Thank you Michael! I really appreciate you sharing your preplanning paper work. Makes perfect since and is giving me ideas for some bigger shows I have coming up next year. Here's to a GREAT year of awesome shows in 2023!!
Lol - "they sandbaged soundcheck a little bit". Sounds like most DJs. I had a DJ at the back of the dancefloor on a riser, facing the stage. We set levels at his maximum and he said it way way too loud, so I said it's there if you need it. Of course, during his set he went way beyond, making everyone uncomfortable. Easy fix. Cut LR to half, cranked center up another 20db and nearly blew him off the stage. It was so loud, he was unable to cue the next track without winding his send back down. 😎
Really appreciate the video! Just found your channel, I’m a budding audio tech as well on the verge of reaching this level of show audio. Great to see your process and gives me some ideas of how to run my shows as I gather more gear and improve my skills. Definitely will be checking out more videos!
Hey! Great stuff. We met a while back at Pinnacle during the DiGiCo demo. Let me know if you’re ever in Fort Smith again for a gig. I’d love to connect!
Thanks for this Michael! Great to see someone sharing the documentation made for a show of this complexity. I'm just getting into that world now, and it's always interesting to me how much work is done/paperwork generated in the advancing stage.
It makes a big difference on setup when you have 80% of the gig ironed out. There's enough challenges and pivots you have to make onsite anyways, so why not have as much as you can ready to go? Glad this was helpful to you!
Thank you for this wonderfully done video! I split my time between touring music acts, broadcast and corporate, so it's nice to see more and more info about the corporate side! As much as it's the same principals of audio engineering, there's differences in language, priorities and client expectation/handling. Well done!
I would love to see the bid break down for gear and labor. This seems to be my biggest struggle. At times client feels like I'm right on point other times I'm told I'm too expensive. Other times I get told "that's it?" I charge 10% of the retail value of the equipment I bring to an event plus labor. I'd love a video from you on how your bid different jobs. Thanks for these videos I look forward to them every week.
I honestly would love to help here, but I actually don't own any gear. All I bill for as a live audio A1 is my time. The production company who hires me takes care of the client facing bidding. Maybe that's a video I can have my friend Cameron Magee back on to talk about?
I can see the 10% thing being a problem. I just did a new years eve gig and used 6 channels on my M32. I used it because my MR18($900) and X32($2600) were both being used as well at other venues. It was an interactive show with three vocals and some tracks. Two monitor mixes. In a hockey arena so I didn't need any verb on vocals either lol. I could have done it with a 6 channel 200 dollar mixer. Not my 6000 dollar m32 and digital stage box. How would that work with the 10% rule? The difference would be 580 dollars! The clients that want a digital system and understand it's value will pay you the extra. The client who needs some speakers and a mic or two might wonder why so much? Incidentally, I was working for the city council tonight, so I got closer to 30% of the value of my gear. M32 and stage box included. I would have made way less if 10% was my rule. I honestly think you should gauge each customer as they come. And just a word of advice, register and insure your business and join the local business associations and see if you can land a gig for the city you live in. GOLD my friend! Biggest paying gigs for me. Ribfest's, outdoor music fest's, Christmas tree lighting ceremonies, city sponsored car shows with bands in the middle of intersections lol. They pay huge! Worked for me anyways. Cheers!
I know some of the guys at AVAD3. Just out of curiosity, have you ever had an issue with showing these planning documents when you aren't the one making them? Or any of the riders? Do you get the hiring companies permission before making a video like this? Loved the video.
I find QSC stuff to generally run out of headroom when pushed. There's only so much the DSP can do for the mid-range components (1.4" VC/2.5" VC etc). Have you played around with the Yamaha DZR stuff? They're silly loud for the similar $$$ bracket that the K-series is in. I personally would absolutely love some KV2 tho if I ever upgraded to larger point source systems.
I'm curious - where did you learn all this stuff? An audio engineering school? Self taught? Are/were you a physics teacher? I find it absolutely mind boggling for someone to have all of this knowledge and understanding of it and putting it into practice seemingly effortlessly.
Thank you for the kind words. I grew up playing music and got into recording in high school, then studied music in college. I didn't get behind a live audio desk until right after college where I worked for a local production company. I got a ton of reps in there, learn a TON from the owner, and have been very hungry to learn everything I can about the craft. With Northwest Arkansas being a smaller market it afforded me the opportunity to do a ton of gigs in a lot of different settings, as well as some travel. I'm not freelance and chose to really dive into system design about four years ago. I got Bob McCarthy's book and poured over it and also have some generous and brilliant mentors. My audio math survival spreadsheet was the product of me working through the book and trying to digest it all. I did teach at a technical school in Dallas for a bit, but more on the studio side.
Just discovered this channel. Love eem. We could use guys like you up here in the NorthEast. Killer PM and A1 skillz. Ever do any fly dates or come up here?
I've now come to find that this is intentional with these RCF boxes. The FIR filter applied to them in combination with a polarity inversion makes these HDL6-A boxes phase compatible with the subs they pair with right out the box. Super easy fix if I'm using the HDL6-A's with other products, simply invert polarity on the DSP output.
I'm always experimenting with room mics. could you get them up on the truss? Ive used fet47jr in fig 8 with a small diaphragm condenser (I had the nt5) in mid side config with the null of the fig 8 aimed at the pa (from foh) as well as the nt5. it captured the pa and the room from foh and then i like to slap (usually shotgun) on stage and fly them where i can. I find the higher the better. cuz then the mic isn't focused on a small pocket of people like a front fill but if it's up in the air its kinda like pa and has s much larger pickup especially applause, laughter and singing. I'm still working on trying to time align them. Console delayed to my furthest mic form the pa. I go back and forth between the snare and pink noise in smaart. with the snare I record a few hits in pro tools tab to transient and line up that way. then i take those individual differences and using math apply that the delay. In my rig, i run a copied version of the mics to a sub group then run that to a matrix (camera feed) then I run my group masters into another matrix (everything but room mics) and use the external input of the camera feed to send the everything matrix so I can delay everything matrix to the room mics. I"m on a dlive by the way. It can be done on the m32 just have to be creative with routing. anyway if you wanna hear it i can send ya the link. I'm not as skilled at mixing so no laughing. that's why i turn my attention to system teching and trying to get a solid handle on that. hoping that will help me become better by understanding what's going on in the air better. is it me, is it sources, is it pa? thanks
The level of organization here is pretty inspiring. Great work! Curious, what capsules were used for the MC mics? I've got SM86's but haven't had great results. Thinking of trying KSM11's.
Definitely not LCR! Even though I call them the "left, center, and right" hangs, each feed is mono. There's very little overlap between any of the speaker zones, so distributed mono is what I went with.
So turning up the knobs on QSC speakers increases the headroom? By +6db I would imagine? Does this affect the quality of the speaker or the sound at all?
hey Michael, good job! I would do it similarly. And I know the problem with customers who dont want anything on the floor 🙂 but could you please use the metric system for space measurements in the future so that the rest of the world understands what you mean? ;-) Guten rutsch from Germany
I'll keep that in mind for future videos. I did create a metric version of my audio math survival spreadsheet, so at least hope that is helpful to you! I keep forgetting these videos go beyond my little American bubble : )
Just a few times. It's a super cool app and I like the flexibility, but I'm so familiar and fast with the native apps for the X32/M32 that I haven't got around to really diving in.
Hindsight is 20/20 - I should have taken time to run full scale pink noise through the HDL6-A's and find where the boxes go into limit and adjust the gain pot on the back to match. I think I could have had a little more headroom if I did that. All that being said, I feel like the 6 and 9 box hangs of HDL6-A could keep up with the VRX's, for sure.
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #30 ДВА В ОДНОМ [Один человек]• Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/nrXy15orKhY/mqdefault.jpg)
Aside from your general workflow being impressive, your way of presenting it is really effective.
Thank you very much.
Protip- you can drag and drop an entire folder from the data bar to the graph area to display all its contents at once.
And this is why I'm pumped about the SMAART Operator Fundamentals Online class here in a few weeks : )
So much info after watching many of your videos. But I am learning much
Thank you Michael!
I really appreciate you sharing your preplanning paper work. Makes perfect since and is giving me ideas for some bigger shows I have coming up next year.
Here's to a GREAT year of awesome shows in 2023!!
You're very welcome! Let me know how they go
I feel like I’m gonna use this video as a reply every time someone tells me “but you just unmute the mics don’t you?” 🤨😂
Go for it : )
My favorite: "Are you the DJ? Can you play Never Gonna Give You Up?"
@@dighawaii1 Rick Rollinnnnnnnnn
really interesting video, currently learning the basics of sound mxiing, but it's interesting to see how a full production is set up from scratch.
Thanks, Cameron.
Lol - "they sandbaged soundcheck a little bit". Sounds like most DJs. I had a DJ at the back of the dancefloor on a riser, facing the stage. We set levels at his maximum and he said it way way too loud, so I said it's there if you need it. Of course, during his set he went way beyond, making everyone uncomfortable. Easy fix. Cut LR to half, cranked center up another 20db and nearly blew him off the stage. It was so loud, he was unable to cue the next track without winding his send back down. 😎
Very nice! You've gotta have a deep bag of tricks to keep DJ's in check, that's for sure.
Thank you for this
Really appreciate the video! Just found your channel, I’m a budding audio tech as well on the verge of reaching this level of show audio. Great to see your process and gives me some ideas of how to run my shows as I gather more gear and improve my skills. Definitely will be checking out more videos!
Thanks a ton! Glad this was helpful to you.
Oh, Limelight! I used to work with them and Emerald City back when I lived in Dallas. How are they doing? Is Mark still their lead vocalist?
They were killer! I honestly can't remember the lead vocalist's name, but all of the vocalists did an amazing job.
Hey! Great stuff. We met a while back at Pinnacle during the DiGiCo demo. Let me know if you’re ever in Fort Smith again for a gig. I’d love to connect!
Hey, Scott! Yes I remember our meeting at the DiGiCo demo. Will definitely let you know next time I'm down in Ft. Smith.
Thanks for this Michael! Great to see someone sharing the documentation made for a show of this complexity. I'm just getting into that world now, and it's always interesting to me how much work is done/paperwork generated in the advancing stage.
It makes a big difference on setup when you have 80% of the gig ironed out. There's enough challenges and pivots you have to make onsite anyways, so why not have as much as you can ready to go? Glad this was helpful to you!
Thank you for this wonderfully done video! I split my time between touring music acts, broadcast and corporate, so it's nice to see more and more info about the corporate side! As much as it's the same principals of audio engineering, there's differences in language, priorities and client expectation/handling. Well done!
You're very welcome, Ty! Yes, Corporate relies on the same fundamentals, but it's definitely its own animal.
No EQ on podium Mics or pod mic group ? That's how you know the PA is well tuned ! good job, great explainationlove your content !
Thanks a ton!
Great video! Thanks for sharing so much useful info about a real world experience.
You're very welcome.
Thank you so much for sharing this info, Michael!
You got it, Anthony.
Sweet. Thank you for sharing. Happy Holidays
You're very welcome.
I would love to see the bid break down for gear and labor. This seems to be my biggest struggle. At times client feels like I'm right on point other times I'm told I'm too expensive. Other times I get told "that's it?" I charge 10% of the retail value of the equipment I bring to an event plus labor. I'd love a video from you on how your bid different jobs. Thanks for these videos I look forward to them every week.
I honestly would love to help here, but I actually don't own any gear. All I bill for as a live audio A1 is my time. The production company who hires me takes care of the client facing bidding.
Maybe that's a video I can have my friend Cameron Magee back on to talk about?
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Thanks for the reply. I'd love to hear Cameron's perspective.
I can see the 10% thing being a problem. I just did a new years eve gig and used 6 channels on my M32. I used it because my MR18($900) and X32($2600) were both being used as well at other venues. It was an interactive show with three vocals and some tracks. Two monitor mixes. In a hockey arena so I didn't need any verb on vocals either lol. I could have done it with a 6 channel 200 dollar mixer. Not my 6000 dollar m32 and digital stage box. How would that work with the 10% rule? The difference would be 580 dollars! The clients that want a digital system and understand it's value will pay you the extra. The client who needs some speakers and a mic or two might wonder why so much? Incidentally, I was working for the city council tonight, so I got closer to 30% of the value of my gear. M32 and stage box included. I would have made way less if 10% was my rule. I honestly think you should gauge each customer as they come. And just a word of advice, register and insure your business and join the local business associations and see if you can land a gig for the city you live in. GOLD my friend! Biggest paying gigs for me. Ribfest's, outdoor music fest's, Christmas tree lighting ceremonies, city sponsored car shows with bands in the middle of intersections lol. They pay huge! Worked for me anyways. Cheers!
Whoaaa Michael has a UA-cam channel?! Glad this popped up in my feed hope you’re doing well Michael 😄
Thanks a ton, dude! I appreciate you tuning in, hope you are well.
I know some of the guys at AVAD3. Just out of curiosity, have you ever had an issue with showing these planning documents when you aren't the one making them? Or any of the riders? Do you get the hiring companies permission before making a video like this?
Loved the video.
Great question. Yes, I talked with the good folks at avad3 before publishing this video and made sure everything I showed was cleared by them.
I find QSC stuff to generally run out of headroom when pushed. There's only so much the DSP can do for the mid-range components (1.4" VC/2.5" VC etc). Have you played around with the Yamaha DZR stuff? They're silly loud for the similar $$$ bracket that the K-series is in. I personally would absolutely love some KV2 tho if I ever upgraded to larger point source systems.
I haven't tried out the Yamaha DZR stuff. Will have to look out for them in the field.
Nice! Happy holidays!
Thanks, Roger!
I'm curious - where did you learn all this stuff? An audio engineering school? Self taught? Are/were you a physics teacher? I find it absolutely mind boggling for someone to have all of this knowledge and understanding of it and putting it into practice seemingly effortlessly.
Thank you for the kind words. I grew up playing music and got into recording in high school, then studied music in college. I didn't get behind a live audio desk until right after college where I worked for a local production company. I got a ton of reps in there, learn a TON from the owner, and have been very hungry to learn everything I can about the craft. With Northwest Arkansas being a smaller market it afforded me the opportunity to do a ton of gigs in a lot of different settings, as well as some travel.
I'm not freelance and chose to really dive into system design about four years ago. I got Bob McCarthy's book and poured over it and also have some generous and brilliant mentors. My audio math survival spreadsheet was the product of me working through the book and trying to digest it all.
I did teach at a technical school in Dallas for a bit, but more on the studio side.
Great work done Sir...How was the Sub distribution in the Middle...?
There was definitely a power alley down the center, but since there was an aisle there (no tables) I wasn't too worried about it.
Just discovered this channel. Love eem. We could use guys like you up here in the NorthEast. Killer PM and A1 skillz. Ever do any fly dates or come up here?
Thanks a ton! I do occasional work up in the NorthEast, mostly in DC. Would love to talk more about some potential gigs. My email is on my website.
'Every single box from RCF was polarity inverted'. What is this? I'm installing a new RCF HDL 26-A system. Should I be checking for something?
I've now come to find that this is intentional with these RCF boxes. The FIR filter applied to them in combination with a polarity inversion makes these HDL6-A boxes phase compatible with the subs they pair with right out the box.
Super easy fix if I'm using the HDL6-A's with other products, simply invert polarity on the DSP output.
I see you are using raycast, great video by the way, thank you!
Thanks, Carlos! Yes, Raycast has been a godsend.
I'm always experimenting with room mics. could you get them up on the truss? Ive used fet47jr in fig 8 with a small diaphragm condenser (I had the nt5) in mid side config with the null of the fig 8 aimed at the pa (from foh) as well as the nt5. it captured the pa and the room from foh and then i like to slap (usually shotgun) on stage and fly them where i can. I find the higher the better. cuz then the mic isn't focused on a small pocket of people like a front fill but if it's up in the air its kinda like pa and has s much larger pickup especially applause, laughter and singing. I'm still working on trying to time align them. Console delayed to my furthest mic form the pa. I go back and forth between the snare and pink noise in smaart. with the snare I record a few hits in pro tools tab to transient and line up that way. then i take those individual differences and using math apply that the delay. In my rig, i run a copied version of the mics to a sub group then run that to a matrix (camera feed) then I run my group masters into another matrix (everything but room mics) and use the external input of the camera feed to send the everything matrix so I can delay everything matrix to the room mics. I"m on a dlive by the way. It can be done on the m32 just have to be creative with routing. anyway if you wanna hear it i can send ya the link. I'm not as skilled at mixing so no laughing. that's why i turn my attention to system teching and trying to get a solid handle on that. hoping that will help me become better by understanding what's going on in the air better. is it me, is it sources, is it pa? thanks
Great ideas here! I'd love to hear it. My email is on my website, shoot me a link.
The level of organization here is pretty inspiring. Great work!
Curious, what capsules were used for the MC mics? I've got SM86's but haven't had great results. Thinking of trying KSM11's.
Thank you very much. They're the standard SM58 capsules.
Out of curiosity, are you doing LCR mixing for this show? Seems like audience are hearing mono on the sides?
Definitely not LCR! Even though I call them the "left, center, and right" hangs, each feed is mono. There's very little overlap between any of the speaker zones, so distributed mono is what I went with.
i didnt see a cardiod sub setup, what was the reasoning for that/
How was the PA configuration. Is it LCR or all Mono .?
We ran Left-Right-Left.
Your board mix is amazing..... i hope the sound system did justice to it.... The room was quite big...
Did you have enough low end with the six KS18s?
Thank you! And yes, I had plenty of low end with the KS118's. I wish I could have put them in a different spot, but this is where things had to go.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio wow... I thought the subs were few. That means the KS118s really perform well..
@@hezekiahcharles6754 They really do!
So turning up the knobs on QSC speakers increases the headroom? By +6db I would imagine? Does this affect the quality of the speaker or the sound at all?
I believe the QSC speakers have a +10dB gain pot on them. The quality doesn't change at all, just increases the level of the input.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Okay, so how does that help with the lack of headroom you mentioned? Does the knob raise the level of the dsp's limiter as well?
@@YiPSKiPP It does not. The QSC boxes had more input headroom available than the output voltage my console was able to provide.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Ah I see. Interesting, thank you
@@YiPSKiPP You got it!
hey Michael, good job! I would do it similarly. And I know the problem with customers who dont want anything on the floor 🙂 but could you please use the metric system for space measurements in the future so that the rest of the world understands what you mean? ;-)
Guten rutsch from Germany
Hallo from the UK! A meter is *roughly* 3 feet. Not close enough to do predictions etc., but close enough for comprehension :)
I'll keep that in mind for future videos. I did create a metric version of my audio math survival spreadsheet, so at least hope that is helpful to you! I keep forgetting these videos go beyond my little American bubble : )
what is RF? and how is it used?
Nice job, do you using Mixing Station at all?
Just a few times. It's a super cool app and I like the flexibility, but I'm so familiar and fast with the native apps for the X32/M32 that I haven't got around to really diving in.
excellent!
Thanks, Bobby.
Do you find the HDLs have more power over the older VRX you had prior?
Hindsight is 20/20 - I should have taken time to run full scale pink noise through the HDL6-A's and find where the boxes go into limit and adjust the gain pot on the back to match. I think I could have had a little more headroom if I did that.
All that being said, I feel like the 6 and 9 box hangs of HDL6-A could keep up with the VRX's, for sure.
This may sound like a stupid question but why don't you lowpass your sub matrix?
Great question! The subwoofer I was using, the QSC KS118, already has a lowpass filter built into it, so I don't want to add another and double up.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Thanks :)
Are you the boss of your freelancer business?
It's just me! Yup.
How much did you charge for this gig? Great channel
$600 per day. We had a setup day, rehearsal day, and show day + strike. The strike went into overtime and I billed for that.
Wow for a guy with your talents... that's very light.. I think you are worth much more