Curtis Judd 7/11/14 Curtis Judd 7/11/14

RODE smartLav+ Quick Review

RODE released their smartLav, a lavalier microphone that records into your smart phone, back in 2013. This is an incredibly convenient microphone that makes it simple to get decent quality audio for your videos. The build quality is great. But...the mic was noisy and produced a lot of hiss. Sort of spoiled things. However, RODE has released an update to this mic: The smartLav+ that costs about $20 USD more but is worth every penny in my opinion, if you need the convenience of a mic that records into your smart phone.

http://youtu.be/3ylyArmnar0

Curtis Judd 7/4/14 Curtis Judd 7/4/14

Better Indoor Dialogue Audio: Review of the Audio Technica AT4053b

My workhorse microphone for recording dialogue indoors has been the RODE NTG-2. But audio engineers will tell you that a shotgun mic is not the best tool for taming echo indoors when recording dialogue. Instead, small diaphragm hyper cardioid condenser mics are the tool of choice. The broadcast standard is the Schoepps CMC641 which is priced at nearly $2000 USD. So that was out of my budget and probably out of most enthusiast budgets as well. One less expensive option is the Audio Technica AT4053b and in this episode we have a closer look at what this mic can do for you when shooting dialogue indoors.

http://youtu.be/lJ3CLIkENyA

Curtis Judd 6/25/14 Curtis Judd 6/25/14

RODE smartLav+: Review Coming

Just heard last week that RODE updated their smartLav with a new version. For those that aren't familiar with it, this is a lavalier microphone designed to plug in to your smart phone and your phone acts as the audio recorder. Very convenient. The original smartLav was decent once I figured out that in the RODERec app I needed to turn off the setting for "iOS Processing". It isn't the cleanest mic but the build quality was good and the convenience of recording to my phone made it worth the $60 USD.

But over time, I haven't found myself pulling it out of the mic closet for use because it was just too noisy and I have a lot of better options like the Giant Squid or HMNSound lav mics which can also record to smart phones if you have an adapter like the MyMyk.

So the new mic should arrive tomorrow and over the next few weeks I'll be putting it through its paces, along with continued testing of the Audio Technica AT4053b and, of course, the Panasonic GH4. More to come...

Curtis Judd 6/11/14 Curtis Judd 6/11/14

Shotgun vs Hypercardioid Microphone for Dialogue Indoors: Quick Comparison

Recording indoor dialogue for your film or video projects can be tricky, especially when you're working in a room with a lot of echo or other acoustical issues. Most of us enthusiast, low-budget film-makers learn early on that a shotgun mic is the tool for the job, but many more experienced sound engineers suggest that a hyper-cardioid mic is better in rooms with lots of echo because they reject echo more effectively than a shotgun. In theory, shotgun mics do not reject low-frequency sound from the sides very effectively whereas a hyper-cardioid mic does.

In this short episode, we quickly compare the RODE NTG-2 and the Audio Technica AT4053b in a very echo-y room to see how they sound.

The difference is not night and day from what I can hear. The NTG-2 has more low-end and some may prefer that sound. However, most of that additional low-end response seems to be proximity effect--the radio voice sound you get when your talent is very close to the mic. The Audio Technica seems to handle the echo just slightly better and has less proximity effect.

We'll do a full review of the Audio Technica in an upcoming espisode.

Here is my previous review of the RODE NTG-2 shotgun mic: