Location Sound completed their largest Q1 sale to Sony Picture Studio’s Culver City, California, which is undergoing a revamp of its production facility. Sony’s purchase of eight live sound consoles—five Soundcraft Vi4s, one Soundcraft Vi6, and two Yamaha CL5s— will be used for audience sound reinforcement as well as recording of production dialog.
Sony’s choice of Soundcraft Vi4 and Vi6 consoles carries forward some continuity as the company had employed earlier analog models of Soundcraft Series Five consoles. Aside from the consoles’ smaller footprint and extensive modern features, upgrading to the latest digital models allows them to tap into the extensive fiber optic and Dante network that is instlled between stages and studios in the complex.
Val Asuncion, Location Sound’s assistant sales manager, has been working with the Sony revamp project since November 2013. “The consoles are part of Sony’s production sound packages that are rented for various shows produced on the Sony lot, as well as other lots around Southern California. Since they were familiar with the sound and ergonomics of Soundcraft consoles, the Vi Series seemed a perfect fit,” Asuncion said. Soundcraft’s Tom Der points out the long-standing relationship Location Sound has with Sony “made them the natural go-to vendor” for the deal.
Sony also had specific integration requirements for the Yamaha consoles used on the stage where Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune were taped. For this reason, Jonathan Peirson, Yamaha’s district manager, brought in two Yamaha CL5s and Rio stage boxes, a system that offered the best solution for integrating with the existing infrastructure. Since the consoles will be used in portable applications on stages with frequent changes, its ease of use, size, and features—such as scene memory and networking capabilities—played heavily into the buying decision.
“Location Sound has been on the forefront of showing products that work on a Dante network. And having recently become a Yamaha CL dealer, we partnered with them to show these capabilities on the consoles. It turned out to be perfect timing as Sony was looking to upgrade to consoles that would support a Dante network,” said Peirson.
David A. Panfili, Location Sound’s CEO said, “Sony’s complex system integration requirements also serve to reinforce our commitment to aligning ourselves with technologies that advance and enhance our clients’ sound recording capabilities.”