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Newstips Electronic Editorial Bulletin Issue # 2008-05c
News between observed & actual Memorial Days
New Samson head-worn SE50 mike
If you've never seen a head-worn mike, that's deliberate; near
invisibility is one of the goals of this genre of microphones &
its newest member, the new Samson SE50. The whisker-thin voice
tube connects to a micro-miniature omnidirectional condenser
element that adjusts easily to be fit over a left or right ear,
with a uniquely designed retaining band to help keep it in place.
It has a water-resistant coating, necessary these days because of
the popularity of these mikes in fitness applications. The audio
quality is tailored for vocalists, which makes it outstanding for
spoken-word applications. It's available in black or beige &
comes with 3 windscreens, a detachable cable, adapters that fit
most popular wireless mike transmitters, a drip ring, a collar
clip & a carry case. Mark has more info, pix & hands on the gate
for the review queue. Contact: Mark Wilder, SAMSON TECHNOLOGIES
(Hauppauge, NY) 631-784-2200x142 mailto:mwilder@samsontech.com
http://SamsonTech.com
Third-party adapter mounts Tekkeon MP3450 to cameras
Users are wonderful beings who sometimes take products to places
the designers never got around to imagining. The Tekkeon MP 3450
myPower ALL Plus (online $130), with or without its companion
MP3450-10 piggyback second battery pack ($100), was primarily
designed as a way to extend the runtime of a notebook PC - by up
to 3.5 hours solo, 7 hours with the piggyback. The output adjusts
from 3-19V & each of these 12-ounce units has a lithium polymer
battery with a 50 Watt-hour capacity. One clever user had a
different need - power for his pro-level camcorder - which proved
so sweet an application that he now sells adapter mounts to put a
Tekkeon pack where a $300 "brick" battery would usually go. We
think you'll get your own cool ideas when you snag one to review.
Contact: René Williams, TEKKEON, INC. (Tustin, CA) 949-360-7770
mailto:rene@tekkeon.com http://Tekkeon.com
Un-Micro lighting spotlights Litepanels advantage
In a recent night shoot for a car company, an enterprising
cinematographer rigged small porches to the front & back of a
Mercedes, with a 6-wide array of studio-size Litepanels 1x1 (foot
square) lights on each. One detail of that may help your interest
in the Litepanels Micro ($300) for SLR & video cameras: the
entire array was powered by an inverter in the car & consumed
less than 500 Watts. While each 1x1 array may have used 40 Watts
(with a lot more light than you'd think 40 Watts could ever
deliver), an LP Micro can shine at full brightness for 7 hours on
a set of 4 Energizer E2 Lithium AA cells (or 90 minutes on
alkaline AAs or about half that on NiMH rechargeable AAs). If
seeing is believing, ask Ken to get an LP Micro to you to review.
Contact: Ken Fisher, LITEPANELS, INC. (North Hollywood CA)
818-332-3070 mailto:ken@litepanels.com http://LitePanels.com
Wi-Ex expands on why expand bandwidth if you can't get any
You've probably seen the announcements about newer, fatter cell
service data paths so such things as next-generation BlackBerry
or iPhone handsets can ride more bandwidth. These announcements
tend not to mention that you can't get more bandwidth when you
get fewer bars. Our humble suggestion: get your choice of home,
personal or in-car Wi-Ex bar boosters in for review so you can
honestly report on how much good they can do. Contact: Sharon
Cuppett, WI-EX INC. (Norcross, GA) 770-239-5475x6380
mailto:scuppett@wi-ex.com http://wi-ex.com AGENCY CONTACT: Deanna
Anderson 404-759-1890 mailto:danderson705@comcast.net
Bandwidth boosts let Droplet video get better
If you've been following happenings in cellular, you may guess
that faster data bandwidth to support next-generation iPhone &
BlackBerry models is just ahead. Higher data bandwidth lets the
codec within Droplet's software deliver higher-quality video
(mostly, better resolution) at its manifest 29.96 fps
broadcast-quality frame rate. Ask John. Contact: John Ralston,
DROPLET TECHNOLOGY (Menlo Park, CA) 650-688-5762
mailto:ralston@droplet-tech.com http://droplet-tech.com Agency
contact: Evan Kennedy (Terpin) 310-821-6100x116 evan@terpin.com
Special Report: Reverse Agribusiness
Once there were just farms, but the industrial revolution
triggered changes that would eventually redefine them as
agribusiness. Today's economic climate may flip the concept a bit
to encourage industrial plants to plant crops on idle acreage. We
checked the viability of the concept with an authority (in the
Ohio State University Extension: Agricultural, Environmental &
Development Economics) & found a supporter. Per the expert, the
biggest cash crops in Northeastern Ohio (for both gross revenues
& high net profits) are corn, soybeans & wheat. Corn now leads
that group by some margin, with sweet corn (for food) costing
more to produce but netting more than field corn (which still
makes more than soybeans or wheat). So how feasible is it to
plant idle industrial park acreage? Very: with corn, first-year
profitability is almost certain. The work, of course, would have
to be performed by contract farmers; there's no shortage of
those. For industrial parks or plants near working farmlands, an
aggregate (on one property or on neighboring properties) total of
20 acres may be enough to make it all work out. Elsewhere, a
minimum of 50 acres (100 would be better) is enough to make
economic sense if contract farmers have to travel to those
locations. The biggest threats to a corn crop are raccoons &
deer, but they are unlikely to ravage a crop to any significant
extent. A lot of that corn crop would go to market as an
ingredient or for plastics or feed or, of course, ethanol. What
about the impact of petroleum costs on these little farming
projects? Beyond its impact on the cost of transporting the
crops, it also has a direct impact on fueling the equipment that
plants, tends & harvests the crops & an indirect impact as a
component of fertilizers, herbicides & pesticides. These higher
costs, or course, drive up the price of the corn crop & thereby
its net profits. Because of the cash yield farmers can realize
from corn crops today almost no farmland is standing idle. That's
a compelling case for letting idle industrial acreage assets
(especially among industries ravaged by the current economic
climate) produce revenue through farming.
Special Report Bonus Review: BlackBerry 8110 Pearl
We got a lot more than we expected when we replaced our
first-generation BlackBerry 8100 Pearl with a new 8110. They look
a lot alike & the user interface is almost identical. The biggest
agent of change for us is that the newer 8110 has an embedded GPS
receiver, but there's a lot more here that's cool & new. The
camera is now 2Mp, it now offers video record & playback modes,
there's a new "Voice Notes" audio recorder, there's a new boosted
audio mode in its media player (much more "out loud" when
listening to music or watching videos), the media player can now
keep playing while you do other things with the phone, the
headset jack is now 3.5mm (was 2.5mm) & you can now swap Micro SD
cards under a side flap, without opening the case & removing the
battery. There's a much more complete (not to mention welcome)
auto-complete logic that suggests complete words as you type a
few letters. Outgoing messages offer a spell check option, but
it's not imposed. The Bluetooth feature set is now all of BT2,
including stereo headset support. Some 8100 support gear works
fine with the 8110 (like chargers or spare batteries) while
others (like holster clips) need to be replaced; we got Zagg to
send an Invisible Shield even before the 8110 arrived & we go on
even before we got all our navigation software reloaded. Bottom
line: We love what they've done to the Pearl.
Special Report Bonus Review 2: Audio Technica ATR35s lav mike
Lavaliere mikes hide under collars or behind lapels, close enough
to the mouth to pick up what people are saying pretty
effectively. They're the most likely type of mike for any
newscast. Lav mikes get used a lot with wireless miking set-ups,
but make no mistake, wired lav mikes are still the workhorses for
most news studios. They're also an important alternative to
consider when you're shooting with your camcorder in
circumstances where there's a single speaker you need to hear
clearly. Most pro lav mikes come with 3-figure price tags (high
enough to keep them out of the impulse buy category); also, since
these tend to be condenser mikes, they need a polarizing Voltage
source & tend to terminate in an XLR connector (of one size or
another). We've been trying to find a less expensive candidate to
recommend for your field work & may have one in the $40
Audio-Technica ATR35s. It plugs into a 3.5mm mini-jack, like the
mike input on almost any camcorder. In the box, there's the mike
itself on a 20' cord, a tie clip mount for it, a tiny foam wind
sock & a button cell for its in-line preamp. This is an omni
mike, so it picks up evenly in every direction; that makes it a
little more susceptible to noise but a lot less susceptible to
having your voice fade in and out when you move your head. The
box cites it as "ideal for aerobics/dance/fitness instructors" &
we can't fault them for that, but we think it may also have a
role in your on-camera field work. Bottom line: the mike is
perfectly suitable for field voice work, ready to connect where
you need it without third-party adapters & comes at a no-brainer
price, so it's very hard not to be fond of it.
Special Report Bonus Review 3: 3 Koss portable headphones
We want to be able to recommend a very portable on-ear stereo
headphone for monitoring audio during field recording (audio or
video), especially if they can be good enough to use with your
media player while you travel. Koss sent us 3 candidates; we'll
describe them all, but we do have a winner. The Koss KPH 15 ($20)
does not offer the audio transparency we want when monitoring.
These favor & flavor the lows & their foam ear cups can isolate
you from outside sounds (especially inappropriate for field
recording on your own). They are nicely portable with a unique
design: the headband folds in the middle & the ear cup sections
pivot up in front of (not into the middle of) the headband. These
have an in-cord volume control slider that's good for muting or
slightly reducing volume from peak responses but really is not a
fader, so don't expect a lot of control range between muted &
loud. Overall, these are OK for listening to music but the
combination of its headband's springiness & the ear-cup
non-breathing foam surrounds makes these uncomfortable for
long-term use. There's an audible step up to the SportaPro ($30),
a purely on-ear headphone. The audio quality is much better, with
a small amount of bass emphasis, but certainly no de-emphasis of
the middle of the audio spectrum; a huge amount of detail comes
through though the highs could be a bit crisper. Its headband
nests twin arms of flat spring steel that slide out to expand. At
the bottom of each side of the headband, a "sideburn" comfort pad
lies beneath a swivel mechanism that lets the earpieces swing up
for nicely compact totability. The earpieces are on a clever ball
& socket pivot that lets them rest more comfortably against the
ear. Koss suggests that the band can go either over the head or
behind the neck; the spring headband clamping strength is a
little too tight for long-term comfort; when worn behind the neck
as a neckband, it's slightly more uncomfortable. Their third
model looks enough like the SportaPro that we thought it was just
a brand positioning gimmick, but that impression went away as
soon as we wore & listened to them. While the PortaPro ($50)
looks a lot like the SportaPro, some small but significant
differences make it our favorite of the trio. The inside
"sideburn" pad on each of those pivot pods is twice the size of
its opposite number on the SportaPro. Even more significant: an
outside firmness control lets you readily change the angle of the
ear cups, which reduces pressure on your ears, making these much
more comfortable for long-term wearing. Their larger-diaphragm
drivers are rear-ported & the back of the carrier cup has an open
design; together these allow freer motion of the diaphragm, which
may explain its superiority at reproducing musical details.
Bottom line: the Koss PortaPro portable stereo headphones have
the audio transparency & compact totability we sought for field
monitoring & we think you'll find them worth a listen.
Special Report Bonus Review 4: Two Beyerdynamic headphones
Beyer has long been a revered brand in professional & broadcast
audio, but they're new at consumer electronics. We asked for two
of their supra-aural (on-ear) open-transducer dynamic headphone
models in our quest for good choices for field monitoring audio.
The look of their FX1 ($18) "super lightweight" (1.4 oz) headset
isn't exactly a confidence builder: bright blue (one of 6 colors
in their spectrum) from the cord to the headband, a very
molded-plastic look, Shame on us for judging on looks alone! The
audio transparency (excellent flatness, with perhaps a small
amount of top-band roll-off to keep the highest notes from being
too cutting; Beyer calls these "soft highs") is wonderful, their
clarity & detailing are exemplary & they display the kind of high
efficiency that lets you hear all that's there even at reduced
volume settings. The cable comes only into the left ear cup, so
there's no dangling "Y" to deal with. The ear-cups pivot to be
parallel with the headband, so they can at least fold flat, but
they are not as tightly totable as some others. The earcup foam
pads do a nice job of letting you hear both the reproduced audio
& the real world, which is good for monitoring, but they do warm
the ears, which can ultimately dissuade you from long-term use.
Also, while the sound quality belies the construction, we have
misgivings about these surviving the lumps & bruises of demanding
environments. Where the FX1 is a traditional headband design,
their brand new DTX 35 (probably $33, based on its European
pricing) dynamic headphone is a behind-the-neck-band design,
running over & around the ears to snug the on-ear cups against
your ears. The neckband does not fold & the ear cups do not
swivel so it never gets any smaller than its size in the box or
on your head. There is no ear cup adjustment & we found them a
bit snug without much promise of long-term comfort. The audio
detailing is good but with definite peaks & valleys across the
audio spectrum; these are not monitoring-quality headphones. They
do exhibit a good balance of letting both the music & the real
world through to your ears. Bottom line: while these seem an
excellent choice for strolling or exercising with your media
player in tow, the DTX 35 is not a good choice for field audio
monitoring applications; the FX1 is a fine choice for field
monitoring, with advantages in economy & disadvantages in field
durability.
Special Report Bonus Review 5: Beyond411 Search
We think it's appealing to find both white pages & yellow pages
styles of info in a single product, which is the hallmark of
Beyond411 search; it also offers Web searching with an option to
prefer mobile-optimized Web pages. Its searches are
geographically aware, based on stored home, work & third-location
addresses or on your GPS location. You can also add any search
result to the BlackBerry address book contacts. In a yellow pages
business search, click on the number to dial it or click on the
name for a map & driving directions; doing that also adds the
business to your search history so make it quicker to retrieve &
one-click call later. Its shopping display ties into Yokel
lookups for the best local specific-product pricing. A movies
search gets you local movie play times for all movies or just the
one you specify. The sports search can let you either search for
scores by team, city or league or if you're in a major team city,
say nothing to get all local-team scores. You can even choose
from among hundreds of plug-ins to add new searches or info to
the menu; some examples include dictionary, food recipes, drink
recipes & calories. Bottom line: the one thing that this
amazingly rich search utility may be fastest to find is a home on
your BlackBerry desktop.
Too many, too few, too long per review?
It's pretty obvious that over the past few years, we've been
trying to change the nature of our "Special Reports Bonus Review"
items in each issue of this Bulletin. Our conception - please
correct us if we're wrong - is that we can serve two goals here.
One of those is to scout out & vet products that you may find
useful in doing your job. The other is to run through a good
sample of the new stuff out there to help signal whether or not
they may be good candidates for your own reviews or coverage.
(Please remember, in 27 years, we've never had anybody on our
circulation who didn't qualify as a journalist, so we're
certainly not doing this to compete with you for your audience).
Initially, we ran one review per issue; recently we've been up to
4-5 per issue. Is it too many? Too few? Do you want them longer?
Shorter? Should we include some items with non-exclusive
syndication permission so that you can run them in your own
coverage or on the Web? Drop Marty a line with your responses on
what would help you the most. Contact: Martin Winston, NEWSTIPS
(Novelty, OH) 440-338-8400; mailto:marty@newstips.com
http://Newstips.com
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Newstips Bulletin [Novelty, OH] +1.440.338.8400 http://Newstips.com
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