May 2018… If you produce, record, mix, or master music, you probably hang out at Pensado’s Place—or at least, you should. On this popular weekly online TV show, Grammy Award-winning mix engineer Dave Pensado and music-business expert Herb Trawick offer audio production tips and techniques; interview top music industry artists, engineers, producers, mixers, and record executives; analyze current popular music recordings; and generally offer a helping hand to anyone who wants to learn to produce like the top pros.
Production assistant and audio engineer Chongor Goncz wears many hats at Pensado’s Place, including helping to produce the Pensado Awards and holding down an assistant job to Trawick. Goncz also hosts Corner Office, a Pensado’s Place show where you can submit audio production questions and get answers on the air. Among Goncz’ many responsibilities at Pensado’s Place is ensuring the audio signals are clean—an awesome responsibility, considering the hosts, guests, and even some viewers are A-list audio professionals. To that end, he relies on TASCAM’s DR-10L digital audio recorder with lavalier microphone and DR-701D linear PCM recorder/mixer for DSLR cameras.
“Essentially my main role is to make sure you get content every week,” relates Goncz. “At the start of the day, I make sure the graphics are queued up, our cameras are together, all the shots are right, the set looks as clean as it needs to, and the audio signals are clean. People will forgive bad picture but they don’t forget bad sound. TASCAM makes it so I don’t have to worry about that.”
TASCAM’s DR-10L is an ultra-compact digital recorder/lavalier microphone combo designed for creative filmmakers and busy videographers. Ideal for location recording, the DR-10L can be mounted to each on-camera actor, removing the need for booms and wires or unpredictable wireless systems. Its professional features include an automatic limiter to protect against sudden input overloads and Dual Recording, which captures a copy of the signal at a lower level as a safety track in case of distortion in the primary recording.
“The DR-10L is one of those devices I just can’t live without,” Goncz enthuses. “I love it, I love it, I love it! I love the fact that you can leave a lav on someone and know that you’re getting two layers of recording: a full line level and a lowered one. I don’t have to deal with RF signals anymore. I can get ten hours on one AAA battery. You just put TASCAM DR-10L on, turn on Record, stop it once you’re done, sync it up, and you’re good. It has become such a versatile tool in my arsenal that I don’t feel comfortable going to shoots unless I have a DR-10L.”
The TASCAM DR-701D is another Goncz favorite. Designed for professional filmmakers, television producers, advertisers, and documentarians, the DR-701D is TASCAM’s flagship recorder for single-shooter video production. Four mic inputs can be individually recorded, along with their stereo mix, for a total of six tracks, and multiple units can be cascaded.
“The TASCAM DR-701D, what’s not to love about it?” offers Goncz. “You’ve got high-quality HDDA preamps, time code, HDMI, and the sync slate. It sits under your DSLR, right on top of your tripod. You can’t condense your format any more than that. I can time-code sync between all my cameras on the shoot, which makes life easy. Balancing audio and camera work is tough. Being able to have such fast audio access while being on the camera makes my life so much easier, and it makes the operator’s life easier. There’s not much more you can ask for.”
With his passion for audio excellence, Chongor Goncz takes pride in providing top quality on every project—and Dave Pensado and Herb Trawick wouldn’t settle for less. “When I use TASCAM products, I know I’m going to get clean audio, with clean preamps that are built really well, from a company that stands behind what they do,” Goncz explains. “TASCAM just makes my video sound better.”
