Rodney Morris
Forum Replies Created
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This news piece was shot on a Canon 5D. Audio (Sennheiser wireless) was recorded directly to camera; no other details were given. Sounds decent enough on my laptop – seems like it’s better than a “3”.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/MixerSome contents or functionalities here are not available due to your cookie preferences!This happens because the functionality/content marked as “Vimeo framework” uses cookies that you choosed to keep disabled. In order to view this content or use this functionality, please enable cookies: click here to open your cookie preferences.
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Tony,
I have not used the H4n with external microphones. I’m sure it works very well in that situation. I’m pretty sure that I’m not using the H4 for what it was primarily designed to do.Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
Yes, Ty I have tried using the -10 line level settings without any success on my H4. The H4n that I used this summer belonged to the client and I was feeding it using the D.O.’s of my 442. When I had the D.O.’s set to mic level and inputting them into the H4n on the XLR jacks (mic level), tone at -20, I got distortion on the transients. When I selected line level for the D.O.’s and inputted into the H4n on the 1/4″ input (line level), tone at -20, I got distortion on the transients. The only way I could get acceptable audio was to use mic level out on the D.O. into the 1/4″ line level inputs of the H4n. If I have this much trouble feeding audio into the Zoom units, then how much more trouble will an amateur or a non-audio professional have with it?
Again, I could be doing something wrong. Any more suggestions, I’ll gladly accept them!
Did you find that beer you were looking for?
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
Yes, I do use -20dBfs for my reference level on the H4. The distortion happens only on the transients. And yes, I am aware that the TA3 outs follow the switching for the XLR. It’s crazy that I have such a hard time inputting levels into the H4. I also had a situation this past summer when I was feeding the D.O.’s of two of the 442’s inputs into an H4n and I had a lot of trouble getting the sound to be acceptable. Finally had to set the output of the D.O.’s to mic level (menu setting on the 442) and input them into the Zoom through the 1/4″ (line) inputs. Nothing else was acceptable.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
Yes, I always mix using the hybrid metering system. I got used to that system with the Durrough loudness meters at my last job. Much more useful information that way.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
Yes, I have tried -10 as well. The only acceptable method I’ve found when inputting a feed to the H4 has been using the XLR outputs of the 442 set to mic level. Even using the TA3 outputs directly below the XLR outs set to mic level will give me small amounts of distortion on the transients. The tape/mix out (an 1/8″ jack), which is switchable between mic and line (-10) in an internal menu, also gives me distortion on the peaks, regardless of which level setting is selected. I will readily admit there is the possibility that I’m not doing something right, but it shouldn’t be as hard, or as confusing, to feed audio into the H4. That is why I think it is not very user-friendly.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
I would suggest the Marantz PMD661. I have the Zoom H4 (the original, not the newer H4n). The Zoom is a very popular recorder for folks in your situation because it seems to have a lot of features in a portable package at a decent price. But some of the features are useless for your application (I’m pretty sure you won’t need a tuner, metronome or phrase trainer, for instance). Plus I’ve found the Zoom to be not very user friendly. I am considering the Marantz unit myself to replace the Zoom recorder. I’ve never had good experience trying to input a line level signal from my Sound Devices 442 into the Zoom units without some amount of distortion. I believe the Marantz will handle my needs better. The biggest selling point for me is that the Marantz will accept line level signals on the XLR inputs. I don’t think anyone else in this price range has that feature. The PMD661 is $600 though and I know you were hoping for something cheaper. This is just my suggestion, my $0.02 worth. Hope this helps.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
In my experience, Sennheiser makes a good sounding lav mic but they seem to be more prone to breath pops than other cardioid and omni lav mics on the market. The cardioid version has a huge windscreen but still is highly susceptible to breath pops. I use one on Dick Vitale when I do live hits at his home in Florida and I have found that the breath comes out of his mouth and nose in such a way that he frequently pops the mic. Because it is a cardioid you are really limited to mic placement (vertical movements along the lapel). Even the MKE2 (which I like) is pretty prone to plosives. I’ve noticed (more so in Europe than here) that when folks use the MKE2 exposed that they often mount it upside down to keep the breath from entering the capsule (you can do this since it is an omni-directional mic). So although I like the sound of the Sennheiser mics, I don’t prefer to use them because of this issue.
My $.02 worth. Hope you find something in there helpful.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
Welcome to the forum James!
Unfortunately, $3500 isn’t enough money to get what you need to be competitive in this business, unless you want to buy used equipment. Even then, you are severely limiting what you can do.
I recently put together a list of ENG/EFP audio gear for someone here on the forums. That list cost over $11,000 and that was a somewhat basic, but high quality, setup.
https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/30/864586
Your best bet to break into TV/ENG/EFP location audio would be to find a shooter in Phoenix who has their own gear and try to get hired by that person(s) for some jobs. Most shooters have basic audio gear. It would be a good way to learn the gig, familiarize yourself with what people use (and how to use it) and give you time to save money before making any purchases.
I would not rely on the TASCAM recorder as a field mixer for ENG/EFP productions. It doesn’t include some features necessary to work on set/in the field (such as a tone generator for calibrating input levels on the camera, return audio for confidence monitoring, etc…). This recorder would work, however, on a film shoot where only two channels of audio needed to be recorded discreetly.
I’m a little scattered this evening, so this may not be as coherent as I would have liked. If you have any other questions, let me know. I have a friend who used to work in the Phoenix area as a sound mixer. He may have some leads.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer -
“Secondary audio (remote audio from a Tandberg audio codec, for example) goes into another input, and you turn the AUX knob for that channel to 0.”
Correct. You can also use subgroups to create a mix minus, just remember: don’t assign that subgroup to the main mix bus.
Rodney Morris
Freelance Sound Technician/Mixer