Running audio through the DVX100B

[seher]

For our indie short which will have a mix of indoor and outdoor scenes, we're considering a 2-mic setup, one through each camera, one a more directional mic to make sure we get conversations well and one that is more omni-directional to get a good mix of conversation and ambient sound. First off, is that a sensible approach or should we get a pair of matched mics?

The bigger question is if there is a huge improvement in nrunning the mics through a mixer rather than just through the camera. Our DP has never used the DVX and was worried about sound quality through the camera based on his past experiences with older camera. Our editor would prefer running through the camera, I just want to know if the benefits of running through a mixer outweigh the extra cost andwork on my editor's part. Thanks in advance.

 

[Oleg 2]

For our indie short which will have a mix of indoor and outdoor scenes, we're considering a 2-mic setup, one through each camera, one a more directional mic to make sure we get conversations well and one that is more omni-directional to get a good mix of conversation and ambient sound. First off, is that a sensible approach or should we get a pair of matched mics?

The bigger question is if there is a huge improvement in nrunning the mics through a mixer rather than just through the camera. Our DP has never used the DVX and was worried about sound quality through the camera based on his past experiences with older camera. Our editor would prefer running through the camera, I just want to know if the benefits of running through a mixer outweigh the extra cost andwork on my editor's part. Thanks in advance.

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[ddent]

Oleg's quote is so concise and to the point.

1) hire a sound mixer who can handle all this. Why worry about this?
2) hire a DP who knows the DVX or use a camera he knows
3) listen to Oleg or follow #1. Make your life simple.

find soundman with gear beore you will need to find how much is the adr cost

 

[ptalsky]

The audio on the DVX100 is mediocre at best, and the headphone jack is supremely noisy, making it hard to tell whether you've captured good quality audio.

I will third Oleg's suggestion - find a sound mixer that has all the necessary equipment and experience to do the job. Also, I'd be very concerned if I were hiring a DP that had no experience with the camera being used. (I know you didn't ask for that advice, but hey, we're all friends here, mostly).

Phil

 

[Steve House]

For our indie short which will have a mix of indoor and outdoor scenes, we're considering a 2-mic setup, one through each camera, one a more directional mic to make sure we get conversations well and one that is more omni-directional to get a good mix of conversation and ambient sound. First off, is that a sensible approach or should we get a pair of matched mics?

...

It's hard to say what mics you do need but at first glance that's not at all sensible. An omni or cardioid recording dialog needs to be within about 12" of the person speaking's mouth to record "good conversation" so unless you're shooting a reporter doing a standup using a handheld mic on camera, fugeddaboutit. In any case, you DO NOT want to record ambient sound along with your dialog - ambience is recorded separately from dialog and added to the track in post where you can control it. And while we're on the subject, dialog is preferrably recorded in MONO. In situations where you do use mutliple mics, you try to put each mic isolated onto its own channel rather than mixing them.

Your wording implies you plan on putting a mic on each camera - not a good idea. Connecting a mic to each camera to record separate tracks is fine in a multi-mic setting but physically placing the mics at the camera will almost never record usable dialog. The fact that that a mic is directional won't help - there is nothing that works for sound like a telephoto lens does for picture. For good dialog recording, isolating the speaker from the ambient sound with a directional mic placed close to the talent (preferrably boomed by an operator who will follow the script from actor to actor), plant mics hidden in the set, or lav mics hidden on the talent is the way it's done.

You asked about the advantages of a mixer - one of them would be when using multiple cameras like that. You might choose to send the mic, or mics, to the mixer and then the mixer splits its output to feed both cameras at once, some can even more than that - my SD 442, for example, has enough outputs that I can easily feed the same stereo signal to 3 cameras at once and without too much trouble I could even add a fourth.