Speakers to monitor audio from AJA Lhe

[Ron Thompson]

I’m a big fan of Alesis monitors. I have an amp/monitor combo, but their M1 MK2 Active monitors are great and will run you around $350 US for the pair. They have the XLR connection you need to.

Personally, I like to have control over routing, so I route all of my audio into a Mackie mixer. You’ll also have better control room volume control.

Ron

[Hd Freak]

Thanks for that Ron. I’ll check out those speakers.
By the way I’ve asked this on other threads but got no answer yet. Do you know how to capture audio direct from the Camera into FCP via the Lhe?

HD F.

[Bob Zelin]

you plug the audio out of your camera into the Audio in of the LHe. I urge you to purchase a mixer, to allow you to control and balance the level coming out of your camera, to match the LHe.

Bob Zelin

[Ron Thompson]

To follow up on your question and Bob’s mixer advice:
Buying a mixer like the Mackie 1402 or 1202 will allow you to plug any and everything into your LHe and monitor levels.

For something like camera audio, I maintain a permanent connection from my Mackie to the LH via Aux out, and use either XLR or 1/4″ connections for input… now you have gain controls, EQ, pots, and Aux levels into the LH–not to mention the ability to solo the LH output.

Overkill?? maybe, but at least you know and can hear what you’re recording.

By the way, I own two Alesis RA150’s/M1 MKII combos.

Good Luck

[Bob Zelin]

To follow up Ron’s excellent advice, if you think that getting a Mackie is overkill, buy a Behringer – you can get one of these mixers for about $100, which, if nothing else, will allow you to control your audio levels (and lots more, if you choose to do so). If $100 is too much money, you can probably find one used on eBay.

If you feel that “you don’t want to own too much equipment” – then you have entered the wrong business.

Bob Zelin

[Hd Freak]

Thanks Bob and Ron,
No $100 is no problem for a mixer so I’ll probably get that.
Just one detail about the audio capture again. I only have the breakout cable which does not have composite inputs (the breakout box does) so are you saying there is no way I can capture the audio directly without a mixer? The only audio out on the camera (Sony Z1) is the composite cables?

HD F.

[Bob Zelin]

Hello Mr. Freak –
you will soon learn that modern products come with .pdf manuals, and on a day like today (Sunday), instead of having fun – you must READ THESE MANUALS PAGE BY PAGE.

When you do this, you will learn that the Kona LHe has analog component inputs, however you can use the Y input as the Composite Video input, if you choose the correct EASY SETPUP from the FCP menus. I urge you to READ THE MANUAL, and learn how to use the AJA Kona Control Panel, so you can practice getting audio and video (composite video) thru your AJA Kona LHe, even before you run FCP (so you can make sure that it is working). Your camera has RCA audio outputs on it, and you will (for today) need to get cables that take the RCA outputs from your camera, and get them into the XLR inputs of your Kona LHe.

When you finally get your mixer, you will find that you need ADDITIONAL cables. The level coming out of the camera’s RCA outputs is very low (-10dBu) and it will need to get boosted up (via the mixer) to a +4dBu level for the XLR inputs of the Kona LHe. You will need RCA to 1/4″ phone plug for the camera to Mixer, and 1/4″ phone plug to XLR for the Mixer out to the Kona LHe input. You will also need cables that come out of the Kona LHe to go back into the mixer (XLR to 1/4″ phone plug), and more cables to go from the mixer CR Mon Out to the Speakers XLR inputs (also 1/4″ phone plug to XLR).

You will soon learn that cables cost a lot of money – more than anyone expects them too. May I suggest that you search for assorted musical supply houses on the web, like Musicians Friend, to get your cables, as these are as cheap as you are going to find.

You will also soon ask “when do I get to stop spending all of this money?” .

This is the answer – NEVER.

bob Zelin

[Ron Thompson]

What Bob said…. 🙂

Seriously….probably a little more costly than you expected, but well worth doing it right.
With monitors, mixer and cables, I would say $700 is a pretty good investment. (meaning, you shouldn’t spend more than that to get it all hooked up).
markertek.com is a good resource for cables and adapters (RCA to 1/4″ will come in handy!).

[HD Freak] “so are you saying there is no way I can capture the audio directly without a mixer? The only audio out on the camera (Sony Z1) is the composite cables?”

I assume you mean RCA? Yes, all the more reason to add a mixer in the mix. An RCA to 1/4″ cable or adapter would make this a simple hookup….XLR (aux or main output) would take the signal into the LHe.

Ron

[Hd Freak]

Thanks again Bob.
Everybody seems to think I want to do everything on the cheap and hate spending any money on cables or whatever. I never said anything about that ever and don’t know where that came from. Maybe it was Ron saying I might think his solution was “overkill” but I never said anything like that. I am getting my edit suite together slowly but surely and am just installing the AJA setup. I have a list of stuff I have to get which now includes a mixer and cables.
I don’t think the manual is very clear about the setup. I have now finally understood that I need to get new cables to link up to the camera but AJA could say things like that. Just as they didn’t say about having to get adapters for the BNC to RCA component cables. When you open the box you think you can plug in your board but you have to get on to the internet and find these adapters. They only cost about $6 it would have been nice if they had included them with the board.
Anyway thanks for everything

[Ron Thompson]

I definitely didn’t mean to imply that you didn’t have money…sorry that you took it that way.
I’m always careful on these forums NOT to spend other people’s money, because everyone is working with different budgets. But now that you went from spending $350 to now $750 (plus or minus $100)…I just wanted to be honest that this is probably more than you expected from your original post.

By “overkill”…. I was referring to my Mackie setup. Most people on this forum use mixers as a way to monitor sources… I use it more as a router or patch bay. I definitely take advantage of its capabilities in my workflow.

No worries….any more questions, let us know.

Like Bob said….unfortunately, you will never stop spending money in this business.

Ron