Which microphone to use for sit down interviews?

[Jeff Mcbride]

What’s my best option without a boom operator? Should I just lav for now? I don’t have to have perfect sound right now (and probably won’t because of my extremely low budget).

[Jonathan Levin]

I am one of those people for now that does the Boom mic and a Lav approach. And here is my reasoning why. Ty and others please feel free to enlighten me about my thinking:

First, Ty is correct, a boomed mic will and does sound a ton better than my Audio technica 899 lav.

I like the idea that I can “mix” in post the Lav and in my case a Rode NT3 Cardioid mic. I can balance the (to my ears) thinness of the lav with the ballsiness of the NT3. I realize I can adjust this using HP filters and all that, but I like trying to do things mechanically first. And although I realize the 899 is Omnidirectional, I like being able to add a little room/ambience in post with the NT3. So in post my mix may look like the Lav is coming in at 0-3dB and I may have the NT3 at -20 to -25dB

During production, I record each mic to it’s own channel and pan one the Lav hard left, and the NT3 hard right. I also am doing a double system, recording a “scratch track to camera.

So what i think I end up with is three very useable redundancies: Left channel recorded on a Sound devices 633, Right channel on 633 and if in a real pinch and the 633 wigs out, I have the scratch track.

Of coarse proper gain staging hygiene is most important. I record Poly Wav 24bit 96k.

The one thing that you all probably noticed, is if I want three Usable tracks, why set level of NT3 to -20 to -25 and the answer is that I hope that my first choice, having the left and right ISO channels works just fine for my project. the L/R mix is also an option, but I find I am always tweaking something.

Jonathan

[Brian Reynolds]

Jonathan, Rode NT3 as a boom mic, isn’t that a bit heavy?
How do you deal with the constant acoustic flanging between the 2 different mics as the talent moves slightly?
Also recording at 96k, are you keeping the same sample rate throughout your workflow or are you changing several times during your edit session which could often lead to problems?

[Jonathan Levin]

Hey Brian.

Yeah the NT3 is like mounting an axle from a Chevy to a C stand. Lifting it makes for a good work out. Great mic though.

As far as the other issue, The interview was a sit down. Did the 3-1 method of miking.

Jonathan