Good shotgun mic for Zoom h4n?

ajedproduction

ajedproduction

What is a good budget shotgun mic for the Zoom h4n? Something around the price range of the Rode Ntg1 and 2. I hear those two are great mics but do not work too well with the H4n because of the weak phantom power or something along those lines. Or am I wrong about that?

What is a good alternative option? I assume I'd have to pay a little more of course.

I need an option that I could look into buying(cheapest as possible) and also a more expensive one that I could just rent for specific shoots.

Thanks! :)
 
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You're partially right/wrong. The NTG-1 works just fine, it's the NTG-2 that has issues. It's the same with the Audio Technica AT875 and the AT897; the AT875 works just fine, it's the AT897 that has issues.

Both the NTG-2 and AT897 use an internal phantom power scheme which uses a battery. For some reason they (and most similar mics) have lower output levels whether they use internal or external phantom power. The NTG-1 and AT875 don't have that problem; they get their phantom power from an external source only. You should be aware that when the H4n, Tascam DR-100, DR-40 and other low budget recorders supply phantom power to mics their batteries drain very quickly, so you'll have to lay in a good supply of fresh batteries when you shoot.

Don't forget that you'll need a boom-pole, shock-mount, wind protection and a quality XLR cable.

The H4n has noisy mic preamps, the DR-100 and DR-40 a little less so. The recorder/mic issue is that with the weaker output levels of the NTG-2 and AT897 you will have to increase the gain of the mic pre, thereby introducing more noise to the sound from those substandard mic pres.
 
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A friend of mine recently bought the Zoom H5 and the NTG-3 mic. We did some tests against my NTG-2 and a couple of other mics. Not only did the NTG-3 sound very slightly cleaner and richer compared to the -2 (to my untutored ears), the gain was better - with a fixed setup, we used record level 6 with the -3 compared to 8 for the -2.

I've used the NTG-2 with a Zoom H4N, but needed an inline preamp to boost the signal and had to use a battery in the mic. Alas, we didn't test the NTG-3 with the H4N, but I think it would be a better choice than the -2.
 
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