Taken from dashner over at http://teamfortress.tv/thread/19912/airon-gxl-fundraiser

Hello friends,

For those that don’t know, I am handling the on-site production of TFTV/eXtv’s stream coverage of the GXL LAN event (including the CEVO finals on the Friday) along with Lange. I was also recently in Europe helping in a similar manner with the i52 stream production, which was a great experience for me and I learned a lot. Dating back to April, before i52 was even a reality for the two of us, Lange and myself had been planning the production of GXL and brainstorming on how to make it the best production our community has seen. One of the biggest issues we had at i52 is not having a proper audio set up, since we did not have the money or the manpower to make it happen. As a result, there was clipping on a lot of casters, mics occasionally didn’t work, and we didn’t have a stable sound system until the middle of Saturday. While it was a very small blemish on what turned out to be an awesome production, it is something we want to avoid this time around.

I’m making this thread on behalf of Airon, who is currently one of the lesser known talents this community has right now. He’s a sound designer and mixer currently living in Germany and has been the godfather of everything sound in the TF2 community. If you’ve ever watched something TF2 and thought “that sounds pretty cool”, it was likely Airon’s work. Among other things, he has done all the soundwork for postproduced eXtv videos, he mastered the vast majority of the sound effects and videos you saw at Tip of the Hats, and most recently pulled a 36-hour all nighter with Bones and Cube to finish the sound mix for the i49 Fragumentary in time. His professionalism and high standards for himself are, in my opinion, unmatched in this community, and he does this all without asking for recognition aside from a short credit and does it without pay.

We find ourselves in a very lucky position this year at GXL, as the organizers have generously given us access to some very high end equipment to help make the stream amazing, but we do need people who are proficient with said equipment! Airon has been helping us a lot in choosing the right gear and training us on it but after discussing it, me and Lange both agree that this production’s success will be dependent on having a dedicated audio engineer on-site, who has experience running live events of this nature. We considered hiring one rather than having Airon fly all the way out from Europe, but in the end the costs would have been close to the same and Airon understands the needs of this production and is passionate about TF2 as an eSport. In short, he is the perfect man for the job. He will be responsible for the live mixing of the event and ensuring the audio side of the stream will be as professional as possible through the use of “faders, eq, gates, and compressors” and other things that I have no understanding of.

Airon has finally confirmed his availability for the event and is in the process of booking his flights to Philadelphia, which will cost him $900 two-ways. His hotel and other expenses will be paid for by eXtv (i.e. myself or eXtine if it comes down to it).

If you guys want to help us knock this stream out of the park, or just want to show your gratitude to Airon for the work that he’s put in for this community, I would strongly encourage you to consider donating to Airon’s travel fund if you have anything to spare. I realize that this community has been drained dry recently by other fundraisers (including my own to get me to i52), but we wouldn’t ask if this wasn’t extremely important to putting on a good show at GXL.

Airon’s donation drive can be found here: https://imraising.tv/u/aironextv

if you wish to donate directly, his paypal email is: loetzbl AT gmail.com