Ty Ford
51
Audio Coins
54
COW Coins
Forum Replies Created
-
Jeff,
A lot of the stuff people post these days is not thought out properly, not expressed properly or misunderstood.
I think the “boom & lav” approach was primarily developed to cover one’s butt, in case one or the other of the mics failed. The problem with that is that the two sounds seldom match because the boom mic is directional, the lav 97.8% of the time is omni. The other 2.2% of the time with a cardioid lav, the mic will definitely be visible because you have to point it at the face.
87% to 93% of the time, the boom mic will sound better. There are a few occasions when the omni lav wins over a good boom mic due to the position of the ambient noise and the position of the person wearing the lav. If, for example, the noise is behind the person wearing the lav, the person’s body may block more of the noise from getting to the lav than the directional boom mic can reject. When that happens, it’s not a “sound problem” it’s a “location problem.”
If for some reason the boom mic malfunctions and no one hears it, which should never happen, that leaves the lav, Provided you didn’t try to bury it too deeply resulting in a lot of clothing noise, you can “save the take” by using the lav track. Attempts at using one or two words to plug a bad spot in the other track are seldom satisfying because the sounds simply don’t match.
And, if we’re talking indoor sit down interview, the boom mic should not be a shotgun mic, it should be a hyper or super cardioid because unless the sit down is done in a very acoustically controlled space, the shotgun will pickup unwanted low and mid frequencies from the floor, walls, ceiling, windows, table tops, counter tops and any other hard reflective surfaces near by much more readily.
Even if the sit down is outside, a hyper or super may still give better sound than a shotgun. General, omnipresent traffic or people walla will invade the shotgun at lower and mid frequencies. In addition, if there are reflective surfaces, e. g. pavement, hard walls, windows or any nearby hard flat surfaces, the shotgun will have the same problem with them.
The case for “dirtying up the boom” with lav sound does come into play in several situations. In narrative work, when the scene is boomed and laved, depending on which actor is picked up by which mic, adding lav track to compromise the cleanth of the boom may help that particular voice sound like it’s more in the same space with the other voices.
While you can “dirty up the boom” for a solo interview, it’s probably much better to apply EQ to the boom. The problem there is that you need to know HOW and WHERE to add or subtract with EQ. Many video editors may not understand EQ or have a video editing system that allows EQ to be easily done. As a result they add lav track to the boom track.
The problem with that is that the two are never time aligned. If you zoom in far enough, you’ll see the boom track is a little behind the lav track. This is because the boom is farther away from the talent than the lav. The speed of sound is about one millisecond per foot. That usually results in the boom mic being one to three milliseconds behind the lav. SImply adding lav to boom results in comb filtering which is heard as cancelation of high frequencies, so the voice becomes less distinct, less intelligible.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Jeff,
a lot depends on the gain staging, mic sensitivity and A/D conversion quality of the various parts, but your job is to find out and report back! 🙂
30%/70% what?
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Auio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Hi Jeff and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
I agree with Brian, but based on the background noise level, a shotgun mic in that environment at 36″ (arm’s length) would still be unusable.
You need to be a lot closer with a boom, and not a shotgun indoors like that. For that, you’d want a super or hypercardioid. Here’s a tutorial you may find helpful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaUSXP-a3hA
What sort of input does your Samsung Galaxy S3 have?
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum leaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s BlogSome contents or functionalities here are not available due to your cookie preferences!This happens because the functionality/content marked as “Google Youtube” 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.
-
Joe,
Yes the antennae may be straight, but are they still soldered to the circuit board inside the transmitter and receiver?
Is there anything else on your camera rig when this happens?
Like an external monitor or monitor/recorder?
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum leaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Hello Joe and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
Sorry for your pain.
Sounds like an RF problem. What shape are your transmitting and receiving antennae? Are their connections to the transmitter and receivers solid? If one or the other of them has pulled off the circuit board inside, it could do this.
Can you operate them without this problem in other locations with the same sort of conditions. In pocket, etc.?
Were both wireless mics doing this?
Where were the receivers?
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Hello Erin and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
The LIttle Fork VO sounds a LOT better because I don’t hear the room. Plug in a good set of headphones and you will plainly hear the difference. I spec Sony MDR7506 or Audio-Technica ATH-M50 for this kind of work. If the headphones you have are not telling you the truth, you will make mistakes every time.
If you did use the same mic for both, then.
1. Your choice of environment could have been better for the first one. An environment without so many hard, flat surfaces to reflect the sound would have been better R. Also, you have plenty of room over the top of the head. You could tighten that a bit and that would allow you to get the mic closer, therefore hearing less room. Remember to keep the lens as high as the face. That lets you position the mic really close to the top of the head without being seen. Positioning the lens below the face (shooting upwards) means you have to have the mic farther away to not be seen,
I do hear a zero crossover error at :50 seconds in between words where I’m guessing you made an edit without a proper crossfade. That’s why there’s a click there.
Instead of a shotgun mic, try a super cardioid or hypercardioid. At your budgetary level, I’d suggest an Audio Technica 5053B or Audix SCX-1 HC. Here’s a video that explains the reasons for using different mics for diferent shots, and YES, you can use a hyper or super outside.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaUSXP-a3hA
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s BlogSome contents or functionalities here are not available due to your cookie preferences!This happens because the functionality/content marked as “Google Youtube” 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.
-
Perhaps not in this case but
1. Recorded for legal posterity?
2. So people attending with bad hearing can hear them?Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Thanks,
and if they ask, “how’d I do?” afterwards… If little or no improvement…..say, “better”……..with a little lift that lets them know there’s room for improvement.
If they really did improve, tell em even if they don’t ask. “Hey you were really right on it and it sounded great!”
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Jo,
Nice post!
Dan, one of the things I try to use in these situations is…
“People make judgements about you by how good you sound. You can sound really good if you are always around six inches from your mic. If you don’t really care how good you sound, that’s OK, but I just thought you’d like to know a little secret.”
Maybe that’ll stick with them, maybe not.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog -
Hey Dan,
A couple of automixers (shure and Audio-technica sell them) will also work in your situation.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum LeaderWant better production audio?: Ty Ford’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford’s Blog