Audio Technica PRO88W-830-24 battery powered wireless transmitter and receiver in-depth review

Audio Technica PRO88W-830-24 Pro 88W Wireless Microphone
So you are thinking about wireless audio options for Canon DSLR

Reasons that I thought about buying…
So if you have watched my review on Zoom H4N, you know that using a separate Audio recorder is probably the way to go for capturing high quality audio.  The next problem that I ran into is being able to record audio from a distance without running a wire and carrying around a microphone. The main things that I needed were the ability to run on batteries and keep the weight down as low as possible.  I looked at the options with Sennheiser and some of other lower cost options.  As you can tell from my other reviews.  I tend to try and save as much money as I can.  I want the quality and features but at the lowest cost. Even though I read several reviews on this product, I thought that for my needs, it would work out.

Here is what I actually use it for.....
I found that for interview and training types of videos, I use this as the main input for mic'ing and ultimately sending the audio into my Zoom H4N.  If I want the flexibility of moving around, without moving a mic, I use this a lot. I will typically mount the zoom on top of the hot shoe on top of the camera and then mount the receiver to the bottom of the Zoom.  This doesn't cover all things and the one area that I am lacking is news interview style where I use a lav mic for myself and a handheld for people I want to interview.  Because of this, I haven't done any of this style of interviewing.  Just as well because it really requires multiple people for a camera man and talent.  I did my research to compare multiple systems and although the Audio-Technica is not the best, the distance that I typically shoot works alright.

Here are the things I didn't expect or didn't like...
I didn't expect the audio quality to be great, but I didn't expect the level of noise that is introduced because of the radio signal.  I also didn't expect the level of radio interference that can happen at really short distances.  Computer equipment, some lights, cell phones, all of these things can disrupt the signal.  And not having the option to change the signal beyond an A/B switch is not enough to get to the best possible clear signal.  I have found that when I shoot around lots of computer equipment, cell phones, walls, and other interference, I have to test and move the position of the receiver a lot.  This is not a fun process.  I typically have to be within a few feet in order to keep the signal from being static ee.  In open air though, across 30 feet, it does pretty well.  

Here are the super cool things that I love about it...
I love not being tethered to the camera, once I find the right (non-interference spot), turning on all the signal chain and the camera and then knowing that it will work.  I haven't had any problems with cables, or even the mic, although I haven't ever stretched to any heat or cold limitations.  The batteries last quite a while, several hours, without worry. Just don't forget to turn it off.  For the price, it was a good purchase.  For the amount of headache of checking for interference, and doing takes that end up screwed up because of signal interference, I can't really recommend this product.  If you want rock solid and flexibility, it looks like spending the extra money is well worth it.  I will be upgrading to a the Sennheiser system for the future.
 
Common settings that I use...
Only has an A/B switch for channels
Levels can be adjusted but I never have from out of the box.

Wacom Cintiq 24HD Touch in-depth review

So you are thinking about buying Wacom Cintiq 24HD Touch

Reasons that I thought about buying… As a long time lover of the Wacom products, I had quite a history with using their products.  I had a serial 9x11 (and for those of you that don't know what serial was, there use to be serial and parallel interfaces in computers of old, is has since been replaced by USB and the like) So I had a tablet to draw with clear back in the 1990's.  I bought the original Painter (in a paint can, no less).  I have always liked the idea of having a pen to be able to sketch and draw and paint with a digital interface.  Chances are that the thought of using both the analog of a drawing pen with the latest advancements in the digital realm.  If you know about me from my bio, you know that my primary profession is designing software interfaces.  This usually involves a very large amount of drawing.  About 6 years ago, I convinced my boss to let me get a Cintiq 21UX for work.  If you are looking at the Cintiq 24HD Touch, chances are that you are already a digital artist of some sort, or want to be.  When the announcement came of the 24HD, I got really excited about the added capabilities, with the extended full HD resolution.  For a while now, trying to do digital whiteboarding, using a HD projector with the Cintiq 21, was a pain.  So I thought that moving to a full 1920x1200 resolution would enhance this greatly.  Probably my main excitement came from the enhanced ergonomics of being able to pull the drawing surface closer to me.  Drawing on the 21UX was alright, but trying to keep a keyboard close by, and draw made for a sore back most of the time.  To my surprise, Wacom announced a Touch version of the same 24 HD.  To me, this was going to remove the need for keeping an external keyboard nearby.  I watched several of the marketing videos that showed "beta" software that made this thing really sing.  I had to have one.


Here is what I actually use it for.....  So my primary uses were going to be, drawing user interfaces, mostly in Photoshop, and photo retouching in Lightroom and painting in Painter 12 on my personal time.  So I use this to draw, edit, prototype, and share what I am drawing by hooking to a HD projector and mirroring the Cintiq display on the projector.  I started with Windows 7 Enterprise Edition and most of the features that were demoed in "beta" software, were released by the time I got the Cintiq.  While it wan't perfect, like how Painter would stop being able to touch the tools menu bar, even though multi-touch zoom and rotate would continue to work, it was awesome.  Photoshop had it's own strange-ness with using touch features to zoom and rotate, but it too was very cool. Being able to see what you are drawing and touching right on the screen as you draw it, is amazing.  Especially when you switch between a pencil, to a pen, to a brush, to selection tools, it is awesome.  As a monitor, the color reproduction is also much improved over the 21UX. 


Here are the things I didn't expect or didn't likeWow, where to start. So I thought that software updates would fix all the annoying bugs that seem to happen in the initial release.  I upgraded both the Wacom drivers and other software like Adobe Photoshop as soon as they were released.  This was the worst experience that I have had with any piece of software.  I am not one to complain about buggy software, because I know the nature of software because I write software.  It is rarely perfect.  But when every update actually made things worst, or kept things the same, I went from annoyed, to livid over the course of several months.  I updated to Windows 8, thinking that maybe these products were being tested in a different environment than I might be using -- no such luck.   So without taking you through the process, today, almost a year after the release of this product, it doesn't work even as well as it did the first day.  I actually did an unboxing and a review of the product when I got it, and showed features that don't work now.  As far as I can tell, Adobe pulled out of being able to support some of the basic features of this touch and pen enablement.  So, for most people, this means that using their primary software choice, Adobe Photoshop, requires the touch feature to be turned off.  This wouldn't be so bad accept for the fact that it kinda worked before, as it was a selling point in the marketing material.  It was very strange to watch how Wacom had remove marketing material and place "disclaimers" on their website saying that Adobe didn't support touch features.  It also wouldn't be as bad if the touch version was a few hundred dollars difference.  But it's not, it's 1000 + more for the touch version. 
I do not think that knowing what I know now, that having the touch version is worth the trouble and heartache that I have had over this past year.  My disclaimer for this is that Adobe might come around an do a update tomorrow and make it all better.  The testing teams of both Wacom and Adobe should be ashamed of themselves.  They let a marketing and sales teams push through a product that wasn't ready.  Shame on them.  Shame on Adobe for not recognizing this trend and having a touch ready product with the release of Windows 8.  This was the primary reason that most people bought a Windows 8 tablet and if they did, they are frustrated trying to learn some other drawing program and product.  I can understand not doing an RT version, but are you really going to ignore the potential market of Touch and Pen combination that would have been huge.   
I spent a huge amount of time trying to get a Touch Keyboard that would work well.  I found the Windows 7 virtual keyboard to be useful, but without enough flexibility to really use it to replace a hardware keyboard.  The Windows 8 touch keyboard is better in some areas, but much much worse as a replacement keyboard, as it is designed for tablet devices and not desktop screens.  I will probably do a full review just on the state of the virtual keyboard world.  


Here are the super cool things that I love about itSo, with all that said, and ignoring touch features for a moment. The pen interface (even though there have been problems with certain pens and programs) for me, it has worked very well.  Like I said before, the color and brightness and the texture of the screen are all great.  The touch ring and programmable buttons are all so much better and very useful.  I love the multi-touch added capabilities that are also programable.  Being able to position the screen at an angle to prevent back ache makes things so much more comfortable. Too bad I have to turn off touch and still position a keyboard within reach. 
I am so utterly disappointed with this product.  It is like having something that is a dream come true, but, when you get it, it is all smoke and mirrors.  I have to say that there was a large stretch of time that I just didn't use it.  I used the old fall back of just a mouse and keyboard.  That was just sad times.  
There may come a day when Wacom and Adobe get back together to give creative professionals the best experience that money can buy - who knows, it could be next month, next year, or maybe never.  Right now, there is NO REASON to buy the Touch version unless you are a gluten for punishment.  Wait till they figure out what the hell they are doing. 


Settings that I use all the time…
Custom settings for buttons for applications
Multiple monitor setup and projector mirroring
Cakewalk Sonar X2 with update for touch (Win8 only but still very cool)

Swivi 5.6 External Monitor for DSLR in-depth review

So you are thinking about buying a Swivi 5.6 external monitor for your DSLR Camera?

Reasons that I thought about buying… 
If you have watched my review on the Canon 7D or the Canon 5D Mark III, you know that one of the hard things about using a DSLR for video is focus.  I went down the path of getting a viewfinder that attaches to the back of the camera in my review of my viewfinder.   With that review, I also talked about how it exposed the quality of the LCD quickly becomes the issue of being able to really see focus.  I also found that watching things back on the same small 3 inch LCD. especially when I was trying to share the video with those around me became a huge issue.  So for shooting things that I wanted the ability to see focus, as well as play things back, I needed something that would be large enough and of course battery operated.  Along came the Swivi... I read several reviews of people who got pre-release over at Cheesycam and Oliviatech who liked what they were seeing.  I also found the price to be within reach.  Honestly at the time, I didn't understand focus peaking but it seemed like this would be something that would come in very handy.  It really really did make a huge difference to be able to see where the focus really was.

Here is what I actually use it for.....  
I have found that this is very useful for almost every situation shooting video.  The Swivi attaches to the camera mount at the bottom of the camera and swivels either to the side or just overlays the back of the camera.  I found the resolution to be a huge jump from the LCD of the back of the 7D.  When I take it out in public, people tend to be in awe of it, and other photographers tend to be jealous of it.  The monitor sun hood comes in very handy when trying to deal with blocking the sun.  Obviously, this is not an super bright LCD or OLED screen, so being able to see in direct sunlight is a must.  Also being able to attach the sunhood in either direction gives some great flexibility.  It is plastic so the durability is worry some.  I have been very careful with being hard on it.  I have always left it behind when shooting on hiking shoots.  The focus peaking that is built into the monitor is pretty good.  I have seen other high end monitors that do a much better job, but it is very useable.  Indoor shots are usually the ones where I use it the most.

Here are the things I didn't expect or didn't like
So probably the biggest problem that I have had is getting it to stay tightly connected and not swivel when attached to the camera.  The wheel that allows you to screw to the mount at the bottom of the camera takes a lot of force to get a tight enough fit to really stay put.  I have found that pulling the right edge up against the camera is the only way to really make it not swivel on the 7D.  For what ever reason, this didn't seem to be the case with the 5D Mark III.  The other strange thing that I noticed is that if I leave a battery in, which it takes the same LP-6 (the video says EP-6, whoops) Canon battery as the camera, it will actually drain the battery within a day or so.  Even if the monitor is not turned on, it seems to suck battery power. My fix for this is to always place the battery that I am using in upside down when not in use.  This way it doesn't drain the battery.  The power button is a little strange as well.  Turning it off takes holding it down for a full second or two before it powers off.

The color reproduction is good.  Good enough that I rarely find enough color difference between the back of the camera and the monitor, although there is some.  Brightness is good as long as you are not in direct sunlight. The sunhood helps but it isn't quite enough to really see well in that much sun.  Sunsets work well though.  Bootup time isn't great.  It does take a while before the camera recognizes the signal and switches to the monitor.  Some of that is the camera though.  It has a button that allows it to go full frame or cropped.  It is mostly useless on the 7D.  The menu and rocker wheel to select and modify settings like brightness and contrast works well enough.  Swiveling the monitor feels like you might break it off.  The fact that it is made of plastic makes it feel cheap but as long as you don't twist it the wrong way, you should be fine. When it is not rotated, and even when it is, access to the buttons on the left side of the screen are hard to get to.  But, access to the scroll wheel on the right is.  So recording is easy, but playing back is not because the play button is on the left side.

Here are the super cool things that I love about it
I have to say that it was really nice to be able to see a level of detail that I could not see just looking at the back of the camera.  The resolution bump from the LCD of the back of the camera to this monitor is enough that it adds a huge value.  Having the focus peaking available, at least before Magic Lantern started working on a 7D, was worth the money alone.  For the price, this was a great addition that allowed me to step up to a level of cinematography that I expected.  The fact that it uses the same batteries for me was a huge plus.  It meant that all my power options were sharing the same type, so in a pinch, I could swap things around if needed.

I like the ease of mounting and the cable that is rotate-able to prevent it from getting messed up by rubbing or pushed sideways.  I have also gotten several adapters and a longer HDMI cable to be able to mount on a jib/crane away from the camera.  Although it doesn't help with being able to remotely focus the camera, it does help to be able to see the shot as you are shooting from the back of the crane.  

Let me know what you think.  Send a comment.