Preamp for Computer (ADR Recording or w/e)

KyleProhaska

KyleProhaska

Veteran
I'm looking for a Preamp to hook to my computer and record from my XLR mics to do ADR and also it would be nice for it to be my hub to hook up my Production Speakers. After some research something that isn't top of the line but will get the job done is the M-Audio Mobile Pre which is bus powered so I can also take it in the field with my Macbook Pro and not just hook it into my MacPro at home (where the speakers are).

What do you guys use?
 
I have an RME Fireface 800 which I use for music. It's little brother, the Fireface 400, is a great audio interface. I would look into that if I were you.
 
Why not use your camcorder as an audio recorder?

My consumer camcorder has much better preamps than my laptop: I don't notice any electronic noise at all when I record with my camcorder, but I notice a considerable amount when I record with my laptop using the same microphone.
 
seunosewa said:
Why not use your camcorder as an audio recorder?

My consumer camcorder has much better preamps than my laptop: I don't notice any electronic noise at all when I record with my camcorder, but I notice a considerable amount when I record with my laptop using the same microphone.
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The preamps and A/D converters on laptops and OEM internal sound cards are pretty much scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of sound quality so saying your camera is better isn't really comparing it against much of a standard. The preamps and converters in a stand-alone audio interface should blow both of them out of the water.

I personally like the Echo Audofire series of firewire interfaces - my workstation uses a Mackie 1642 mixer for its preamps, level and routing controls, and monitor controls connected to an Audiofire12 12-channel external interface.
 
Another issue with recording audio close to a running computer is fan noise. I have no idea how noisy the fan is on a Macbook, but it's something to factor in.
 
The preamps and converters in a stand-alone audio interface should blow both of them out of the water.
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I don't see how any expensive piece of equipment can blow "I can't hear any noise" out of the water.
 
seunosewa said:
I don't see how any expensive piece of equipment can blow "I can't hear any noise" out of the water.
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Depends on what you're listening with, how good your ears are, and ultimately on what your audience is listening on as well. If you're listening carefully on a properly calibrated set of good quality studio monitors in a quiet room, that's a fair test; if you're listening on earbuds plugged into the camera headphone jack, just because you don't hear any noise doesn't mean it isn't there waiting to jump up and bite 'ya when you want to show your final product in a film festival theatre.
 
I like MOTU, myself. I have a 1296 and a Firewire 828 MkII. One thing that is convenient about the MkII, it has 2 inputs on the front that can be phantom powered (Condenser mics) or not, independently. That front access makes ADR a bit easier for me, and +48 means I can use my favorite mic without going through other things.
 
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I'm bumping this thread for another question. How about this thing?

http://www.mackie.com/products/satellite/index.html

yes not the greatest thing on the planet but will it do what I"m asking? I need 1 pair of headphones giving my actor the looped audio but not feedback from the mic he's speaking into. I also need my headphones on to listen to what he's putting into the mic. I also need it to be compatible with Soundtrack Pro as thats what I'm using.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. I gotta jump on this problem quickly as my time is very limited.
 
KyleProhaska said:
I'm bumping this thread for another question. How about this thing?

http://www.mackie.com/products/satellite/index.html

yes not the greatest thing on the planet but will it do what I"m asking? I need 1 pair of headphones giving my actor the looped audio but not feedback from the mic he's speaking into. I also need my headphones on to listen to what he's putting into the mic. I also need it to be compatible with Soundtrack Pro as thats what I'm using.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. I gotta jump on this problem quickly as my time is very limited.
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From my years in radio I can tell you that your actor needs to hear the feed from his microphone. He needs to be able to hear himself. Not to be insensitive, but have you ever heard a deaf person talk? They are perfectly capable of making the same sounds as you and I, but because they can't hear themselves, they have a hard time speaking 'normally'.

In radio, our headphones always gave us whatever was on the air, including our own voices. If for some reason we couldn't hear our own voice, we sounded funny.

But what you do need are headphones that make a good seal and don't 'leak' sound out, which will loop into the actor's microphone and cause everything from echo to feedback.

Good luck!
 
Personally, I think people are spending way too much money on audio. My first feature required ADR for the entire film (I knew this going in to it) due to the way I like to shoot. My process was to burn a picture locked DVD with the original audio that sounds like crap. My actors would come over and we'd watch the movie. When we came to their lines, I'd play it as much as they needed and they'd record the take into the camera mic, which was now a foot or two away from their mouths. I'd give direction like, "more emphisis here", until we got it. Next line. Yes, it sucked syncying everything up, but it allowed me to waste nobody's time but my own. On set, we never had to wait for a sound guy or redo a shot because the boom was in it. A clip from my movie can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ytz8SEvabI&feature=channel_page
Yes, it looks like crap (still learning about how to encode for the web) but listen to the actors lines. The sound of it is so natural...
 
seunosewa said:
I don't see how any expensive piece of equipment can blow "I can't hear any noise" out of the water.
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Not to gang up on you but Steve is right. If you "can't hear any noise" your either not listening on a good system or you just don't hear it. A DVX 100 has acceptable recording but your talking low end DAT. I didn't think my DAT had any noise till I heard my new recorder. You don't have to be deaf to not hear it. The human brain is designed to tune out things like noise. Recordists, mixers and other sound professionals tend to hear all this stuff not so much because of hearing quality, our ears age like everyone else's and most of us have gone to a rock concert or two, but because we have trained ourselves to listen for it. A good recordist is listening as much for what he/she does not want to record as they are to what they are recording. A classic situation for someone starting out is to come back and start transferring sound sand find out they have planes etc all over the recordings. They got so excited about what they wanted to record that they tuned out what they didn't want to record. If you don't listen for what you don't want you end up with a lot of useless recordings.

This is a long way of saying that it's no shame that you don't hear the noise, your not trained to. But it is there and it will/ can come back to bite you on the butt.

Aside from quality a camcorder is the last thing you want to record ADR on.
 
That is maybe the stupidest thing I have read on DVX user. Most low budget filmmakers are spending close to zero on sound and it shows. I do a lot of triage on films that didn't pay much attention to sound, I have yet to find one that didn't come away just awestruck by how much a decent sound track improved their film. People as a rule spend awy too LITTLE on sound, both in $ and in thought.

Not shure how this didn't waste peoples time since they had to come back and do ADR. And ADR in a very obtuse way. But if it works for you great. Hong Kong action films are largely shot that way. If the essence of your film is action then it can work, if your film is about story and performance then I would be very surprised if you weren't fataly compromised.

El Director said:
Personally, I think people are spending way too much money on audio. My first feature required ADR for the entire film (I knew this going in to it) due to the way I like to shoot. My process was to burn a picture locked DVD with the original audio that sounds like crap. My actors would come over and we'd watch the movie. When we came to their lines, I'd play it as much as they needed and they'd record the take into the camera mic, which was now a foot or two away from their mouths. I'd give direction like, "more emphisis here", until we got it. Next line. Yes, it sucked syncying everything up, but it allowed me to waste nobody's time but my own. On set, we never had to wait for a sound guy or redo a shot because the boom was in it. A clip from my movie can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ytz8SEvabI&feature=channel_page
Yes, it looks like crap (still learning about how to encode for the web) but listen to the actors lines. The sound of it is so natural...
Click to expand...
 
OK after looking at the clip. well it's obviously ADR, sync looks loose but that doesn't really mean much after YouTube gets through with it, but I suspect that it is loose. It would be near impossible to get tight sync with the way you did ADR. If it's that foreign movie dubbed feel your going for then you've got it down. But if you want people to believe that you recorded that on location it's got aways to go. Everyone sounds like they are indoors and there are pretty much no BG's. Nobody makes any sound other than talking. Half the pain with ADR is not recording the voices but all the other stuff you NEED to do to sell the voices.

OK for ballance I will say your ADR is tighter sync than most ADR prior to say 1995 or so when DAW's started to come into post in a big way. And when I say it's obviously ADR I don't mean everyone is going to call it out. I've done enough live shows with VERY obvious lip syncing and Q&A with actors that everyone knew was deaf to be surprised what people "don't" see. But your in the film biz and like it or not your putting yourself up against Hollywood, and a slightly wonky track will always strike people as "not Hollywood" and by that not "professional", or at least "low budget".
It all depends on what your going for. But it certainly does not work for everyone.
El Director said:
Personally, I think people are spending way too much money on audio. My first feature required ADR for the entire film (I knew this going in to it) due to the way I like to shoot. My process was to burn a picture locked DVD with the original audio that sounds like crap. My actors would come over and we'd watch the movie. When we came to their lines, I'd play it as much as they needed and they'd record the take into the camera mic, which was now a foot or two away from their mouths. I'd give direction like, "more emphisis here", until we got it. Next line. Yes, it sucked syncying everything up, but it allowed me to waste nobody's time but my own. On set, we never had to wait for a sound guy or redo a shot because the boom was in it. A clip from my movie can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ytz8SEvabI&feature=channel_page
Yes, it looks like crap (still learning about how to encode for the web) but listen to the actors lines. The sound of it is so natural...
Click to expand...
 
someone is filling your head with terrible lies about
the quality of your sound in that clip. (yourself).

Most smaller speakers (computer speakers) will hide a lot of imperfections in audio. Not in this case!
I can only imagine what this would sound like on a full range theater set.

The funny part, and its really not meant to be picking on you but YOU'RE
the one who said it..
As far as "my feature required ADR due to the way i like to shoot"?

Sorry but there was absolutely NOTHING special about your shooting
in that clip that would warrant ADR. NOTHING.

"Yes, it sucked syncying everything up, but it allowed me to waste nobody's time but my own."
Really? seems you wasted all of your actors time making them do ADR
in the first place.

"On set, we never had to wait for a sound guy or redo a shot because the boom was in it. "
No offense but judging by that clip (remember you're the one who made it available) it looks like you didn't "wait" for anyone, and that includes, lighting, sound and performance.

It's one thing to make a movie that looks like a bunch of friends woke up
one morning and said "lets make a movie".
Its another to then come onto a forum with ridiculous statements like yours
where another "newbie" could read them and without knowing better
actually take your advice to heart.



El Director said:
Personally, I think people are spending way too much money on audio. My first feature required ADR for the entire film (I knew this going in to it) due to the way I like to shoot. My process was to burn a picture locked DVD with the original audio that sounds like crap. My actors would come over and we'd watch the movie. When we came to their lines, I'd play it as much as they needed and they'd record the take into the camera mic, which was now a foot or two away from their mouths. I'd give direction like, "more emphisis here", until we got it. Next line. Yes, it sucked syncying everything up, but it allowed me to waste nobody's time but my own. On set, we never had to wait for a sound guy or redo a shot because the boom was in it. A clip from my movie can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ytz8SEvabI&feature=channel_page
Yes, it looks like crap (still learning about how to encode for the web) but listen to the actors lines. The sound of it is so natural...
Click to expand...
 
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