issue recording from my tascam dr70 to the canon t3i. Thanks in advance.

[deleuze3]

Hi dear members. I have an issue with recording with a tascam dr70 to a t3i. Let me explain in details my workflow.

I plug a ATM41HE (dynamic hypercardioid mic) in the tascam dr70. The sound is peaking at -16dB.
The sound of the tascam pass throught the "LINE OUT" to the "MIC INPUT" of the canon t3i.

In the t3i, the sound is in manual mode, 1 dot above zero and the signal is lower than on the tascam. The signal is about -30db.

When i put the audio in Adobe audition, the audio peak at -20dB. It is pretty weak.
When i add 20-25db, i get a signal peaking at -3dB with some background noise.

Do you have any thoughts on why the signal is so weak ?
I should buy a SESCOM attenuation cable. It doesnt attenuate the sound by 25db, right ? This is far from ideal for me in my situation it seems. I dont really have a solution.

thanks in advance,

 

[graywolf]

Very typically line-out is either -10 or +4 db. Mic-in is typically -45 db. Those are calibration levels.

That tells us that you need about -30db if your Tascam puts out -10, and about -40db of attenuation if it puts out +4. +-10db probably makes no real difference. All the attenuators do is bring the audio levels into the adjustment range of the input stage.

However, if your signal is weaker in the camera than the output of the recorder, you do not need to attenuate the signal. Nomally, we try to get the gain at the microphone input, the recorder's preamp in this case, and set all the rest of the signal line to unity gain (0db), so that level carries all the way through. I do not know your camera, but if it is like most unity gain would be about 1/2 scale, so it sound like you have your camera input turned too low.

Try turning it up to about 1/3 to 1/2 scale and the recorder down a bit to give you the level you are looking for.

 

[Rick R]

I perused Canon t3i manual specs but could find any ext. audio input levels. But based on this recent thread, you probably need the Sescom (or other) attenuation cable.
I'm sure you already know, DSLR cameras do not record good audio quality even in a perfect world and properly set-up.. should be ok for reference and sync purposes though.