Labelling
Most of the time it doesn’t seem to really matter. In fact you don’t even notice most of the time, however, when things go wrong it causes multiple mistakes, lost time, frustration and poor results.
It’s a simple thing, no great skill required, just attention to detail and being willing to put the time in to get it right.
What am I talking about?
Labelling.
Too often, whoever assembles or maintains a PA system knows it so well that they just assume its all straight ahead, self explanatory and they keep all the details in their head. For others, if nothing breaks or gets plugged in to the wrong input or output, then they just mix with how its set up week to week and everybody’s happy.
But there’s a couple of things to consider, because when things do go wrong, as they inevitably will at some point, then lack of good clear accurate labelling can cost you in many ways.
- Lost time - it takes a lot lot longer to trace faulty cables, identify multicore lines, confirm what core is plugged into what channel if they’re not clearly named and identified. You spend most of your time trying cable by cable til you luck upon it, and if this happens in the middle of a service or show, you’ve pretty much lost the moment then and there.
- Multiple mistakes - When amplifiers, outboard gear, and console channels aren’t labelled correctly, you can compile mistake onto mistake by chasing down faults ‘assuming’ signal paths and chains that aren’t what you think they are. Not knowing for sure which amp channel is driving what foldback send or what eq is in line or inserted can lead you to make decisions that are incorrect, and by the time you find that you’ve been chasing the wrong thing, you pretty much have to start again.
- Poor results - Even when nothing is broken, if you label your console channels poorly or out of what is considered a standard order, you make it harder for others. A new production team member for example may not know that the vocalists are named Bob, Sandra, Jenny, and Dave, so finds it much harder to get the vocal blend right than if you simply labelled those channels left to right as the mixer ‘sees’ it Vox 1, Vox 2, Vox 3, Vox 4. (Feel free to add the people’s names under that as well if that helps, but clear L to R labelling of what the input is makes everything simple).
- Making the most of your time - A stagebox clearly labelled along with a stage plan makes it easy to involve the music team members in helping you setup, pack up and save time overall. If the vocalists know the stage positions for Vox 1, 2 etc, then when they arrive for the day, they can be taught to collect a mic and cable and plug it into the right stagebox input for where they will be singing. The same applies for musicians miking up guitars, plugging in DI boxes and the like. This alone can save the sound guy well over half an hour and involves everybody in taking responsibility for more than just their place on the stage.
By taking the time to clearly identify and label all cabling, amps, gear and channels clearly and logically, you stand a far greater chance of producing good consistent results and helping others who join your team to learn faster as well.
In our next article we’ll cover the standard practices for labelling and layout to help you with your planning.
