Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Ben Lagman

Ben Lagman

Freshman
Jan 11, 2011
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Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, United States
I've been browsing through some pictures online, and I noticed that in some pictures, there's a very small array facing the stage. One on the left, and one on the right. Let's say each of the performers were doing their job, and each singer had an IEM in, what is the main purpose of the tiny array(s) facing the stage then, if the IEM's purpose to block out a lot of exterior noise and assure that the artist can hear him/herself?

Here's an example of what I'm talking about (taken from jblpro.com)

34zexb8.jpg
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Flown side fills, to keep the deck clear for rolling risers, monitor engineer sight lines to the band, or artistic reasons of the performers. It also makes it easier to provide consistent side fill coverage without a big 'hot spot'.
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Flown sidefills, in general, provide more even coverage across the stage and avoid deafening the people closest to them. Another advantage is that the talent can't climb on them...
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Tim McCulloch said:
Flown side fills, to keep the deck clear for rolling risers, monitor engineer sight lines to the band, or artistic reasons of the performers. It also makes it easier to provide consistent side fill coverage without a big 'hot spot'.
Click to expand...


+1
Very useful when in a festival setting with multiple bands and such.
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Ben Lagman said:
I've been browsing through some pictures online, and I noticed that in some pictures, there's a very small array facing the stage. One on the left, and one on the right. Let's say each of the performers were doing their job, and each singer had an IEM in, what is the main purpose of the tiny array(s) facing the stage then, if the IEM's purpose to block out a lot of exterior noise and assure that the artist can hear him/herself?

Here's an example of what I'm talking about (taken from jblpro.com)

34zexb8.jpg
Click to expand...

+1 to all of the people who said that they are sidefills.

They are usually only used by the bands who don't use IEMs, or in the event that the IEMs fail during the show. Personally I don't think it makes sense for one musician to use wedge monitors and IEMs at the same time, but it happens all the time. Usually the sidefills aren't used when the band has IEMs. Unless you're Evan Ks band, then you use sidefill subs to fill in the bass for the band.

They are flown for the reasons others have stated.
1)Its a huge stage, you can get more even coverage by flying them.
2)The artist can't get the microphone right into the grill of the speaker (inducing feedback)
3)It keeps the stage clear
etc.
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Thanks for all the detail and responses. I got a little confused though. Since they don't use IEMs, won't there be a 'clash' of sound from different sources? For example, with the artists performing, when he/she is singing, won't the side fills conflict with him/her being able to hear themself clearly via the monitors? Or.... Do the monitors just add support for the artist WITH the side fills in order for the artists to hear the overall mix, but at the same time being able to hear themselves clearly as the monitor works along with the side fills? ie. Singer 1 hears the main mix from the side fills, but he hears +X dB of his voice because of the monitors, along with any other singer in the band; along with providing some coverage of sound for the attendees near the very front of the stage of the overall mix.
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Ben Lagman said:
Thanks for all the detail and responses. I got a little confused though. Since they don't use IEMs, won't there be a 'clash' of sound from different sources? For example, with the artists performing, when he/she is singing, won't the side fills conflict with him/her being able to hear themself clearly via the monitors? Or.... Do the monitors just add support for the artist WITH the side fills in order for the artists to hear the overall mix, but at the same time being able to hear themselves clearly as the monitor works along with the side fills? ie. Singer 1 hears the main mix from the side fills, but he hears +X dB of his voice because of the monitors, along with any other singer in the band; along with providing some coverage of sound for the attendees near the very front of the stage of the overall mix.
Click to expand...

Yes, no, and maybe... or perhaps it's the other way around.

Some acts want to be immersed in their sound and will have a full band mix in the fills, others want different things, according to who is depending on them and what they need to hear. Also some fill configurations are set up to have fairly narrow coverage, downstage to upstage, so there will be places where they do not conflict with wedges. Speaking of wedges, remember that TIME is a significant factor and that the closer source will be perceived as louder (Haas).

Ideally the front fills do not spill into the audience. It's a time-incoherent source that can't be aligned, or aligned to in a useful way.

Have fun, good luck.

Tim Mc
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Ben Lagman said:
, won't the side fills conflict with him/her being able to hear themself clearly via the monitors? Or.... Do the monitors just add support for the artist WITH the side fills in order for the artists to hear the overall mix, but at the same time being able to hear themselves clearly as the monitor works along with the side fills?
Click to expand...

There is a school of thought that side fills should be considered "cross stage monitoring" meaning that the side fill speakers opposite the stage from where a performer is standing is there to give him the illusion that the people way over on the other side are closer to him/her than they really are making the playing/singing more itimate and "tight". Personal floor wedges are still used for the usual stuff.
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Hey Guys,
one way to deploy this type of setup using line arrays for sidefills and "spot" wedges, is to engineer the focus of the arrays to not overlap in the middle, maybe even a little "hole"
If they overlap you have the classic comb filter ripples and uneven frequency response.(feedback central) With no overlap as your artist approaches one side he walks out of the field of the other side. When he's exactly in the middle the center fill wedges take over, you could also delay their arrival time, but if your artist moves around it can get complicated.
Also having different signals in different sources can help the artist to hear things better. Many times multiple wedges can help instruments from crowding each other out.
As an experiment setup a pair of wedges as a stereo pair and put Snare in one and voice in the other, then compare this to snare and voice in both wedges (Kudo's to Dave Rat on this one)

hope this helps,
ferrit
 
Re: Purpose of having a small array facing the stage?...

Ben Lagman said:
I got a little confused though. Since they don't use IEMs, won't there be a 'clash' of sound from different sources? For example, with the artists performing, when he/she is singing, won't the side fills conflict with him/her being able to hear themself clearly via the monitors?
Click to expand...

I remember hearing one monitor engineer explain how he got around this problem (for an A-list act). What he did was add delay to the lead singer's wedge, so that the arrival from the wedge was time aligned with the arrival from the sidefills.

The first time he tried it, the singer acknowledged that it was a vast improvement, but complained that "it sounds like everything is coming out the wedge in front, I don't feel like I have my band round about me". The solution was to use two auxes, one with only the singers vocal and guitar, and the other with the rest of the band. The first aux was delayed to match the sidefills, and the band mix wasn't. The two mixes were then combined (via a matrix feed) to derive the feed to the wedge. This way he got the best of both worlds.
 
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