOISE at all. But I'm really hearing a rather loud sound from the LCD. Noticeable from 10 feet away.

Edit: I see there was a thread on this problem in December: see thread here.

But I haven't found any solutions posted, or if this is a problem across the board. Everyone's buzzes like this?
Click to expand...

Try to increase the LCD brightness to its maximum level. That should stop the noise.
 
stevesherrick said:
I will setup a video camera that will be documenting the tests so people can get an idea on where the mic is placed, how far from the camera, and they'll have the actual recording to judge on their own.
Click to expand...

Please record ambient temperatures and the time the camera is running, too.

We did some test shooting yesterday in typical tropical weather conditions. Outside, I think 32 degrees celsius (90 fahrenheit), camera shielded from direct sunshine. The camera got hot to the touch but held up alright. After being on for 20 minutes or so the fans were running at the highest speed and didn't shut off anymore. Since we were outside it wasn't a problem at all but if this was inside and sound was critical we would have had to start with a fresh camera or cool it down.
 
Correction!!!!! LCD buzzing DID go away by adjusting LCD brightness. It just didn't go away until the LCD was on THE BRIGHTEST setting possible!!! So thank you big lebowski for that tip. I'd actually tried it earlier, but again, going up in brightness didn't remove the sound until it was on the brightest setting, and then poof, the nasty buzz vanished. What a relief.
 
Okay guys. Here is the first test. A bit rough, unscientific. Here are the parameters. Room temp about 74 degrees, fans in variable, Build 13. Recorded some room without camera on, then fired it up, let it run for a bit. Mic was an Okatava MK012 positioned about 3 Ft to Camera Left, facing away from the camera. The first test has the Red Drive on as well. The second, no drive. Here is the link. These are big files 24bit/48K WAV. Use headphones.

http://homepage.mac.com/stevesherrick/RedTests/FileSharing124.html
 
Steve - what's your professional opinion on the noise levels, out of interest?

I'm not much of a sound guy!
 
Sean said:
Correction!!!!! LCD buzzing DID go away by adjusting LCD brightness. It just didn't go away until the LCD was on THE BRIGHTEST setting possible!!!
Click to expand...

This is pretty common on laptop lcd's (my thinkpad has just developed it, after a couple of years of steady use). I believe it's often caused by a bad/failing inverter on the lcd. You might want to give Red a call.
 
Dominic Jones said:
Steve - what's your professional opinion on the noise levels, out of interest?

I'm not much of a sound guy!
Click to expand...

The noise that I was picking up in the scenario I was recroding in would not be good. Keep in mind this was with Build 13. However either would the drone from the heating system in the building. For that I would have tried a high pass in my record chain. But a quiet interview in this room would have been a bit of an issue.

Steve
 
Had a listen to some scenes with normal non-screaming dialog where the camera noise was not at all audible.

Then they went on to record room tone. Mixer gain was dialed up so the sound guy had something showing his meters. Now - on this silent stage, with the RED being the loudest thing there was of course *huge shocking* camera noise.

But this was with a preamp gain setting where your speakers would probably fly through the studio wall if somebody´d sneeze during room tone recording.

So, trivial moral of story: If you want to record really low signals, the RED will have to be away from the mike. Other than that its fine.

And, about all this talk about filtering: A better approach might be masking. You *never* have total silence in a movie (as a matter of fact, when I asked for it once, my dubbing mixer flatly refused to do it). So use street atmo, woodswaks, nightowls, the sound of paint drying.....

Jochen (this is so trivial, I´m not sure I should post it, but I think its whats the cause of a lot of those noise complaints)
 
Steve,

Thank you so much for performing these tests. Can you perform some tests with Build 14 as well?

If this issue isn't fixed, I just don't see how this camera is practical for an EFP or doc scenario with a camera-mounted mic. Still an awesome camera, maybe just not "awesome" for this application.

Thanks again for performing these tests and please do let us know when you perform similar tests of Build 14.

Thanks!

Peter
 
Josch said:
And, about all this talk about filtering: A better approach might be masking. You *never* have total silence in a movie (as a matter of fact, when I asked for it once, my dubbing mixer flatly refused to do it). So use street atmo, woodswaks, nightowls, the sound of paint drying.....
Click to expand...

I've always been amazed at how much atmosphere and roomtone cover things up. On the last movie I produced we shot on Soviet era Kinor 235's and those things are LOUD. Not crazy, but you could hear them on a LOT of production sound. Let me put it this way, you could hear it above most quiet production crew shuffling that may occur in the middle of a shot.

Stick some roomtone in, music and EQ a dialog and it all melts away.. It's not ideal, but it does work.

I do have to mention that I have not heard what the fan in the RED sounds like though...
 
When my fan is low during recording it omits a high pitch tone at about 1300 Hz. That's well within the needed harmonics of the human voice. This is build 14, AUTO fan mode.

Anyone else having this problem?

I'd hate to apply a notch filter on every audio track recorded on RED.
 
William Wedig said:
I've always been amazed at how much atmosphere and roomtone cover things up. On the last movie I produced we shot on Soviet era Kinor 235's and those things are LOUD. Not crazy, but you could hear them on a LOT of production sound. Let me put it this way, you could hear it above most quiet production crew shuffling that may occur in the middle of a shot.

Stick some roomtone in, music and EQ a dialog and it all melts away.. It's not ideal, but it does work.

I do have to mention that I have not heard what the fan in the RED sounds like though...
Click to expand...

William, have a listen to my tracks. I pick it up pretty well when I turn the mic on the camera at one point.

Yes, masking works well and in a lot of situations would cover up the kind of noise being generated by the camera. However, all it takes is a scene with two actors in a quiet room (intentional, story driven reasons) and the director is asking, what the heck is that noise in the background.

Is the noise terrible, completely unacceptable? No. Could it be improved? Let's see what I get with Build 14 and 15.

Just for reference, dialogue was recorded at a nominal -20 level, so there was no pumping up the noise floor. I recorded at what I would consider a good dialogue level. Phil and other sound professionals on here can verify that for me if they have the time. I don't think the levels were an issue.
 
Well, looking back at the above posts I think it seems to be clear that:

1) People perceive noise in different ways, probably because of the different environments and situations they work in.

2) Different cameras may produce different amounts of noise.

Since there are these conflicting statements, I'll try to test the fan noise on my camera some more and will try to compare it with some of the other Reds that are in Austria now. (Any volunteers out there?)

I still think that one needs to develop a cooling barney, that blimps and cools the camera at the same time. Will do some tinkering when I get the time.

Best

Georg
 
Georg Misch said:
Well, looking back at the above posts I think it seems to be clear that:

1) People perceive noise in different ways, probably because of the different environments and situations they work in.

2) Different cameras may produce different amounts of noise.

Since there are these conflicting statements, I'll try to test the fan noise on my camera some more and will try to compare it with some of the other Reds that are in Austria now. (Any volunteers out there?)

I still think that one needs to develop a cooling barney, that blimps and cools the camera at the same time. Will do some tinkering when I get the time.

Best

Georg
Click to expand...

I hope to receive my camera soon; if it's a problem, that's my plan too. Perhaps something along the lines of exhaust tubes used in enclosed auto shops or dyno rooms to safely get rid of exhaust gases. It's just a matter of moving air in the right direction at the right volume. At least that's my theory.

It's still gotta be better than blimping the lenses on my old BL2. Though the blimped Angenieux 20-120 sure looks impressive!
 
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