Re: Lavalier Mic comparison
And minutes ahead of me. 
~:-D~:grin:
Patty, I second what the first two have said. I've been in your shoes before (granted as the audio guy and not the director), and you will find that renting gear is the best option for you at this point, or at least incrementally getting into a good quality system. I would suggest headsets if you can, but that's personal preference. I also highly suggest that you get some training and skill in utilizing these microphones and sound systems in general. The biggest flaw in almost every single high school I visit is that their sound techs do not know their gear as well as they should; I even had to explain the mute groups on a GB4 to someone in the middle of their musical's tech week. As always, skillful, well trained operators will trump good equipment anyway in a direct side-by-side comparison.
A note on gear getting torn up - I know that I am told that I'm anal about it by all of my fellow students, but we're one of only 7 schools in the county that haven't broken a microphone during our use of it. Our one failure was by an activities staff member zipping the soft case closed over the capsule… works faster than scissors in removing the capsule.
A side story on gear getting torn up: I can now no longer borrow wireless microphone gear from county central because one school decided that they wanted their headset booms shorter. To accomplish this, they tied the booms in a knot. They worked fine, but when country central tried to unknot them… that was a few thousand out of the budget right then and there.
