Cooper Sound Mixer in TV Series
Although this will probably read like a hymn of praise, rather than an objective assessment, Freelance Sound Mixer Giancarlo Dellpina is honest enough to admit that his six ,months shoot earned enough for him to justify the purchase of the Cooper Sound CS208 location mixer he used. In any case it's always interesting to hear what recordists at the sharp end have to say about equipment and the way they use it.
The Job was a seven part television series for Channel 4 (in collaboration between SKA Films, who made the original feature - and Ginger Productions) based on the successful Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels.
Cooper Sound mixers are no strangers to the UK film sound world, and in this case the CS208 particularly seems to have hit the spot. Giancarlo enthuses, "I am very happy with the CS208. It's beautifully made and extremely solid, it feels as if it will last forever. I had the MS decoder option fitted on channel two, which allows me to use the first pair as my stereo FX channels.
"I'm particularly impressed with the comms side of things. The 208 has three separate phone outs with Private Line assignable to all three. On this production I'm using two Garwood transmitters fed through two separate head phone outs, with the director and script getting a mix of the sound I choose, and the boom operator also getting a separate mix on a different frequency; it means that I can talk to the director and script separately as well as having a private line to the bottom op, without having to interfere with programme sound.
"I also love the photo-optical limiters on every channel. They are very quiet in operation, you can silently switch them on or off during a take if a scene demands it. I also like the fact that you can set the threshold on each channel to your own taste.
"Also the EQ is very versatile - just as well considering some of the locations we've had to put up with. All in all, the CS 208 is a no compromise, sonically transparent, logical mixer, which does the job it was made for , but certainly does it better than any other product I've tried."
Pro Sound News, June 2000