Which audio gear should I purchase with a 4k budget?

iijohnkeatingii

iijohnkeatingii

Member
We are a documentary film production company. We will be traveling as three people over the course of the year filming in Germany, South Korea and North America. Lots of fly on the wall coverage and plenty of interviews.

Here is what I already have.

2 wireless lavs, a Zoom, a $500 sennheiser shotgun mic and a pelican to house these items.

I need a recorder. I have been looking at the 702T. I need a boom. Not sure what else I need.

We will be shooting on the EOS c300.

Any advice would be so appreciated. I'm rather lost when it comes to sound.

Thanks,

John
 
You need to check your wireless systems (which ones, by the way?) to make sure that the frequency blocks are legal in your countries of destination.

Which Sennheiser shotgun? Price doesn't tell us much.

As for support for your shotgun mic, generally speaking:
  • Boom pole (minimum 9-foot reach; the lighter the better, so carbon fiber is advisable)
  • Zeppelin (blimp) wind protection with integrated shock mount and with fur windjammer
  • Shock isolation mount, compact version
  • Foam windscreen with compact fur cover
  • Cable assortment (2 of each): shortie (1' or thereabouts), 5', 15', 25', 50'
Do you have good headphones?

How about an audio bag and harness for run-and-gun work?

The 702T is great, but is it going to suit your needs? You have a boom and two wireless mics. That's potentially three simultaneous inputs... how will you handle that with a 2-channel recorder? You can add a 3-channel mixer on the front, like the SD302. You could also move up to the Sound Devices 633, which is a 6-channel mixer and 10-track integrated recorder. It has time code. If you need functional mixing and recording with time code, and need to trim costs, and 2-channel recording will suffice, the SD302 with TASCAM HD-P2 may be a good solution.

Are you running strictly second-system, or do you plan to send audio to the camera at any time? If you'll need/want the option of in-camera audio, you'll need an ENG snake to run from the mixer to the cam.

Plenty of batteries and memory cards.

Last and most importantly: do you have someone on the crew who will be dedicated to sound and who knows what s/he's doing with it? Without that, any of the above will be wasted investment. Further, if you do have someone skilled with sound, you should consult with that person on which kit will most likely cover all needs.
 
iijohnkeatingii said:
I need a recorder. I have been looking at the 702T. I need a boom. Not sure what else I need.
Click to expand...

What you need in all honesty is a dedicated sound person.

But assuming that you aren't going to take that advice, consider a decent mixer instead of a recorder. Say a used SD 442 or even a 302. Run a break out cable between mixer and camera, and record directly to camera. The breakout cable will return the headphone output from the camera to the mixer, where the sound person can monitor it. This avoids the cost of a recorder, and your budget is tight, so this is a good thing. It also avoids the problems of syncing sound in the field which makes reviewing your footage much less of a hassle.

If you're going to boom, you need a boom pole, a shock mount, and a hypercardiod mic for indoor recording. For exterior recording, you'll need that same boom pole with a blimp, and a furry wind cover, and some level of shotgun mic (that will fit inside the blimp and work in its shock mount).

You'll need sufficient XLR cables. A bag / harness so you can wear the mixer / wireless receivers while you boom, and headphones so you can monitor while you boom. Failure to monitor while recording is unforgivable; you know that, right? Right?

Test the whole kit out thoroughly with real-world interview work before you go. Make sure you do proper gain staging along the recording chain (and if you don't know what gain staging is, learn it now before it's too late), make sure you understand how to set and use the mixer's limiters. Make sure you can swing and aim the mics using your boom pole -- it's not intuitively obvious, and it does take (a lot of) practice to do it well. Learn how to find and use a sight line so you can keep the boom (and boom shadows) out of the picture. Make sure that you know how to set sensitivity on the lav. transmitters, and gain on the lav. receivers. Make sure your lav. units are frequency legal where you are going to use them. Make sure you know how to scan for open frequencies and how to sync. receiver and transmitter to use that open frequency. Always scan before any use.

And don't forget you have to power this stuff. Either a pallet load of AAs, rechargeables, or something that'll run the entire bag (Anton-Bauer maybe?), or some combination of batteries and A/C power.

Good sound is considerably more difficult than good picture. Just saying. Which is why everyone and his brother are going to advise you to take a dedicated sound person. And I've gone full circle.
 
I would concur with the others. Have back-up gear available, even a cheap Zoom is better than nothing. A way to charge batteries (on the type of power you will encounter) and/or plenty of replacement non-rechargeable cells For interviews, running sound directly to the camera should be sufficient (again, I concur with the camera snake return)
Expensive gear is not a substitute for skill and experience. Hire an audio pro.
 
David W. Jones said:
As much as I like dedicated pro audio recorders, is there any particular reason you are not using the C300 as a bit bucket?
Click to expand...

Since it doesn't have a digital audio in (at least not listed) you can't really use it as a "bit bucket".

Reasons not to use it as your only recorder would be no way to really monitor/control your recordings. The cameraman is looking at picture not sound levels and you don't want your sound guy touching the camera while your shooting.

From my own experience I would never do another shoot where the only audio that was getting recorded was in camera. Now if your a one man band that adds a wrinkle where minimizing equipment to keep track of starts to play a big part, but this is a three man crew so that should not be an issue.

I would probably have your boom op/ mixer doing all the recording and use a wireless hop to the camera for a guide track.
You can go wired but if you can swing it the wireless will really cut down on the cable wrangling.

I would also record 48/24 so you have more bits when it comes to cleanup.

OP you should make sure your wireless gear is legal for the places you are going. Laws vary. Different frequencies are legal and some places have different power limits, and some places require a permit. I would double check with Korea to make sure your coolsi nce you will technically be in a "war zone" and penalties might be stiff.
 
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