Eight Tracks in a Pocket

Tascam DR-680

At CenterStage, we love products that make it easier for us to do our jobs properly. The Tascam DR-680 eight track digital multitracker is one such product - a device that we have waited 15 years to become available. Stereo and four channel portable digital audio recorders have been commonplace for many years, but the DR-680 is a portable multitracking powerhouse providing eight individual tracks for concurrent recording. We consider it nothing less than a game changer in remote recording convenience. Since … [Read more...]


Network Television Slop

There is a movement underway right now in the world of television drama that results in footage that is, in our opinion, unwatchable.  Unwatchable is a word we use around CenterStage Productions to describe visuals that are very poorly presented, distracting to the underlying story, and occasionally quite visually disturbing.  Maybe we're just too rooted in old school filming techniques, but we believe there is a right way to capture visuals and a wrong way. If you have watched some of the … [Read more...]


The Front End

Mic Locker

At CenterStage Productions, we realize that microphone selection, for just about any manner of audio recording, is perhaps the most crucial component of the audio recording chain. Although there are many mic's that can be used for many different applications, there is typically one mic in our mic locker that is the most appropriate mic based upon the conditions present during recording, both in terms of the vocal, instrument, or location sound characteristics and the recording environment. That's … [Read more...]


Amplified Signals

PreSonus DigiMax 48k's

When we find gear that just works, we tend to stick with it for the long haul here at CenterStage. One key piece of equipment in our remote recording rig that fits this description beautifully is the PreSonus DigiMax mic preamp. We have four of them in our road rack case that give us 32 channels of Class A preamplification at our disposal. We've had these mic pre's for over ten years and they have never let us down ever! Of course, these units were hand assembled in Louisiana by the folks at PreSonus. … [Read more...]


DSLRs For Video?!

Here at CenterStage, we love using Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) cameras for vIDeO - there, I said it! Around here, we're not fans of the "v" word mostly because of the aesthetics that are often attributed to video - the majority of which is due to technical limitations of the format. You know the look - absolutely everything in the frame is in focus because the depth of field (DOF) just goes on and on and on. The result of this aesthetic (or lack thereof) is a general degree of viewer distraction … [Read more...]


Audio Mastery

Tascam DM 3200

We are audio fanatics here at CenterStage Productions. This probably stems from the fact that our team has over 80 years of aggregated audio experience accumulated from the areas of pro audio, live sound, audio post production, and musicianship. As such, we place equal, if not greater, emphasis on the audio component of our productions. There's an old saying in the film world that goes something like this: "Good audio can make up for bad visuals, but good visuals can't make up for bad audio." … [Read more...]