Ty Ford
51
Audio Coins
54
COW Coins
Forum Replies Created
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That would be a “no?”
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://home.comcast.net/~tyreeford/AudioBootcamp.html
or https://www.tyford.com -
OK,
How about one of these 4-lighters (https://www.lowel.com/caselite/caselite_b.html#info) with bounce fill and several small spots for hair and background.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://home.comcast.net/~tyreeford/AudioBootcamp.html
or https://www.tyford.com -
Hi Dan,
I’ll be working alone at first. I have a Canon XL2. My plans are uncertain but one shots and two shots are probably a good place to start.
I have a photographic background and have been watching and gripping for shooters on corporate industrial, documentary and commercial shoots.
I bought my Sachtler with the hard case just in case I need to fly with it. In my travels with other shooters, they carry the camera as carry-on. That;’s what I would do with the XL2.
I own not enough grip gear but understand its importance. This is a slippery slope, I realize. I think a softbox, key and rim light would be a good start; perhaps with a bounce fill. That’s the kind of gear the people I’m working with have now with some extra practicals, gels and dimmers.
I may not need everything at once. I’d like to stay below $1500 for the first move.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://home.comcast.net/~tyreeford/AudioBootcamp.html
or https://www.tyford.com -
Odd. I don’t see anything in the specs about audio at all, much less that the optical port handles 5.1. In all the other Macs I’ve seen, including my own, the optical ports are S/PDIF digital which is two channel only.
Can you find the link that says this iMac does 5.1 via the optical ports?
Regards,
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://www.tyford.com
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I wouldn’t use the compressor. I’d capture the loud claps and reduce their volume.
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://www.tyford.com
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Thanks Gary, and DAMN, yes the MixPre only has PEAK meters. My bad saying they have RMS/PEAK, but the important thing is to have those peaks. The tone from the MixPre, of course, is still an RMS sort of signal with no PEAKS. Technically, you could argue that the top of the tone sinewave is a PEAK. Yes, sigh, it is, but the RMS to PEAK RATIO is 1:1.
I’d rather be dragged through fire naked than get people lost by over discussing this, but RMS to PEAK ratio is simply the difference in height between the RMS level and the PEAK level. An example of a BIG RMS to PEAK ratio would be clapping your hands in front of the mic while you had a noisy HVAC running in the background. The handclaps would show the PEAKS while the more continuous HVAC would have more of a constant (RMS) level.
OK. Enough. I HATE the audio metering on a lot of the MiniDV and HDV cameras. My XL2 has dots on the eyepiece screen. I have no idea what they mean. However, of the side metering (on the body) there is actually a meter that does have a -20 blip. Hooray!
If you have a good mixer that has an output limiter, here’s another way to set your camera input levels. Set tone from the mixer for what you think is -20. Talk into the mic very closely at a level louder than you expect to record while you observe the camera and mixer levels. See where the PEAKS hit on the mixer and camera meters. With the limiter engaged, adjust the camera levels upward to about 3 to 6 dB below 0 VU (for digital camcorders). This tests the limits of the mixer limiter for everything but very sharp, quick sounds.
As you shoot, adjust the inputs to peak the audio at or just below the limiter thresholds. Occasionally the level will go over and you will engage the limiter, that’s OK.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://www.tyford.com
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Thanks Peter,
All Sound Devices mixer meters are SWITCHABLE to read VU (average/RMS) and Peak at the same time. This is a WONDERFUL feature. You see the RMS as a more continuous line of lit LEDs, some unlit LEDs and then lit Peak LEDs. I ALWAYS set my Sound Devices 442 meters to read RMS AND PEAK simultaneously.
I forgot to do that once and set tone at -20 dB, while viewing RMS only. Setting tone that way was no problem. When we started to shoot, I was feaking out because the levels were WAY LOW. Then I realized didn’t see any space between the RMS and PEAKs, so I wasn’t in RMS AND PEAK metering mode, I was just in RMS mode. I switched to RMS AND PEAK and BANG! There were my PEAK levels….actually a bit higher than I usually run them because I had cranked everything up a bit because the levels looked so low. Fortunately, the limiter was containing all of the PEAKS and the audio was fine, just a slightly thicker than usual.
FTR, Calibration tone has no peaks like the human voice or other sounds. It’s a continuous sine wave. As discussed in my book, when you set it to -20 (on a digital camcorder) you have from 0 dB all the way to +20 dB for safe audio. The nice thing about the Sound Devices mixers is that they have very good limiters. I set my limiter threshold at +16 dB. Any audio that exceeds +16 dB is caught by the limiter. The difference between +16 dB and + 20 dB is 4 dB, that’s a little extra headroom; my safe margin. I need that because sounds like hand claps or a three-ring binder clacking opening have very quick, loud sounds called transients. They will go through the limiter so quickly that they can’t be caught. That extra 4 dB (between +16 and + 20) is where these peaks end up, and they are still safe.
BTW, the more you look at the combined RMS and PEAK metering, the more you find that the relationship between RMS and PEAK of people’s voices are all over the road. Sometimes the difference between RMS and PEAK is pretty small, other times it’s quite large.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://www.tyford.com
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To clarify the importance of reference tone.
It’s there so the person operating the mixer knows how loud the peaks can be.
As I explain in my little book.
The Sound Devices 442 mixer has a default tone level of 0 dB. When you send that from the mixer to the camera, with a digital camera, you set the record level at the camera to – 20 dB.
For analog cameras, you set the tone level lower, depending on the camera, usually around -15 dB.
Now your mixer meters are calibrated to the camera meters.
BIG WATCH OUT!!!!!…..MAKE SURE THE OUTPUT OF THE MIXER (LINE OR MIC) IS ALSO SET TEH SAME WAY ON THE CAMERA. MOST CAMERAS WILL LET YOU SEND LINE LEVEL FROM THE MIXER TO THEIR INPUTS, EVEN WHEN THEY ARE SET TO MIC AND NOT LINE!!!!!!!
You’ll want your mixer meters to indicate peak reading. It’s the peaks that kill. NOW, ANOTHER MESAGE FROM MY BOOK —- WHEN DO YOU LISTEN? ALWAYS.
From the number of posts from people with audio problems, I know that NOt listening during shooting is a major contributor to screwed up audio.
“Well, it sounded ok before we started to record……..:)”, is not an appropriate excuse. 🙁
you can send line level to a mic level input and hear audio, but when the action really starts and the mic is put in the rigbht spot…..SPLAT….now you’re distoring.
And by listening, I mean listening to the input of the camera, not just the output of the mixer.
Audio-camera interconnect cables have two balanced cables for audio and an unbalanced stereo return that plugs into the camera’s headphone output on one end and plugs into the mixer return jack on the other end. There’s a switch on the mixer that lets you toggle between hearing the mixer output and the return from the camera. You won’t know what things sound like unlke unless you listen to the camera return.
Even then, if something’s wrong with teh record head, you can still end up with crappy audio.
Regards,
Ty Ford
BTW, using tone in a digital camera is almost useless. You want the tone from the mixer so you can calibrate the two devices so you don’t have to look at the camera audio levels while recording…although that is not a bad idea.
I find that sometimes there is a discrepancy between camera and mixer peak levels even after calibration. Keeping an eye AND AN EAR is very, very important.
Regards,
Ty
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://www.tyford.com
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[topher944] “Any good/free apps that will auto balance audio levels. I’m really tired of guys delivering tapes supposed to be masters with audio levels all over the place – all within the same scene/ and some the same shot even! Thanks in advance for your knowledge. Kind Regards, Chris K.”
Hi,
None that I know of that don’t drastically change the dynamics of the content.
These are mixed masters rather than source tapes?
Ty Ford
Ty Ford’s “Audio Bootcamp Field Guide” was written for video people who want better audio. Find out more at https://www.tyford.com
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Thanks David,
Boy, the sun really came out for me with this solution.
I feel much more confidant about shooting and editing in general now.
Regards,
Ty