Record onto What?

DavidG

DavidG

Active member
Hey, im currently shooting my first feature, and im shopping around for the audio equipment, I was wondering as im on a micro budget yet want max quality audio what can you guys suggest i record onto? Someone mentioned minidisc players? (is that a low quality idea?) Infact while im at it - what boom mics do you think work well on a budget?

Thanks guys. Dave.
 
Single-system recording will save you a great deal of time/money in post, assuming your camera has decent audio capabilities. If your budget permits, consider recording both single- and double-system by running the recorder's output into the camera. That way, you get the efficiency of single-system with the greater quality of double-system, and all of your outtakes/wild-takes/room-tones will be at your sound editors' fingertips.

Except for the HHB Portadisc, portable Minidisc recorders are generally low-end consumer devices, and as such a poor investment for double-system sound. Minidisc audio is compressed using ATRAC, a lossy CODEC that makes them a poor choice for recording. For all intents and purposes, minidisc is an obsolete format.

There are a number of excellent solid-state recorders on the market, many of which will record uncompressed 24-bit sound. I've had favorable experience with the Tascam HD-P2, Sound Devices 722 and 744t, and I currently own a Fostex FR-2.

You can find plenty of information on mics in the forum stickies.
 
BRH and SMuir have the right idea. I would put my money into some good shotgun mics, boom poles or a wireless system. There is no end to the stuff you can invest in besides a recorder that will make your film shine in the audio dept.
Good Luck
 
well before we all get too excited, what camera would you be recording into? If it's a DVX 100 or better then go for it. but there are a lot of camcorders out there that have VERY bad audio with auto gain that can't be turned off and no external ins etc.
MiniDisk can sound very good but you have to put a bunch of $$ into the front end. Stick a MixPre and some good mics in front and go in line and you can get very decent recordings. But that makes no sense today since you can buy a better setup for much less.

THe other fly in the ointment is that recording direct to camera only saves you time and money if it sounds good. If it comes out full of noise etc you will lose any savings trying to clean it up in audio post.

With a good camera AND a good sound person you can save a lot of time in post.
 
Better prosumer cameras like DVX100 and XH-A1 have truly great audio recording quality when using line-in, hardly ever is the camera the limiting factor, more so the less than perfect or even good mics, preamps, and micing practices. Those who blame the camera do not understand audio and/or how to work the system.

Good or at least decent mics (short shotgun, lavs, hyper) with good wind protection, good headphones for monitoring, compact mixer, that is the order of importance for getting audio gear (cables & boom, too of corse). Only then you might need external recorders.
 
When would I use line in v/s mic in on the A-1? I recently plugged in an XLR mike into the A-1. In the line-in mode, the mic was dead. It only worked in Mic mode..When do I use Line-in mode? Thanks.
 
cheers, yeh im currently only sing a 2 hv20s.. so not exactly the best cam to record to.
 
Not quite. THe DVX100 and up are on a par with DAT recorders as you said going line in. That is good but not "truly great". However there are a TON of camcorders under the 4K mark that are regularly getting used for low budget films and a LOT of them have crappy audio sections. The LX-1 for instance. On top of which many folks going direct to camera don't use a mixer and go straight into the mic ins. Even the DVX100 does not have great mic ins. And I have seen work come in where they recorded at 32k, a setting on some cameras. So blaming the camera is bunk, you should have known better. But it's also bunk to assume that your camera has a decent audio section. Those that "understand audio" and have worked on some of these low budget films know this. With close to thirty years in sound I have worked on too many.

Petrus said:
Better prosumer cameras like DVX100 and XH-A1 have truly great audio recording quality when using line-in, hardly ever is the camera the limiting factor, more so the less than perfect or even good mics, preamps, and micing practices. Those who blame the camera do not understand audio and/or how to work the system.
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I agree with this part, assuming that the camcorder does have a decent audio section, though I would swap places of the headphone & mixer.

Good or at least decent mics (short shotgun, lavs, hyper) with good wind protection, good headphones for monitoring, compact mixer, that is the order of importance for getting audio gear (cables & boom, too of corse). Only then you might need external recorders.
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Line in comes from a line level output. Sort of obvious but mixers, mic preamps, CD players, etc. It is a MUCH stronger signal. Mic inputs are very low level signals that you would typically get from a microphone. Some very hot mics in VERY loud situations can come close to a weak line level signal, so it is poss sometimes to actually hear something from a mic going into a line level in. Many mics use phantom power, there is no phantom power on line level jacks (or should never be) so any mic needing phantom power will be dead on a line in. Some cameras also use diferent jacks for line level signals so switching may have switched which connector the camera was looking at.
Also there are two "line" levels (actually there are at least three standards that I can think of but two camps) the first is a consumer standard at -10dB unbalanced and the other is a professional standard at +4 dB balanced.

-10 is usually on a 1/8" TRS, RCA, or 1/4" "mono" plugs.
+4 is usually on XLR plugs.

Mixing +4 and -10 is almost as bad as mixing Mic and line. The 14dB difference in signal strength needs a lot of boosting or cutting to work.

Jokerswild said:
When would I use line in v/s mic in on the A-1? I recently plugged in an XLR mike into the A-1. In the line-in mode, the mic was dead. It only worked in Mic mode..When do I use Line-in mode? Thanks.
Click to expand...
 
DavidG said:
cheers, yeh im currently only sing a 2 hv20s.. so not exactly the best cam to record to.
Click to expand...

Hi Dave,

On your Canon HV20, you have a 1/8" stereo mini-jack, inputting to a 16 bit, 48 kHz two channel recorder. This should be fine for your needs. You'll want a 1/8" mini to XLR converter coming out of the camera - hopefully the 1/8" mini has a 90 degree elbow to help protect your camera connector (tape it down to relieve stress).

Assuming your primarily recording indoors, you might want to consider a hyper-cardioid like the Oktava MK012a instead of a NTG boom mic. But that's another subject and you'll find tons of posts and links to reviews here in this forum.

Warm Regards, Michael
 
Truly great = CD quality, clearly better than the old "pro film standard" analog $15000 Nagras. Better than any replay system. Really, a good prosumer cam 16/48 audio from line inputs is NEVER the bottleneck in the audio system. If people can not use them it is their fault, not the cam's.

Especially when the the end result is a mepg2 DVD...
 
Petrus said:
Really, a good prosumer cam 16/48 audio from line inputs is NEVER the bottleneck in the audio system.
Click to expand...

Just beware that there are several popular models of cameras out there, particularly the Sony VX and PD series of DV camcorders, that have horrendously bad, noisy sound, even when switched to line in, meaning that these models just had fundamentally bad audio circuits, period.

Dan
 
That article you listed there is perfect for the new people that come here! It will save me a lot of trouble explaining the same thing over and over (you can't do sound for $100). It would be cool to do a quick revision incorporating some of the new gear we are running around here (SD302, k-tek k-zepp, k-tek kssm, 12' CF Gitzo pole, hvx-200, hpx-500) and a few findings from your other new mic article.

Thanks!
 
Petrus said:
Truly great = CD quality, clearly better than the old "pro film standard" analog $15000 Nagras. Better than any replay system. Really, a good prosumer cam 16/48 audio from line inputs is NEVER the bottleneck in the audio system. If people can not use them it is their fault, not the cam's.

Especially when the the end result is a mepg2 DVD...
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What an ignorant statement. Obviously you have never worked with well recorded Nagra master tapes. A well recorded Nagra master tape will easily hold it's own against DAT 48/16 and will exceed it in many cases. The switch had more to do with convenience and price than it had to do with quality. Your sowing your ignorance. ANd FYI Nagras got replaced mostly with Devas doing 48/24 not DAT doing 48/16.
It really doesn't matter that much what your end delivery is Your acquisition is all post has to work with. You want the highest poss sound going into post.
 
Noiz2 said:
What an ignorant statement. Obviously you have never worked with well recorded Nagra master tapes. A well recorded Nagra master tape will easily hold it's own against DAT 48/16 and will exceed it in many cases. ...It really doesn't matter that much what your end delivery is Your acquisition is all post has to work with. You want the highest poss sound going into post.
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Reminds me of my first taste of how good a recording really can sound, almost 30 years ago now. Seminar on stereo micing techniques given by folks from Schoeps at a professional dubbing stage on the Coast. They demo'ed an original Deutsche Gramaphone master tape of the NY Philharmonic and Metropolitan Opera chorus in concert on location in Saint Patricks, recorded on a Nagra at 30ips with a Blumlein array mic setup. Absolutely breathtaking!
 
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Noiz2 said:
Mixing +4 and -10 is almost as bad as mixing Mic and line. The 14dB difference in signal strength needs a lot of boosting or cutting to work.
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Sorry to be so nitpicky, but the actual difference between -10 (generally given as DbV) and +4 (generally given as Dbm) is 11.8 Dbm.

And many Hi-Z, nominal -10 devices will accept +4 input levels just fine as long as they're wired correctly at the XLR end (unbalanced - usually ground to pin 1 and hot to pin 2). Then it's just a matter of using the trim pot to cut the level down at the entry point. Most decent low cost mixers have them.
 
My 2 cents -

I've done extensive comparison testing of DVX/HVX line inputs vs. dedicated recording gear. And while the HVX and DVX have very good audio as far as camcorders go, I haven't found a single dedicated audio recorder that isn't significantly better when recording the same line input signal.

My tests have been using an SD302 or MixPre, and recording with XLR outs going to the camera and tape out going to various ProTools systems, a MOTU Traveler, MicroTrack 24/96, Zoom H4, a Fostex VF160, and a rackmount CD recorder (I think Tascam).

In every case, the camera had a lot more low-level noise. The camera audio is not unusable, but quickly degrades when boosted in post, making the differences between systems pretty noticeable.

(An exception is the new MicroTrack II, which is useless due to excessive noise when using unbalanced inputs... but that's a bug which hopefully they'll fix. It's still better than the camera when fed from the balanced XLR outs, though in that case I don't have direct comparison from double-system recordings).

So, the camera is indeed in many realistic cases the "weak point" in the audio system. Not the recording format's 16/48k spec, but the analog circuitry and converters. As I may repeat excessively, a camcorder is a nasty and noisy electronic environment, not the best place for you to route your audio signals.

Mind you, my recordings are mostly music with large dynamic range, which exacerbates these issues. Even so, many of my (less demanding) clients find the camera-recorded audio tracks to be fine. So for less-demanding applications like dialog recording, the camera is certainly useful. For nature sound recording, many types of SFX or ambience, it will be less so. But if we're talking about where a dramatic improvement can be made for little $$, even a MicroTrack (with a good pre/mixer) makes a big difference.

P.S. Recent MiniDisc recorders can use larger capacity (I think about 1GB) discs and record uncompressed WAV files. I haven't tested myself, but these devices are well-reviewed by nature recordists, which means they must be pretty clean and quiet when fed a line input. So, if you have easy access to one of these recorders, it's definitely worth a try as a dual-recording system. Make sure it's one of the models that lets you transfer the audio via USB - older MD recorders only played back the files through the analog outputs...
 
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ullanta said:
So, the camera is indeed in many realistic cases the "weak point" in the audio system. Not the recording format's 16/48k spec, but the analog circuitry and converters. As I may repeat excessively, a camcorder is a nasty and noisy electronic environment, not the best place for you to route your audio signals.
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Ullanta:

You nailed it. I have been writing about this for over a decade. Betacam SP had lousy sound quality and with the dawning of the Mini DV era, things sounded even worse. I would go so far as to say that the Sony VX and PD series camcorders, along the my beloved little TRV-900, were some of the worst sounding audio devices ever produced, no dynamic range, hi noise and hiss levels whether using line or mic level inputs.

To me, the DVX/HVX camcorders are a big improvement over any of the Sonys but are still just barely adequate for dialogue. But for effects, music, I agree, almost all camcorders sound worse than a $150.00 cheapo compact flash recorder. Audio has historically never been a priority for camcorder buyers. They tend to salivate over new toys, effects, and fancier lenses but I have yet to see a camcorder ad, brochure or white paper that highlights anything about even decent sound quality. If I were shooting a narrative project with any smaller camcorder today, I would run reference sound to the camcorder and the other mixer output would go to a decent recorder. If you do it right and keep detailed sound logs, you could do your off-line with the camera sound, then go through and manually conform the better quaity audio as you on-line. As long as you had well kept sound reports and good edit notes, it isn't that difficult.

Best,

Dan
 
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