Eclipse goes in the Studio in Ontario, Canada

July 2011

The Studio at Hamilton Place is one of Ontario’s most highly regarded music and theatre venues. An intimate 500-seat space located in the cultural heart of downtown Hamilton, Ontario, is reputed for its outstanding sound quality and has attracted a wide variety of artists such as Billy Bragg, the Cowboy Junkies, Robert Cray, Jon Anderson and many more. The Studio also hosts a number of other live events ranging from theatre to comedy shows to live boxing. The final phase of the most recent upgrade saw the installation of an Eclipse digital mixing console from Innovason at FoH, which partners the Sy48 that was originally installed during the first phase of the upgrade a few years ago and has now been moved to the monitor position. Both consoles were supplied by Innovason’s distributor, Sennheiser Canada, as was most of the rest of the sound system in the Studio.

Steve Foster, chief technician and sound engineer at the Studio, is delighted with his new Eclipse. “I’ve been mixing on Innovason for a few years now, having started with the Sy48 which is a great console,” he stated. “I’m particularly impressed by three things: first and foremost, sonically the console has a very clean yet warm sound with plenty of headroom; secondly, the EQ is very precise; third is flexibility – I can lay out the console exactly the way I want and it interfaces with any outboard gear easily and quickly.”

Foster explained that the Studio at Hamilton Place is an extremely versatile space offering a number of different set-ups for many different types of events. Its primary function is as a concert theatre but the venue also host sporting events, fashion shows, TV and film shoots and conventions. As a result, Foster needed a digital console that could function in a number of different ways including live, broadcast and recording. The new Eclipse fitted the bill perfectly.

"In fact, due to the flexible nature of the room I often end up with varying crew sizes or even no crew at all,” remarked Foster. “When I do have to run a show on my own I simply link the two consoles via EtherSound. This allows me to set the input for both consoles during soundcheck from one control surface, which is a real time saver. The fact that the Eclipse has a digital trim gives me some flexibility at FoH. I can make the monitor desk the master, set the input gain during soundcheck and by using the trim on the Eclipse I can attenuate without affecting the monitor levels. I have also found, in situations where the artist has brought their own tech, that I can usually show them how to operate the console in a matter of minutes. In a room where we often have four acts on stage in a night, these types of features are great. As we are a union house and we have very tight setup and show schedules, time is always a factor in terms of the bottom line for the client and the theatre itself.”

“What I like about the Eclipse is that Innovason have managed to take a good design and improve it still further,” he continued. “With the addition of the touch screen and more functional encoders on the control surface, the console is now faster and easier to use than ever before. The quality of the sound is top notch and the Eclipse seems to have more headroom and even less latency than earlier Innovason consoles. I also like that the I/O cards are fully interchangeable between Sy48 and Eclipse - really handy if ever there is an issue and I need to swap cards for a quick and easy solution to get the job done.”

Foster is also a fan of the new M.A.R.S. feature. “It’s a fantastic tool,” he enthused. “I’ve already used it to EQ the room and I’ve also used it to make a number of high quality multitrack recording for clients and artists. It couldn’t be simpler and the results are really professional. Overall I think the Eclipse is a very well designed, easy-to-use, great-sounding console. I’m very pleased with it.”