One of the latest additions to the theatre's extensive portfolio of professional live sound gear is the InnovaSON Sy80 digital mixing console which has been installed in the Millennium Theatre, the anchor of the Sight & Sound theatre complex, sporting three stages and more than 85 loudspeakers. The theatre produces elaborate stage events, which can include live animals, animatronic figures, life-size props and even helicopters that fly in. The sheer number of microphones, combined with the vast number of scenes and settings meant the mixing and recall capabilities of the Sy80 were ideal for the venue.
Gary Parke, audio operations supervisor at Sight & Sound Theatres, says the new Sy80 console is not only making the job of the sound engineers easier, but improving the quality of the presentations as well. "The primary reason we bought the console was to increase the amount of microphones needed for our expanding shows," Parke says. In addition, the console's operational features have increased its value to the point where the theatre can hardly imagine ever working without it. "Its open architecture makes it very easy on the operator," he says. "You have tremendous flexibility in routing mics to certain faders for certain scenes, making it easier to control the many mics needed for that scene. This makes it much more manageable for the operators to handle, versus having to have the mics spread out across a large analogue console."
Ease of programming was also a factor in the theatre's choice. "Setting up scenes is very easy, and everyone caught on to how to program it very quickly," Park says. "There's not a lot of page-flipping needed with the way the console is set up. It's laid out very logically and elements for every scene are kept in close proximity. Our shows may have up to 15 plus mics just for dialogue with the bigger choral numbers employing 35 or so live mics. Once the mix is setup, scenes change automatically and productions stay very consistent. Trying to maintain that degree of consistency with multiple operators on a traditional analogue console would have been tough."
The Sy80's scene recallability feature, made possible via the unique XFAD technology, enables each participant's stored EQ to go directly to the right scene, say InnovaSon. "The Sy80 has been a great addition to our theatre," he says. "It's very flexible and easy to set up and I wouldn't want to do a show without it."
(Lee Baldock)
