Thinking about buying the Black Magic Camera, with Nikon Lens, but I know little about sound. I've read all about hyper-cardiod mics for my mostly indoor project, but which one, don't have big money, not over 6oo for mic and nec. ass. Looked at the blue one, the russian one and the audix one. What issues will I have with this camera, what do you know? Thanks.
Mic the New Black Magic
- Thread starter Vows
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For a decent micro-budget hyper look at the Avantone CK-1, around $150.
What audio recorder do you have?
What audio recorder do you have?
Because the audio implementation of almost all DSLRs is seriously substandard, not to mention the fact that all DSLRs record only compressed audio formats. Many do not even allow you to turn off the AGC.
For $275 you can get the Tascam DR-100mkII:
-Nowhere near as noisy (hiss) as a DSLR
-Low impedance (so you can have long mic cable runs if you need to)
-You can use most any low impedance mic without an adapter
-You will be able to record two (2) discrete channels (most DSLR mixers use one channel for tone to defeat the AGC)
-24 bit rate for more headroom
-Up to 96kHz sample rate
-You have more control over the audio limiter
-Real time audio monitoring (which you cannot do with a DSLR no matter what mixer you connect to the DSLR)
-You are not tethered to the camera.
-You can still use it when you change cameras
-It a handy field recorder for capturing sound effects
Okay, the downside:
You will need a battery pack (BP-6AA; $25 each - get two). Supplying phantom power drains the batteries very quickly.
You will have to sync the audio to the picture in post, but they've been doing that with film for over 80 years - and you have an audio guide track from the camera to make it VERY easy; they STILL don't have that with film. Just remember to visually and verbally slate. You should also keep detailed audio and video logs; but you should be doing that anyway!
Wow, powerful info. I purchased the Octava with a hypercardiod, because 95percent of my film is conversation on a single set. I was going just to hang it over their heads and go back and forth. Being a professional photographer for 32 years, I only was concerned with the look of the film. Also, since the dialogue takes place in a large crowd, I was just going to insert crowd roar later in post, thinking audio was only a back thought. But, your info is very profound. I will read about all this on vendors sites, and want to thank you.
Vows
Vows
You need someone to actually manipulate the mic on a boom-pole (the Boom-Op) so that the mic is aimed at the person who is speaking, do not just hang the mic over the table. Ideally the mic should be aimed at the notch at the base of the throat (the top of the breast bone); this allows for more chest resonance so you get a fuller/richer sounding voice.
The closer the mic is to the person speaking the better; you get more voice (signal) and less background sound (noise).
You want as much silence on the set as you can possibly manage so you can put in EXACTLY the type of crowd you want, when you want it - and there may be times you don't want it at all.
A tip for free... If your characters are speaking in a (supposed) noisy environment you need them to speak more loudly than they may want to. Nothing pulls me (and many average folks) out of a film faster than unnatural sounding dialog. I know what the problem is, but the audience only knows that something is wrong. As an example; the characters are at a rock concert next to a construction site at the end of an air force base runway where fighter jets are taking off at full power - yet the characters are speaking as if they were having a conversation snuggled together in bed at their country house at 2am. Yes, that's a little extreme, but the principle holds true. Check out the club scene in "The Social Network;" the dialog sounds perfectly natural because all of the characters are speaking in loud voices. They aren't yelling, but speaking more forcefully than normal, which raises the "pitch" of their voices a little higher than what is normal.
One more tip for free... Put the DR-100 up high in the middle of your room and hit record before the extras arrive. Get them set in their places with their drinks (and food?) and let them talk while you converse (off the set) with your primary actors. The extras will start talking quietly and will slowly raise on volume as they go. This recording becomes a part of your post production library. See if you can surreptitiously record in the venue before and/or after the shoot to add more to your sound library.
The whole concept with audio - as with every other aspect of filmmaking - is control, CONTROL, CONTROL. Audio post is the process of enhancing the film sonically to manipulate the audience to feel exactly what you want them to feel. It should be planned during preproduction just like everything else in the film. You may want to check out this thread:
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44493
Your film will only look as good as it sounds.
Sound is half of the experience.
Sound and picture are equal partners.
Sound and picture are Siamese twins that will die if separated from each other.
More otherwise worthy projects fail because of poor sound than for any other technical reason.
The closer the mic is to the person speaking the better; you get more voice (signal) and less background sound (noise).
You want as much silence on the set as you can possibly manage so you can put in EXACTLY the type of crowd you want, when you want it - and there may be times you don't want it at all.
A tip for free... If your characters are speaking in a (supposed) noisy environment you need them to speak more loudly than they may want to. Nothing pulls me (and many average folks) out of a film faster than unnatural sounding dialog. I know what the problem is, but the audience only knows that something is wrong. As an example; the characters are at a rock concert next to a construction site at the end of an air force base runway where fighter jets are taking off at full power - yet the characters are speaking as if they were having a conversation snuggled together in bed at their country house at 2am. Yes, that's a little extreme, but the principle holds true. Check out the club scene in "The Social Network;" the dialog sounds perfectly natural because all of the characters are speaking in loud voices. They aren't yelling, but speaking more forcefully than normal, which raises the "pitch" of their voices a little higher than what is normal.
One more tip for free... Put the DR-100 up high in the middle of your room and hit record before the extras arrive. Get them set in their places with their drinks (and food?) and let them talk while you converse (off the set) with your primary actors. The extras will start talking quietly and will slowly raise on volume as they go. This recording becomes a part of your post production library. See if you can surreptitiously record in the venue before and/or after the shoot to add more to your sound library.
The whole concept with audio - as with every other aspect of filmmaking - is control, CONTROL, CONTROL. Audio post is the process of enhancing the film sonically to manipulate the audience to feel exactly what you want them to feel. It should be planned during preproduction just like everything else in the film. You may want to check out this thread:
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=44493
Your film will only look as good as it sounds.
Sound is half of the experience.
Sound and picture are equal partners.
Sound and picture are Siamese twins that will die if separated from each other.
More otherwise worthy projects fail because of poor sound than for any other technical reason.
Just wanted to point out he's not talking about a DSLR - the blackmagic cinema camera has better audio specs than any of the current DSLRs on the market. Two channels of audio, manual level control, balanced 1/4" jacks, 24/48k sampling (uncompressed), and a headphone jack. I don't imagine it has incredible preamps, and you still have the disadvantage of being tethered to the camera, but I don't think it's unrealistic to expect you could get decent audio out of it with little more than a good mic/boom combination and some practice.
Shows you how much I know about cameras.
Their website doesn't say balanced audio inputs, although the spec sheet on B&H does. If it IS balanced, why not use XLR connectors? Well, we know, of course; then they would have to include a phantom power supply. So you will still need a mixer that supplies phantom power.
It is a device designed to capture moving pictures, not audio. I wasn't able to find any very specific audio specs, but I would not be surprised if they aren't much better than a DSLR.
Their website doesn't say balanced audio inputs, although the spec sheet on B&H does. If it IS balanced, why not use XLR connectors? Well, we know, of course; then they would have to include a phantom power supply. So you will still need a mixer that supplies phantom power.
It is a device designed to capture moving pictures, not audio. I wasn't able to find any very specific audio specs, but I would not be surprised if they aren't much better than a DSLR.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srXGEUCRS5k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srXGEUCRS5k
Here. This should tell you all you need to know.
Been shooting with the camera, pretty amaze-craze but haven't dug into audio.
The photo of the cinema camera is a little out of my realm. Is it a reality to shoot a indie film, (basically a one act, single setting conversational story) on a DSLR. I read that it just is for special effects limited scene kinda thing. If I throw my sound from the mic to the Tascam, I understand that, then the camera only captures video, I have spent 30 years with nikon, should I consider something I know alot more about. The sound I have time to practise, but what is the backup. Could I save to the camera as well as the unit(if the autogain is off) , I've read about programs that will drop audio into the time line, but I would really like to see the camera capture it from Tascam. Is my question understood? My actors come into my shop and give their lines, in groups 1, 2 , and 3, then the entire cast will join only to act out a couple of pages and I will throw it all together.. The point is, my shop is dead quiet, I will add crowd noise that I get at the next wedding I photograph. What are your thoughts?
There seems to be about ten (10) questions in there. You had better - please - rephrase/reorganize it some; I'm a little confused....
I bought the Blackmagic Cinema Camera and the Riggy Micro Preamp with phantom power that attaches to the rig. I like the idea of not having to sync my sound in post.
I haven't actually tested this yet, but there was a test online that showed much better sound quality and less noise than using a Zoom H4n, so that's good enough for me.
I haven't actually tested this yet, but there was a test online that showed much better sound quality and less noise than using a Zoom H4n, so that's good enough for me.
Sorry about that question. I am going to purchase the Tascam, but the price goes up down every three or four days. With the Octava and the tascam I am comfortable with the audio. How long can a mic cable be, I think I need 20 feet? All other questions are going to be camera. Thanks.
That's a shame!! ... Because the test I've just seen on the video posted is deeply flawed. I don't know if it's a deliberate attempt to fool video folk who don't know much about audio or if it's simple ignorance, either way, it's rather disturbing.
Firstly he used a dynamic mic, which has a low output level. This obviously favours the "Riggy", which is only a mic pre-amp. I would have liked to have seen the test done with say a Rode NTG-3, which has a higher output, which in turn would require less gain and therefore cause less noise from the Zoom and, the NTG-3 is more representative of the type of mic most BMCC owners will be using. An even more major flaw in the test is that it's obvious the words spoken for the "Riggy" + BMCC test were spoken louder and probably closer to the mic than for the zoom test. This of course results in a better SNR to start with and therefore an extremely skewed test, again in favour of the "Riggy"! The test should have been done with the mic fixed in position relative to a fixed sound source, for example some recorded dialogue replayed through a speaker at exactly the same level and distance/position from the mic for each test.
Additionally there appears to be some fairly serious bugs in the BMCC's audio implementation currently. It seems likely that the true dynamic range of the BMCC is currently equivalent to recording in 16bit. If the info on the posted video can be believed.
Having said all this, I would still expect the "Riggy" + BMCC to outperform the H4N, which is not surprising seeing as the H4N is one of the cheapest and poorest quality portable audio recorders on the market. Due to the biased test, in normal usage I would NOT expect to achieve the level of improvement indicated by the video and even less of an improvement compared to say a Tascam DT100 MKII.
One last point, the meters on the "Riggy" look to be completely inadequate, so something like the TVlogic would seem to be an essential requirement, at least until BM sort out some usable metering.
G
Really, maybe we are looking at a different video? The video linked above which I saw stated that they used a Dynamic mic to "Stress the pre-amps in the most unfavourable conditions", which is pretty much the opposite of what I said. I also don't recall them saying anywhere that their test was deeply flawed or skewed toward the "Riggy" or mention that the audio input levels were different for the "Riggy" + BMCC test or mention that the LED meters on the "Riggy" were inadequate.
In fact only two sentences (in the third paragraph) of my post could in anyway be viewed as repeating what was said in the video I watched! Maybe you can give me the link to the video you are talking about?
G
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The Location Sound Bible - Ric Viers
The Sound Effects Bible - Ric Viers
The Foley Grail - Vanessa Ament
Dialogue Editing - John Purcell
Practical Art of Motion Picture Sound - David Lewis Yewdall
Audio-Vision - Michel Chion
Also go to FilmSound.Org; LOTS of great stuff.
The Sound Effects Bible - Ric Viers
The Foley Grail - Vanessa Ament
Dialogue Editing - John Purcell
Practical Art of Motion Picture Sound - David Lewis Yewdall
Audio-Vision - Michel Chion
Also go to FilmSound.Org; LOTS of great stuff.