Sound mixer and Mic

P

pob

Member
Hi,

I'm new here, but i've been reading through the forum for approx 5months. Hopefully you can offer some advice to my problem.

I need equipment, and I'm on a budget. I know its been asked before, but hopefully i'm a little different.

I will be recording small films (60 seconds) and a number of low budget trailers. +occasional use for when i progress up to making short films.

I have a budget of 140 bucks for a mic for mainly voice over/narrative work. I was thinking about the shure sm58??
(((Plus in a couple of months I'm buying a ntg2 kit, with boom pole/muffler, but that is neither here or there at the moment)

And about approx 300 for a sound mixer. I have lights and i have access to a z1. Again, I was thinking about a shure mixer?

Thanks.
 
Are you sure you really need a mixer in your situation? $300 will barely buy you a good mic preamp, and given that you've got the z1, a mixer isn't strictly required unless you need to deal with more than 2 sources.

Eliminating a mixer for now would give you a little more cash for a VO mic with necessities like shockmount, cables, and the often forgotten headphones.

The SM58 is a solid mic, I have a box full of them for live use, but I don't think they sound all that great for voice over.

The choice you have to make is whether you're recording your VO on the computer or on camera. If you're going to the computer, there are some pretty good USB mics out there; the Rode Podcaster comes to mind, as do offerings from Audio Technica and a number of other companies. There are also XLR/USB adapters, including Shure's X2U that let you use any XLR mic with the computer.

That brings us to some XLR options, be it in camera recording, or interfaced with the PC. Your options here are basically limited only by your budget. I'd look more at dynamics like Shure's SM7b, or Heil's PR40 or PR30.

I'm sure others will chime in with a bunch of other good options for you to look at.
 
Sort of what has been said. You have to define what you want out of the gear better. You say shooting trailers, but actual trailers are made out the shots from the film, so I'm guessing that this is more that you are going to shoot short films in the style of trailers. Agree with above 58 would work pretty well for the VO but is next to useless in production, and I'm being very optimistic. If you hop over to the other current sound on tiny budget thread you'll find a link to some CAD mics that are a bit untested, though a few of us have some coming, that should be decent and are going for $50 a pair. These would probably not work well for trailer VO but they should get by for production. Mixer? For what? For production work, battery powered or AC powered for post/ studio work? Big difference. You can get a mixer with decent preamps (AC powered) for $300 ish. If you need batt. powered, well I think your out of luck in the decent/ new category. Also it sounds like your going to have 1-2 mics, that is more of a mic pre than a mixer. A MixPre from sound devices is around $650 and that is about as cheap as quality gets. Behringer makes a battery powered little mixer but you might well get better quality out of the camcorder. If this is to get it into your computer then I would get an interface instead, or a mic->USB adapter (though be warned that most of the inline mic-> USB adapters work only at 44.1 and you will have to convert it to 48 (probably)). You can get a decent interface for $300. You can even get the cheapest Protools (software and interface) for around $300 (that would be line out only but I would trade you a MBox2 regular for the micro and you would have four in's and outs).
 
Thanks for the info.

Its mainly 60 second short films i'm going to make. They are all driven by sound/voice overs. I'm doing these shorts as a way for me to develop my skills and learn from mistakes.
Example:- I'm also going to be doing a puppet show. & a radio show. Amongst many others.

The reason i wanted an (AC powered) mixer.
I've been on shoots where a mixer hasn't been used, whether down to the experience of the sound operator or budget, the sound has always been poor.
I know that its probably a bit over kill for VO but i need to brush up on my skills plus I'm not overly confident on using computers for recording sound via usb microphones.

i will look into the other 'budget' thread. thanks.
 
pob said:
....The reason i wanted an (AC powered) mixer.
I've been on shoots where a mixer hasn't been used, whether down to the experience of the sound operator or budget, the sound has always been poor.
I know that its probably a bit over kill for VO but i need to brush up on my skills plus I'm not overly confident on using computers for recording sound via usb microphones.

i will look into the other 'budget' thread. thanks.
Click to expand...

If you're looking for a mains powered mixer take a look at the Mackie 402 and 802.

The reason the low budget films you refer to have some bad sound is not because of the lack of a mixer, it's usually because the filmaker focusses all his attention on camera and tries to get by with "set-and-forget" sound setups instead of doing it right ... cheating on mic placement and using a shotgun on-camera, not selecting mics of the correct type (lav?, wired or wireless?, boom?, handheld?) with the correct coverage pattern for the shot, not getting the mics close enough to the talent (that's as close as humanly possible without intruding into the frame) and not aiming it properly. You see it over and over in the forum here, filmmakers trying to make do as a one-man band, micing from the camera position, trying to use one stationary mic to cover a group of actors, not monitoring on headphones, etc And then they're surprised when the result sounds like amateur hour recorded in the bottom of a well. The harsh reality is that getting good, transparent, clear, sound - the sound you associate with theatrical features and network broadcast - requires as much attention to detail, dedicated personal focus, and full-time commitment on the set as does the cinematography.
 
pob said:
Thanks for the info.

Its mainly 60 second short films i'm going to make. They are all driven by sound/voice overs. I'm doing these shorts as a way for me to develop my skills and learn from mistakes.
Example:- I'm also going to be doing a puppet show. & a radio show. Amongst many others.

The reason i wanted an (AC powered) mixer.
I've been on shoots where a mixer hasn't been used, whether down to the experience of the sound operator or budget, the sound has always been poor.
I know that its probably a bit over kill for VO but i need to brush up on my skills plus I'm not overly confident on using computers for recording sound via usb microphones.

i will look into the other 'budget' thread. thanks.
Click to expand...

Mackie's have good clean preamps. At that price point though I would look into an Alesis mixer with either FireWire (if your on a Mac, or USB if your on Windows (Firewire is a better route but a lot of PC's don't have a fierwire port)). THis will also function as an analog mixer so you get both for about the same price.

A mixer is not at all over the top for VO work. USB mics are often limited to 44.1/16 and the digital video standard is 48/16 so you would probably have to convert.

You should also look at the post production thread since trailers are all about the post.
 
The Alesis USB 2.0 units can do up to 96kHz/24bit. The older USB 1.1 units appear to be limited to 44.1/16. Still, if at all possible, go firewire. Phonic also makes inexpensive USB and Firewire equiped mixers, the couple I just checked will go up to 192k. I've played very briefly with a couple phonic boards in live settings and they sounded fine, but I can't speak on their quality as interfaces.

Mackie's Onyx units with the firewire addon are great, but out of your price range.
 
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