Coral Canopy - Alan Chang
ETS InstaSnakes™ in Action
Recently, at a meeting of The National Council of Jewish Women in Sacramento that included readings by nationally-known playwrights, Coral Canopy employed Energy Transformation Systems (www.etslan.com) brand InstaSnakes™ for our main speaker run. The installation, which was similar in style to the TED Bay Area event held in December, 2014, we ran one CAT5 snake from FOH to Stage Right by incorporating one PA202F at FOH and one PA206 at SR. We then took the splitter output of the PA206 and ran another CAT5 from Stage Right to an additional PA206 located Stage Left.
By keeping our runs to a minimum, we were able to send Program MAIN LEFT on I/O line 1, and MAIN RIGHT on I/O line 2, thus enabling us to run additional MONITOR mixes and fold-back on I/O 3+4. If delays were to be found necessary, we had the capability to deploy multiple PA206 boxes at all our speaker locations by using lines 1+2 for our L+R program, and line 3 for our delay fills. All that was left to do was daisy-chain CAT5's around the venue, regardless of lengths.
Without the need to employ a bigger digital I/O box for Mains and Delay fills, we were able to introduce the PA206's as our K.I.S.S. ("keep it simple, stupid") rig for major corporate and speaker presentation projects. For our remote location recording rigs, we were able to keep cable runs to a minimum by deploying multiple PA202F under our Decca Trees, Spot microphones, and outrigger wide arrays, all the while running single lines of CAT5 back to base camp.
When we are asked to record sound effects such as high-performance vehicles at Thunderhill Raceway in Willows, CA, we need to deploy multiple PA202 boxes fanned out from our Sound Devices recorders at strategic positions established throughout the five-mile turns and long straight-aways of the course. With simple CAT5 lines running from microphones to recorders, overall system weight is hugely reduced, while ease of use is improved, along with shortened workflows and reduced time to completion.
For our theater and musical venues, the PA202 series provided orchestra pit and green room microphone support while the PA206 provided all the monitor fold-backs for our conductors and musicians without the cumbersome need to bring in an Aviom™ system.
For some film productions, we needed to hide local remote microphones without resorting to wireless. The PA202 series helped keep the cable runs to a minimum by providing four additional microphone inputs to get our microphones closer to the set. Sometimes, we used the PA202's to remote our wireless rack unit closer to the set, due to location difficulties in remotely installing paddle antennas.
For TV and corporate talking heads, each table of two speakers was run to individual PA202F boxes underneath the table tops, which then connect to our FOH/Dugan mixers by simple single-run CAT5 lines to PA202M boxes. Instead of dragging around large (and heavy) multi-core snakes and sub-snakes for all the seating tables arranged in a large rectangular room, the ETS InstaSnakes™ eliminate most of the weight, as well as all of the headache, of designing truly effective configurations.
In general, the ETS InstaSnakes™ offer us a streamlined workflow and optimized organization compared with traditional multi-core snakes with their unwieldy fan-outs. Furthermore, unlike the larger dedicated I/O boxes that could only remote to limited locations, the smaller size and scale of the PA202 Series boxes offers us versatility in placement that we'd never previously experienced.
Alan Chang | Coral Canopy
Film, Television, Broadway, Orchestra
1958 32nd Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94116
p: 415.987.1905 - f: 415.592.9570
www.coralcanopy.com
