Set boosters to full
Testing out the AudioWireless AWBP-1W transmitter booster
After a very slow winter & spring (an ache shared by many in our community), I FINALLY had the chance today to fully deploy & use in anger, the AudioWireless AWBP-1W transmitter booster, & both myself & 1AS Sven Mattes was very impressed.
My setup is pretty simple & quite a common user case, consisting of 3x sennheiser G2 EW100 transmitters in ch70, which have been given SMA antenna mods (by AS Andrea Cremonini), these are patched via short SMA cables to a basic RF combiner module, which then patches out to a single BNC which feeds the AWBP-1W module. This boosted signal then runs up my RF mast & is transmitted by sennheiser A1031U omni directional wideband dipole antenna.
The sennheiser transmitters operate at 30mw, & there is a certain amount of loss from the combiner & connections, which is then boosted by the AWBP-1W by 12dB (the booster has adjustable gain in increments of 0.5dB), which should take the combined signal up over 100mw, & while the power/distance ratio is certainly not linear, having an antenna up high & boosted really does push the signal further.
On today’s shoot, we were running around Earl’s Court, & while we had a little morning test in the wild, it wasn’t until the last setup of the day that the gains from this workflow addition shined.
With time tight, we had to race onto a street to snatch a final scene which the director wanted to do down the road. As we emerged from our previous location (a car park) we found ourselves in the sudden rain down pour from the hot sunny day, to which I was hesitant to move down the road & expose my cart to rain, & instead hung back under cover.
The team then went way down the road & round the corner, out of sight (pictured), & it was here the booster won the day. The AS reported zero RF dropouts from his IEM (which was buried in his pocket low on his body), & was able to hear my speed calls & communicate with zero issues, all the while being way out view.
This new setup allows me to migrate my coms transmitters off my RF mast, & down with my bag, allowing me easier access to monitor theyre battery usage. As a result my mast is now tidier & lighter, with less cables growing like vines up into the sky, & less weight on the top-cross bar.
Obviously there’s plenty more scenarios to test the AWBP-1W with, to which no tool provides solutions to all, but this is certainly a strong new addition to my workflow, & provides my system with more flexibility to overcome more scenarios with greater speed & success.
