Mic directly into camera?

[Soliton]

Hey guys,

Video newbie here. I'm shooting a 3 min short for a friend. For the sound, at first I was thinking of recording the audio separately (powerbook or DAT or something) and dealing with timecode and sync etc. But for convienence, I changed my mind to renting a camera with an XLR input and just using an existing mic on a boom and recording it all into the camera at once.

Do you think the sound would be alright if I had a 414 (tight cardoid) or a 421 or something going right in the camera? Or maybe even a couple of mics into a mixer and then summed into the camera?

Either using a Canon XL 2 or a Panasonic AG DVX 100


Any thoughts?


Thanks!

[pat yacono]

I would suggest a schoeps MK41 for close cueing interior shoots, 416 for outdoors. Sanken short shotgun mikes are great for over three feet cueing, like the css-3.

[JKD99]

Hi there
It's more convenient to record to the camera, but I guarantee (from experience) that the sound will suffer, regardless of what the camera's audio specs are. IMHO, the camera's A/D convertors just aren't up to snuff. So, if at all possible, record to DAT, run a feed to the camera as a guide only, and mic with a shotgun such as a Sennheiser 416 or Neumann KMR 81.

Good luck, and have fun on the shoot!

[minister]

those camera's don't have digital ins do they?

becasue really good pre's and really good converters make a diffrence. sound devices makes great ones. deneke makes good ones i am told.

could use the apogee mini me.

or, heck, rent something with TC record. call your local rental house. or call your local production audio mixer for tips and gear rental. prod mixers here rent stuff to each other all the time.

[pat yacono]

Yeah, the sound devices stuff is supposed to be great. My friend swears by them. You can save a lot of takes because of the pre and post preamp limiters are supposed to be wonderful and almost unclippable. I just did a shoot straight to the DVX100 through a 3 channel shure mixer because of budget, and the dialog sounded fine.

[minister]

well, we have the 422's & the 722... VERY happy with them. EXCELLENT devices.

but, hey, whatever works. the SURE is fine, and i certainly have mixed many things that were recorded through those.

there are some cheaper options.

[pat yacono]

Yeah, I have heard alot of stuff recorded through sound devices gear, and it always is a step above everything else, that's for sure. Minister, do you use your setup for SFX gathering? What kind of microphones do you have in your arsenal? I have tried to rent the 422/722 here, but nobody has it (Chicago).

[minister]

Yeah, I have heard alot of stuff recorded through sound devices gear, and it always is a step above everything else, that's for sure. Minister, do you use your setup for SFX gathering? What kind of microphones do you have in your arsenal? I have tried to rent the 422/722 here, but nobody has it (Chicago).

hey pat,

yes, that os almost exclusively what we use it for. i am not interested in the production mixing side of things. so we don't have the TC functions on anything field recording.

• we have an old SD 422-->DAT *gasp*! (we have rented the 422 out for vdeo shoots)
• an SD 722 and a schoeps capsule collection that allows us MS as well as a 3rd for ORTF or XY (2 cardioids and a figure 8), with zep and sock.
• and a Fostex FR2 with a Sanken CSS-5 with zep and sock.
• in the old days, i took out my neuman 184's with softies on them. but not my favortite setup.

all work well. all have their strengths. the FR2 and Sanken is less money, and works great for FX collection. no reason not to look at that.

Sound Devices just came out with a 702 that is flash card record only, no hard drive. but cheaper than the 722.

i am working on a film now that used the neuman shotgun and a wendt mixer. pretty good.

Deneke also makes inexpensive and under-rated pre's. you might want to check those out too.

[EGS]

Two thumbs up for the Sound Devices 722. Pricey, but all good. It's a word clock generator, too.
http://www.sounddevices.com/download/guides/722_en.pdf

[Ken P]

Hi there
It's more convenient to record to the camera, but I guarantee (from experience) that the sound will suffer, regardless of what the camera's audio specs are. IMHO, the camera's A/D convertors just aren't up to snuff. So, if at all possible, record to DAT, run a feed to the camera as a guide only, and mic with a shotgun such as a Sennheiser 416 or Neumann KMR 81.

Good luck, and have fun on the shoot!

i too have been exploring options along this path. i do some freelance post work for a guy who directs low budget indies and i am trying to help him get better audio from the start. originally i was thinking of a good field mic/mixer package feeding cameras directly. that's how the setup is at my day job - they capture audio with lav's and shotguns in the field thru a cooper mixer that feeds digibeta cameras. i was thinking the same setup would work for these indy film freelance projects, but completely spaced on the bad digital converters on these dv cameras that are so popular with the indy shooters. so then my next thought was what you quoted above, i.e. recordeing to a sound devices 2 track or somethin similar and pass thru to the camera as a guide track, timecode locked if that is ever an option. my only question there now is once the raw footage tapes are passed on to the picture editor, at exactly what point (and how) does the new "good" audio get married up with the picture? this has always been a mystery to me since the bulk of what i do is broadcast mxing from/to digibetas.