Love your Zoom field recorder but wish you could work it like a mixer—with faders and everything? Wait no longer, for your wish has been granted, with the Zoom F-CONTROL. We at B&H are now carrying this unit, which pairs via USB with your F8 or F4 Multitrack Field Recorder to give you total command of your recording experience when you’re out on location trying to balance a bunch of microphones.
The F-CONTROL lays out your field recorder’s channel-strip capabilities, scene-organizational properties, and metering readouts into an easy-to-use 9-fader mixing array, giving you controls for trim/pan, track arming, and adding more goodies; with the F-CONTROL, you’ll have access to a dedicated time code button, 12-segment LED meters, programmable controls for monitoring and output levels, and the ability to attach any USB keyboard (the typing kind, not the MIDI-triggering ones). This last option will be especially handy for entering metadata, allowing you to label takes, tracks, and scenes in a most expeditiously organized fashion. The F-CONTROL also provides 1/4" jacks—one for connecting to your field recorder, the other for your headphones—so you monitor audio straight from the board.
So, is that one actor with the lav getting too loud? Is that guy mumbling his lines again? The controls to adjust for level are now right in front of you—not on a harness, not in a bag at your side, but in front of your face. With a tool like this, your operations will be greatly simplified; your director might cherish your expediency, but even better, the post-production sound mixer will thank you, since you were able to catch those pesky peaks in real time, and label the takes clearly and effectively. If you have the F4 or F8, by all means, drop by our website and check out the F-CONTROL.
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