C200: Any recommendations for a wireless lavalair mic/system to use

jbregar said:
If Zaxcom's patent is "something that has been practiced in the industry for decades before their patent application" then there should be massive amounts of prior art and invalidating their patent should be trivial.
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Trivial? Once you get lawyers involved it never is something trivial, or cheap. Just the initial chat with a lawyer to sketch out a plan for your case will be pricey, and by the time you're done it will be very expensive indeed.

jbregar said:
I can almost guarantee that if it was that simple that someone like Sennheiser or Sony (who are orders of magnitude larger than Zaxcom) would have created a competing product and produced the prior art to invalidate the patent..
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The fact that Sony is a multi billion dollar company is meaningless. What matters is the size of the market for the product. Who on earth wants to spend tonnes of cash on lawyers for a lengthy drawn out court battle to perhaps gain a few more percent market share of a teeny sub niche of a niche field which is pro location sound recordists??
 
My perspective is that Zaxcom has both an obvious and not particularly beneficial patent. At this point, almost every sound recordist is recording and sending out a wireless transmission of some sort. The difference is that it is done at the point of the recorder. In most situations, nobody actually needs or wants to record at the body pack. I have Lectosonics PDR and haven't used it yet despite it basically being Lectrosonics way of getting around the patent. I just can't imagine an editor or DIT who would want to deal with working off the internal recordings on one of those transmitters.
 
jbregar said:
I'd guess since that hasn't happened yet, there really isn't the prior art that's been mentioned and Zaxcom does deserve credit for inventing a device that both records and wirelessly transmits.
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Previous to their patent, people were recording on one device, while transmitting on a second at the same time. Simply combining two separate devices into one does not typically warrant the issuance of a patent. It is simple and obvious. Bear in mind there is one patent judge they simply have to get something by. A patent judge that may know nothing about the technology or practice they are deciding on. Once it's snuck by them it's very hard and costly for competitors to undo. Also to get their patent they don't actually have to have a working device or even plans for a device. And anyone that thinks U.S. patent law is sensible simply has their head in the sand. Remember the guy who sent out cassette tapes by the mail who claimed he had a patent on all podcasts (successfully for many years)?

An example of how aggressive Zaxcom's lawyers are is that they stopped Tascam from selling (only in the U.S.) the version of their 10L lavalier recorder that simply had an output. It is not a device that transmitted a wireless signal at all, but only gave operators the benefit of having an output they could do anything they wanted to do with, which includes attaching to a wireless transmitter. One wonders if Zaxcom will come after videographers for wirelessly transmitting from a recorder. Probably only the negative backlash they would receive prevents them from doing so. :)
 
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cpreston said:
My perspective is that Zaxcom has both an obvious and not particularly beneficial patent. At this point, almost every sound recordist is recording and sending out a wireless transmission of some sort. The difference is that it is done at the point of the recorder. In most situations, nobody actually needs or wants to record at the body pack. I have Lectosonics PDR and haven't used it yet despite it basically being Lectrosonics way of getting around the patent. I just can't imagine an editor or DIT who would want to deal with working off the internal recordings on one of those transmitters.
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I look at it as a good safety net in situations where there are no do-overs. We almost always record in the mixer now for everything, just in-case and because it is so trivial to do, now(we do a lot of wireless to the camera). But if we're taking RF hits from the Tx to the Rx going into the mixer, then the recording at the mixer is going to have those hits. But if you have a recording BEFORE any wireless transmission(what is essentially a hard wired recording), then there are no hits and you have a clean recording(removing the possibility for physical mic scratching, clipped/distorted recording etc.). And the Zaxcom units can be TC jammed, so what's the difference between working with those files in post vs. the mixer/recorder files?*

*I say this with no knowledge of the quality(bit rate, sampling freq., etc) of the Zaxcom recording, because they don't appear to publish it on any of the sales info. I'm basing all of this off of the idea and of it being a high quality recording.
 
Even though it's a pain to put two devices and mics onto talent, you can always pick up a few Tascam DR-10Ls and double mic talent, one wireless transmitter and one recorder. The little Tascams sound surprisingly good, record forever on one AAA battery amd you have that safety net. They are physically small and light too. I wouldn't do it as a matter of routine but I always carry a couple in my camera bag and if we are getting RF issues, hits with the wireless, put the Tascams on and keep shooting.
 
You can get the Tascam DR-10CS from a european supplier so you don't have to use a second lavalier and you can stick your middle finger at Zaxcom's lawyers at the same time. :)
 
Run&Gun said:
I look at it as a good safety net in situations where there are no do-overs. We almost always record in the mixer now for everything, just in-case and because it is so trivial to do, now(we do a lot of wireless to the camera). But if we're taking RF hits from the Tx to the Rx going into the mixer, then the recording at the mixer is going to have those hits. But if you have a recording BEFORE any wireless transmission(what is essentially a hard wired recording), then there are no hits and you have a clean recording(removing the possibility for physical mic scratching, clipped/distorted recording etc.). And the Zaxcom units can be TC jammed, so what's the difference between working with those files in post vs. the mixer/recorder files?*

*I say this with no knowledge of the quality(bit rate, sampling freq., etc) of the Zaxcom recording, because they don't appear to publish it on any of the sales info. I'm basing all of this off of the idea and of it being a high quality recording.
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I'm just saying that in almost all cases I can think of, if I had a hit on the transmission, I would just ask for some type of do over. Post folks aren't going to want to have extra tracks to integrate into the work flow if there is any other option. I mean, it is a nice option when you suddenly have a producer deciding to take a shot in an elevator or car and adamant that their is no time to rewire the talent with a recorder or room for the mixer. Lectrosonics has the technology integrated and ready to go when the patent is gone. But I can't say as I miss it enough to switch to Zaxcom.
 
cpreston said:
My perspective is that Zaxcom has both an obvious and not particularly beneficial patent. At this point, almost every sound recordist is recording and sending out a wireless transmission of some sort. The difference is that it is done at the point of the recorder. In most situations, nobody actually needs or wants to record at the body pack. I have Lectosonics PDR and haven't used it yet despite it basically being Lectrosonics way of getting around the patent. I just can't imagine an editor or DIT who would want to deal with working off the internal recordings on one of those transmitters.
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I think Zaxcom's DEVA 24 recently got a firmware update which allows it to automatically pull the recordings off the bodypacks and slip it into the existing prior takes. Which naturally would massively simplify the workflow.
 
IronFilm said:
I think Zaxcom's DEVA 24 recently got a firmware update which allows it to automatically pull the recordings off the bodypacks and slip it into the existing prior takes. Which naturally would massively simplify the workflow.
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Now we're talking!
 
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