Toronto, Canada
(February 25, 2016) —When the third season of the amateur culinary competition
series MasterChef Canada airs on CTV
beginning on Sunday, February 14, all of the dialog will have been captured using
Lectrosonics Digital Hybrid Wireless® transmitters, receivers and antenna systems. The show’s audio director,
Jan McCharles, and technical director, Brent Marchenski, are employing a total
of 64 channels of Venue
receivers and 16 channels of UCR411a
compact receivers together with dozens of SMQV
belt pack transmitters on the 15-episode series, which is the Canadian version
of the Gordon Ramsey reality TV hit.
“Every single person that is on-camera is recorded with Lectrosonics,”
says McCharles, who mixes in the studio through a Yamaha CL3 digital desk to
Mac-based Metacorder software with a Sound Devices 970 for backup. This season,
the competition begins with 40 home chef audition winners who are initially
whittled down to 14 finalists before facing the challenges set by the show’s
three judges, Canadian restauranteurs Claudio
Aprile, Michael Bonacini and Alvin
Leung.
McCharles
and Marchenski, who have been working together for nearly a decade,
mainly in reality television, own a combined total of approximately 50 SMQV
transmitters, one-dozen six-channel Venue receivers loaded with VRT modules and
one-dozen UMC16B antenna multi-coupler units. "On MasterChef Canada," says Marchenski,
“We have 32 VRT channels and an eight-channel antenna system in the studio. Jan
has a similar set-up in the field that she has in the studio. The production
cart has a Yamaha CL1 and 32 channels of VRT, and we have 16 UMC411a receivers
split between two ENG-style rigs and a four-channel antenna system in the
field.”
McCharles
reports that the operational life of the SMQV dual-battery transmitters is
important on this show. “It’s a not a scripted show with
scheduled breaks. We shoot until we’re finished. So we need at least six hours
of operation time, seven hours max,” she says.
The award winning
sound team of Marchenski and McCharles has worked together in various roles on
shows including Canada's Next Top Model,
Canada's Greatest Know It All and Canada's Worst Driver, which is going
into its twelfth season.
“We’re very heavily invested in Lectrosonics products,” comments
Marchenski, noting that he and McCharles initially adopted Lectrosonics UM
series UHF transmitters and Quadpack receivers and have continued to grow with
the line. “Lectrosonics’ products are well built and they’ve been reliable—and
in this industry, reliability is everything. When you’re shooting in the field
you can’t have any excuses. You get one kick at the can and it has to be right.
And Lectrosonics has always been there for us.”
“We have put the SMQVs through
some serious testing, through some of the most rugged situations, with body
sweat, dirt, rain and water. They’re rock-solid. They work for us and we know
them inside-out, as do all the people that work with us," reports
McCharles. “And we have a team of people that are excellent at wiring and
masters at their trade. We wouldn’t succeed without the people that we hire for
these shows.”
She continues, “We never want to see packs or microphones on people.
We’ve taken a lot of care and developed a system of miking to ensure that it
looks great on-camera and gets a clean sound as well. The preparation that goes
in before we even start is probably why we’ve been successful. We put a lot of
work into the organization and the coordination before we even step out the
door. We would never leave the building unless we knew for sure that the system
was going to work at the location where we’re shooting.”
“Lectrosonics has really listened
to the mixers and the field operators. They have always been there; if you ever
have a question you can phone them, and they’re receptive. Their service has
always been second to none,” comments Marchenski. “And having an office in
Toronto was probably the smartest move that Lectrosonics could have ever made.
I can’t emphasize enough how important it is for us to have the support of Joe
[Burtinsky, RF Technician and Technical Support
Specialist] and Colin [Bernard, Director of Canadian Operations]. It
just makes Lectrosonics such an obvious choice for us.”