Capturing audio for a Christmas concert...

Rylan Zolinski

Rylan Zolinski

Well-known member
I have never recorded a Christmas concert and in two weeks it will be my first time. Obviously I am going to go a few days early and see what sort of setup they have but I am guessing it will be pretty simple. What would be the easiest way to capture audio? I plan on purchasing the Zoom H4N and I was thinking of setting my Rode mic up at the front of the stage and pointing in the direction of the kids speaking into their mic. Would this be my best bet? Or should I hook the mic up near one of the floor speakers in which the audio will come through?
 
Hi Morox,

What's the Christmas concert program about? Does it include musicians, choir members, children skit, readers, flying monkeys, etc.? Try to get in contact with the stage manager or program director about their concert. Write down all possible things happening during the event. If the concert only consists of kids singing, you could probably get away with your Rode mic. Again, what model is your Rode microphone? Is there a sound tech at the booth to handle the microphone process for sound reinforcement? Ask them politely to put up a mic or two for the kids so you could just take a feed from the board into your H4N. DO NOT hook a mic up near one of the floor speakers. Not going to cut it, and you'll end up disappointed. If the program is simple, your method would work easily. Otherwise, you would need to approach this with a multi-mic complexity.
 
I will be talking to the principal of the school today and will ask for a program. As for my mic, it's a Rode NTG2. My knowledge with audio equipment is pretty limited as I am still learning. If I use the H4N, I should be able to capture both music and children speaking through one feed from the board via XLR? Or would they come in on two separate channels and I would need two XLR cables?

I apologize if it's a stupid question, haha.
 
Morox said:
I will be talking to the principal of the school today and will ask for a program. As for my mic, it's a Rode NTG2. My knowledge with audio equipment is pretty limited as I am still learning. If I use the H4N, I should be able to capture both music and children speaking through one feed from the board via XLR? Or would they come in on two separate channels and I would need two XLR cables?

I apologize if it's a stupid question, haha.
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There could be one mono channel from the PA, there could be two stereo channels, everthing might be miced and then again some or all of the musicians, if any, might not be with only speaking parts going through the PA. The board could have its outputs on XLR but then again, it might not and your feed could be coming from one or two TRS or even a pair of RCA outputs. The feed you can get might be +4 or it could be -10 line level. It could be either pre- or post- master fader. You have to actually sit down with the sound guy, if there is one, find out exactly what the setup for the show will be, go over the board with him, go over the PROGRAM with him and make notes on eactly what he will be doing moment by moment through the show, and work out a strategy from there. With the information you have shared so far, there are no answers to your questions.
 
Steve House said:
There could be one mono channel from the PA, there could be two stereo channels, everthing might be miced and then again some or all of the musicians, if any, might not be with only speaking parts going through the PA. The board could have its outputs on XLR but then again, it might not and your feed could be coming from one or two TRS or even a pair of RCA outputs. The feed you can get might be +4 or it could be -10 line level. It could be either pre- or post- master fader. You have to actually sit down with the sound guy, if there is one, find out exactly what the setup for the show will be, go over the board with him, go over the PROGRAM with him and make notes on eactly what he will be doing moment by moment through the show, and work out a strategy from there. With the information you have shared so far, there are no answers to your questions.
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Stuff like this worries me since my knowledge in this area is quite limited. I will sit down with their audio technician and make sure we're on the same level and to see what they have to offer/help me. I've only done small shoots and previously recorded my audio directly into the camera (XHA1). Is it worth upgrading to a Zoom? Is there any other products in the same price range as the Zoom that I should be looking into?
 
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Kids can be a real pain to deal with for sound. They're either WAY loud, virtually silent, over-excited and totally unintelligible, twelve feet from their mic, licking their mic....if they can do something to make the sound guy's job harder, they probably will.

If you're going to mic the stage yourself, you almost certainly need several mics and a mixer. However you end up setting up, you MUST be monitoring and riding levels. Never just drop a recorder somewhere and hope the sound comes out useable.

Honestly, if this is something you're getting paid for, hire a sound guy. I'm not saying you can't learn, but you've obviously got limited time before the event and limited audio gear and experience.

If that's not an option, keep asking questions, no matter how stupid you think they are.

A few questions of my own:
What kind of room is this in? Theater? Gym? Highschool? Elementary?
How many kids are you trying to capture? How spread out are they going to be? Singing or speaking or both?
 
JordanBlock said:
Kids can be a real pain to deal with for sound. They're either WAY loud, virtually silent, over-excited and totally unintelligible, twelve feet from their mic, licking their mic....if they can do something to make the sound guy's job harder, they probably will.

If you're going to mic the stage yourself, you almost certainly need several mics and a mixer. However you end up setting up, you MUST be monitoring and riding levels. Never just drop a recorder somewhere and hope the sound comes out useable.

Honestly, if this is something you're getting paid for, hire a sound guy. I'm not saying you can't learn, but you've obviously got limited time before the event and limited audio gear and experience.

If that's not an option, keep asking questions, no matter how stupid you think they are.

A few questions of my own:
What kind of room is this in? Theater? Gym? Highschool? Elementary?
How many kids are you trying to capture? How spread out are they going to be? Singing or speaking or both?
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I will have answers tomorrow as the principal is calling me. I probably can't do any worse than the last people they hired. All they did was set up a mic at the back of the gym and captured sound from there, haha.

Well, if I get a direct feed from the board, that would be a lot better than setting a mic up front, would it not? As for hiring a sound guy, that would be out of my budget. I live in a city of 35,000 people and I didn't plan on charging a whole lot as I am trying to get my name out there. I only have one competitor and after filming a dance recital for some people that hired this company before, they said they'd be contacting me next year instead of them. I will be getting in contact with their audio technician and asking a lot of questions so that I can be prepared as much as possible. I will also be visiting the school to see what their setup would be like.
 
Oh, and I may as well ask this here... I am trying to pick between the H4N and the DR100. I have read that the H4N isn't too great with the Rode NTG2; is this and indication for me to probably choose the DR100?
 
Morox said:
Well, if I get a direct feed from the board, that would be a lot better than setting a mic up front, would it not?
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The answer so often in sound is "It depends". If the live sound folks are good, the kids are on-mic, and they don't have to do anything too wild with the sound to make it acceptable in the room, a board feed should be okay.

Better would be getting splits off their mics and either mixing down to a small recorder or taking a full multi-track recording. Obviously this isn't practical in your situation.

If you're going to be using a small recorder and your camera, you do have 4 tracks of recording capability. Perhaps a pair of cardioids at the front of the stage as well as taking a board feed, and mixing those in post. How practical that is depends on if you're running around with the camera or you're on sticks somewhere you can run cables to.
 
JordanBlock said:
The answer so often in sound is "It depends". If the live sound folks are good, the kids are on-mic, and they don't have to do anything too wild with the sound to make it acceptable in the room, a board feed should be okay.

Better would be getting splits off their mics and either mixing down to a small recorder or taking a full multi-track recording. Obviously this isn't practical in your situation.

If you're going to be using a small recorder and your camera, you do have 4 tracks of recording capability. Perhaps a pair of cardioids at the front of the stage as well as taking a board feed, and mixing those in post. How practical that is depends on if you're running around with the camera or you're on sticks somewhere you can run cables to.
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From my experience at Christmas plays, usually only one mic is used and kids take turns using it. If so, would my mic interfere with one of the cardiods if they are side by side? I was thinking of using the Rode and hooking it up to a recorder (H4N or DR100, whatever one I wish to buy) and then doing a direct feed from the board into my camera or both cameras (multicam shoot).
 
So, I talked to the principal and I will be meeting up next week as they are setting up and it will give me a chance to see everything. I have encountered one problem already though. He wants to bring in all the students (few hundred) to stand in the gymnasium together and sing a song that he wants me to capture on tape. I'd imagine I would need a few microphones placed in front of them to capture all of the kids singing? Or can I get away with using one mic (my NTG2) and place it in the front/middle of the entire group? I can't just run out and buy a bunch of microphones as I don't have that much money. I can either do that or see if they have their own microphones and I can capture it via a direct feed into my cameras and recorder, but this would make me feel like a chump and that I don't have sufficient equipment of my own.

Any idea on what I should do?

Edit- I must add that I just ordered a recorder (no shops in town). This shoot with the kids he wants done in one week which means I may not have the recorder. I might just have my two cameras to record the audio into.
 
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The NTG-2 is really not the right kind of mic for a choral performance. It's really not the sort of mic you should use indoor if you can at all help it, but as you say, no budget, so use what you have. I'd generally go with a pair of cardioids, in this case placed overhead of the audience. How far back really depends, but the idea is to capture the audience's perspective of the sound. Too close and you'll get the one or two really loud kids overpowering everyone else.

In your case, maybe try the onboard mics on the zoom. They're not amazing, but they might just get you to 'good enough'. With no budget it's a little tough to buy/rent better stuff.

Assuming they're doing a dress rehearsal, that would be a good time to go and try out a couple placements and see what might be best on the night.
 
If you've purchased the H4N, just use it's onboard stereo mics, put it on a tall mic stand, and raise it up pointing toward the kids in the back row. 10-12 feet out and maybe 8 feet high. You won't be able to monitor the levels though. Adequate enough to capture the entire group of kids in the gym.
 
I'm guessing they will be in the bleachers so Alan's suggestion is a good one but higher is better. I'd try to get some sort of reading and set the level at about 75% before clipping, then get it up in the air.
Schools used to all have A frame ladders to change bulbs in the Gym. If you could set that up with a superclamp or something, you could get the initial readings in the air, then just leave it.
 
I purchased the DR-100 instead of the H4N. I never thought I would have to utilize the onboard mic, but in this case, it sounds like I may need to and I don't know the difference in quality between the two for that. The reason I chose the DR-100 is that I kept reading about people getting an almost faulty H4N unit and having to return it for a better one.

I have a problem though. I JUST ordered it. I don't think I will get it on time as the performance is the beginning of next week (I just found this out today). I don't know what to do now. :(

They probably have their own cardioid microphones but I would feel embarrassed asking to use them as I should have my own equipment for this. As someone said, the NTG2 is not really a mic for this. Would it be passable? It's either that or I get close enough with my XHA1 and use the onboard mic (ick).
 
I guess you could ask the folks at the school to borrow a few mics if possible. Otherwise, your DR100 would do. It also has onboard mics (2x cardioids, 2x omnis), but I wouldn't use it solely for professional work. In this case, it would work. I wouldn't want to use the onboard on the A1 due to its size.
 
Alan H. Chang said:
I guess you could ask the folks at the school to borrow a few mics if possible. Otherwise, your DR100 would do. It also has onboard mics (2x cardioids, 2x omnis), but I wouldn't use it solely for professional work. In this case, it would work. I wouldn't want to use the onboard on the A1 due to its size.
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I guess I will have to ask. I have male to female XLR cables. I assume cardioids/omni's utilize something different?

Edit- I just realized payday is Friday. I am thinking of picking up a cardioid mic or two with stands. Obviously this would be something that I would need in the future as I plan on doing more shoots and I may as well just buy a few. What sort of price range should I be looking at for each mic? Also, would two cut it for capturing the students singing next week? Also, would the cardioid be better than an omni for this type of event?
 
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All professional microphones utilize XLR connectors.

Having access to a pair of microphones would give you more options for many recording situations to come. Both cardioids and omnis are used interchangeably depending on the recording scenario. Omnis are used more when the room/venue sounds pleasant, and are used for close placement to get more "air" of the instrument or sound source. Omnis pickup all sound sources equidistant in all directions. Cardioids are the exact half of an Omni-directional microphone. The back of a cardioid is blind meaning it's rejecting the sound sources that are coming at the opposite direction of what the microphone is pointing at. I would strongly recommend a pair of cardioids first before deciding on a set of omnis. Your budget dictates the kind of microphone you'd choose, what's your budget? As my philosophy and so are others, buy once. Obvious manufacturers are from Oktava, Audio-Technica, MBHO, Beyerdynamic, AKG, Rode, Sennheiser, and Shure.

Two microphones would adequately cover all the students in the gymnasium. If you go further than two microphones, you would need to start thinking about mixers, multi-track recorders, and more cables/stands/mounts. Keep it simple.
 
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