one more ? about miking a small auditorium

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powerdog

Veteran
OK, I have many limitations for the situation I need to deal with. Very small budget, no rental places in my state, only a few minutes to enter a room and set up, can't be intrusive....and just me doing all the work.

Given the above, I have to record in a University classroom that looks like a small auditorium (about 50' x 40'). Professor will have a wireless lav, and the class....well, that's the big issue. I have to stand off to the side, but I can put a mic stand anywhere and maybe even hang something from the ceiling.

Should I just use my Senn ME-66 and try to point it at whoever's speaking, put a boundary mic on the floor, consider hanging a choir mic....?

I know none of my options will be great, or even good, but I need to pick a workable solution and make the best of it. Suggestions much appreciated!
 
My experience with hanging mics (in theatre anyway) is that they are barley useful for reinforcement and usually sound BAD. In a similar situation I set up a number of mics that covered the audience, but I was going to an eight track recorder so I could use the ones that worked. I would have preferred to set a couple for safety and used a shotgun or a hyper to pick up the specific people.
 
this is a situation that I get rammed in quite often on corporate work. Boundary mics and such wont help you unless you are specifically looking for a "general" audience ambience - not crisp question/answer dialogue.

If you DO need crisp up front dialogue from audience members, you have four options:

1: Hypercardioid (Such as schoeps 41) on a BOOM, with a SKILLED boom operator - the mic will need to be quiet close to the speaker, but if correctly positioned by a boom op, it will sound the best, and be in position the fastest out of these options. Downside: has to be close, you're probably going to be working with full extension boom the whole time.

2: Shotgun or even long shotgun on a BOOM, with a SKILLED boom operator - the mic will be able to be further away, but you may get much more reverb from the room through using the shotgun pattern, this will depend on acoustics. This method would be more convenient than the hyper, but not sound as good. Downside: the shotgun, and even more so the long shotgun have to be PRECISELY cued. If you miss, you may as well be using the boundary mic. The boom will probably also be full extension for this method.

3: Shotgun/long shotgun handheld - If you can get relatively close, relatively quickly but cant use a boom, this might be best. Downside: Just keep in mind that if you arent going to be able to get to a usable distance (like 3 feet or so max and maybe thats pushing it), the shotgun will give you very reverbed sound that you may not like. It also wont match the wireless nicely.

4: Interview/stick mic on a wirless buttplug transmitter - If you can stomach a mic in shot, passing this to speakers in the audience will give you sound that will closely match the lav on the main speaker. It can take some time to reach the people speaking, so its not perfect for every occasion, but if you meet the requirements, its cool. Downside: Mic in shot. Time to get to speakers. Battery life of wireless is limited. You may need to also run a room mic to fill in tone as the lav and stick mic combo will sound crap for things like applause/ A/V presentations etc.
 
Tim, that's a very helpful response. Thank you.

I think I need to make a choice between bad options. First, the question of a skilled boom operator is moot, as I have NO boom operator. No crew at all. Not even a trained monkey. It's just me. Alone in the world.

That leaves 3 and 4, which have another downside: increased awareness by the audience. Plus, if they have to wait for me to get to them, or for a wireless to be handed across, the participation isn't going to be as spontaneous.

However, the general audience ambiance you mentioned for a boundary mic may be OK. Does this mean they won't sound good, but viewers also won't keep asking "What did he say?" If it sounds sort of echo-y, like when a news anchor's lav isn't on while they're talking, that's not so bad. Viewers just need to understand what's said.
 
no, when i said general ambience, you really are riding the line on people possibly not being able to hear what the person is saying. i think its safe to say, DONT use a boundary mic. sorry. you know how it is: good, cheap, fast - pick two.

in order to get crap (by pro standards, but maybe ok for you) sound, but sound that you are more likely to understand when watching, ill suggest using a shotgun (pref a long shotgun), maybe even (cant believe Im saying this) on camera so you can avoid having to point it with your seventh arm (this suggestion, of course, makes a long shotgun less viable). people further away run higher risks of being too soft to understand, with their direct to reflected sound ratio being lower, and also foreground crowd sounds being more obvious (this could make it hard to just gain the speaker up in post)

lets be clear though: this aint pro OR good sound you will be recording, and there is HEAPS of room for improvement. I understand you are in a jam, so one has to make a plan, and i reckon this is your best with what you have.

i think your main problem is going to be mixing between the lav and the audience, and also just mixing the audience to the right volumes. good luck, sounds like you're gonna need it...

let me know how you do, and what material you get, id be interested to know. good luck, and in future, rent the monkey. :)
 
Tim has laid your choices out well. Watch some talk shows. They have all the money and resources they need to get good sound and they will either have a speaker come to a podium mike or pass around a hand mic. If there were a better solution they would do it.

In order for the questions to be inteligable the mic must be close to the speaker...period. It's not always pretty, easy, or cheap but those are your choices.

IMHO your best option is to pass around a hand mic. It kills some of the spontaneity but the sound will be good.

Good luck
 
yup. wabbit is as usual right.. come to think of it, the three main methods for talk show type audience speakers are: wireless handheld, the podium approach, and very occasionally (saw this somewhere, cant remember where, might have been that weird john edwards show) they have wireless boom guys at key points to chuck a hypercardioid or cardioid close to the speakers. these booms are OFTEN in shot, and the show didnt try to hide it...

tim
 
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