Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

D

drew gandy

Junior
Jul 17, 2011
419
0
16
Chicago
This is a wish list item. Come up with a way to avoid the "coat sleeve surprise". I want the console to ignore inadvertent volume boosts when I catch a fader knob with my coat sleeve. :lol: Some of you know what I'm talking about.

Looking at this realistically, I wonder if it is possible to lock the fader from moving when there isn't a finger on the top of the fader knob. A "push" from under the knob would be recognized as "unauthorized use". Any thoughts?
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

I think the old digidesign procontrol did this. The faders were touch sensitive; I believe it looked at the capacitance of the fader cap. You could move the fader with something non conductive and it wouldn't do anything. Same thing with the flying faders system on analog recording desks. Those were real analog faders though, so the volume still changed. I remember pushing a fader up with a pencil eraser to "preview" fader moves without recording to the automation.
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

Andrew Broughton said:
The Yamaha DM1000 and DM2000 (and maybe some other older ones) could be set to work this way, where it sensed whether you were touching the fader with your finger or not. DiGiCos can be set to work that way as well.
Click to expand...
I don't remember the DM1 or 2Ks stopping the fader from moving if you weren't touching it-but I never tried to be honest.

As far as I remember the touch sensitivity was for touching the fader as a "select" function.

I always turned it off-because if you lightly touched the faders the selected screen would jump from channel to channel
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

There is a cheap, easy way to prevent the coat sleeve surprise: Short sleeves.
If you must mix in a suit or tux, there's always mixing on an iPad. Nothing for your sleeve to catch on.
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

Sleeve garters, sleeve clips, bicycle clips, .... the tools available are legion
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

Ivan Beaver said:
I don't remember the DM1 or 2Ks stopping the fader from moving if you weren't touching it-but I never tried to be honest.

As far as I remember the touch sensitivity was for touching the fader as a "select" function.

I always turned it off-because if you lightly touched the faders the selected screen would jump from channel to channel
Click to expand...
DM2000 v2 manual, Page 276:
Fader Touch Sense: These parameters control the Touch Sense function. If the CONTROL button is turned on and the touch sensors are not triggered, fader operation is ignored.
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

Dear fellow forumites,
To be honest, I wasn't completely serious about asking console manufacturers to fix this but I was curious of the thoughts that people had about the conundrum. These days I find that I'm mixing perhaps 90% of the time in a coat and tie. [ If you haven't done this yet, I highly recommend it. The key is calling it your "Power Suit". ] I've caught a fader with my sleeve 3 or 4 times over the years and usually I just cuss and the meeting continues on. With a music show, the boost (and especially feedback) can often be considered part of the show so I think of it as a minor issue. For corporate meetings it can be a big time distraction and even tick some folks off. Anyway, it's nice to see that Yamaha had this sorted way back with the DM2000. Too bad it doesn't work on an analog Mackie or the Presonus mixers since I see those often for talking head freelance gigs.
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

I didn't think you were completely serious, until now. Seems to me there are three options, you either modify your clothing with the appropriate gadget, you modify your stance so it doesn't happen, or you put some sort of protective grid over the faders.
"The whole problem with the world today is that fools and fanatics have forced all the smart people to search for solutions to non-existing problems." :razz:
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

drew gandy said:
Dear fellow forumites,
To be honest, I wasn't completely serious about asking console manufacturers to fix this but I was curious of the thoughts that people had about the conundrum. These days I find that I'm mixing perhaps 90% of the time in a coat and tie. [ If you haven't done this yet, I highly recommend it. The key is calling it your "Power Suit". ] I've caught a fader with my sleeve 3 or 4 times over the years and usually I just cuss and the meeting continues on. With a music show, the boost (and especially feedback) can often be considered part of the show so I think of it as a minor issue. For corporate meetings it can be a big time distraction and even tick some folks off. Anyway, it's nice to see that Yamaha had this sorted way back with the DM2000. Too bad it doesn't work on an analog Mackie or the Presonus mixers since I see those often for talking head freelance gigs.
Click to expand...

I don't think it would be completely gauche to just put your jacket on the back of your chair while mixing and put it back on while mingling with the client? That's what I usually do. Failing that, maybe an elastic hair tie around the wrist.
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

Tom Manchester said:
I don't think it would be completely gauche to just put your jacket on the back of your chair while mixing and put it back on while mingling with the client? That's what I usually do. Failing that, maybe an elastic hair tie around the wrist.
Click to expand...
And when your hands start to throb and turn purple you know you have them tight enough. ;-(
 
Re: Dear console manufacturers - Coat Sleeve Surprise

The solution is really just to set your mixer up backwards so you can rest your arms on the doghouse and reach across all the other controls to grab the faders.

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD
 
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