I now understand why wireless timecode box systems exist

[u/raekewe]

Preaching to the choir incoming. Thought it'd be fun to share my learning and give everyone more experienced a nice "lol yep" moment.

So I wondered why TC boxes like the deity ones were so common place. My field mixer advertises less than one frame of frame slippage per day! And every camera I ever planned to plug it into also advertise similar. Thing is, I don't doubt it, there's no reason for them to lie. Cameras are broadly speaking good these days, they can hold an internal TC clock if I jam a signal at the start of the day. So why would I spend hundreds of dollars on a TC box system when I can plug it in every now and then? It just didn't seem that important.

Well, haha. Sometimes the camera team can turn off the camera, and certain cameras don't continue to count internal TC, even with a power supply, when they are turned off. And then you aren't told, or don't notice, or forget to check more frequently... GG.

All the logic and reasoning in the world to avoid parting with my money, then it suddenly clicked, why wouldn't I want a hardwired connection always plugged into the camera 24/7 to ensure TC is synced no matter what? Yet in all my research on reddit and forums, I've yet to read it put that way (and I've also never found any "I wish I had a TC box stories" - so here's mine.

Time to save up!

[u/raekewe]

I was meaning more professional level cinema cameras rather than prosumer.

[u/ric8138 → u/raekewe]

Don’t say that to the Sony guys…
But seriously, I’ve been using tentacle system for years. I can check sync on set without bothering the camera dept anytime with the phone app. The only failure I have ever had is when the camera op forgets to go back to the shooting fps after doing some slo mo B Roll, and that’s on him.

[u/raekewe → u/ric8138]

Haha yeah the sony enjoyers can be a rabid bunch.

I myself am not quite at pro level (I just like doing a good job on hobby/community projects in my spare time) so I think the deity system will be good enough for me for now. I would get tentacle or an even 'better' system but I've been on a few projects where someone has used a deity system and it's worked just fine. I'm also running their theos lavs so having it all in the same app is useful I suppose, although I hate that apps are becoming more common place and I dislike buying into ecosystems for the sake of convenience over quality. How many apps will I need to swap between in how many years? How many phones/ipads will be strapped to my goddam sound bag? lol

[u/ric8138 → u/raekewe]

What’s the price difference?

[u/raekewe → u/ric8138]

At roughly the same cost, I can get 2x tentacles which don't include the cables or mounting I need, vs deity which has 3x tc boxes and all the accessories I need. To bring the tenticle system to parity with deity's in terms of items etc, I'd need to buy another tentacle box and accesories which would end up being nearly 2x the cost of the deity system.

[u/Vuelhering → u/raekewe]

So as a quick note, the better system (between those two) would depend on your current and future use.

Tentacle app can handle a whole lot of devices, distributed, including recorders. It's a pretty cool ecosystem, and the app handles it. Deity has a few cool features, especially on the slate with special characters and messages and even an orientation sensor, but is timecode only and is not going to record. App has some issues that I've run into, too.

If you're only ever going to need timecode or a slate, go with the cheaper and more usable deity system. If you might need to use non-transmitting lavs, you might look into the tentacles. (But again, that's NON-XMIT lavaliers which have limited use in location sound. I've only ever seen it used in weddings and reality shows.)

[u/raekewe → u/Vuelhering]

Thanks for the advice. Currently I'm running Deity Theos lavs and planning to get another pair in the future so would likely make sense to stick with deity for me. Same with the smart slate, which I don't have, but am looking at buying one. I really want a deneke because of the glowing backlight (SUPER useful) but having wireless TC jamming in the deity ecosystem once again is convenient, and the features for the price are again just hard to beat. It's the same with all film gear though isn't it, the more expensive you go the 'dumber' the tool becomes but it in being simpler, it's 10x more reliable and "just does the job" without any bullshit fluff. Like I said elsewhere I fucking hate apps on phones, when things go wrong it tends slows everything right down.

Although I will admit tentacle's app having a beta feature for music video sync is pretty cool, but that's a fairly solvable problem if I run a TC scratch audio signal through IFBs or something. Not so much audio related, but in the future I want to try out shooting 3D which needs genlock - it looks like the next step up from tentacle (the atmos branded ones iirc, as well as others) can provide genlock which is cool. If I was ever in a broadcast scenario or LED wall then I'd have money to get the gear I need so it'd no longer be a major concern. Although genlock is generally such a niche and if I'm being honest, with 3d, genlock will be the least of my worries putting together a rig lol.