Hi Fred,

Just wondering if you have any suggestions for decreasing clothing noise with the lavs? (We are making the little folded tape triangle pouches) We get great sound when the actors are perfectly still - but seem to get a lot of clothing noise when they move around. Especially distracting if they are moving quickly.

Also - what batteries do you recommend? The duracells/evereadys we are using seems to run down really fast.

Alkaline (new) batteries such as Duracell Pro or Eveready's are what everyone uses. You could try the fancy lithium batteries, but they are very expensive. It is normal to have to change out batteries around every 4 or 5 hours. I recommend investing in a ten dollar digital volt meter so you can read your batteries before and after use.

As for decreasing clothing noise, make sure that you wipe your lav wires every now and then with Armor All to keep the cables soft and pliant. Make sure that you are forming the small loop just below the mic capsule to reduce cable noise. Also, remember to add a couple inches of tape to the cable (below the loop) to act as a primary strain relief.