AUDIO SPECIAL
The innovative Sennheiser Memory Mic is a plastic clip-on box that can fit on to a lapel or pocket. It features an omnidirectional condenser capsule mic that’s designed to record the subject’s voice and sound around them. It’s designed to communicate with a smartphone via Bluetooth, but it comes with the ability to internally store up to four hours of audio. Once you’ve used the app to start recording video on your smartphone and audio on the memory mic, you don’t need to maintain the Bluetooth connection between the mic and the phone. What this means is that your subject could literally be way off in the distance while you’re filming them, and yet the mic would still be picking up their voice. When paired again with the smartphone, the memory mic downloads its audio. The Sennheiser Memory Mic is internally powered and so will need to be charged up. This is done via a USB cable. The device records 48 kHz/16-bit audio and, despite its diminutive size, features up to four hours of battery life. DON’T FORGET THE MEMORY MIC!
“It’sbettertoinvest insomethingofhigherquality withbatterypower anda foamrubberwindshield”
award-winning Tascam DR-701D or one from the Saramonic range. These can include mixer functions so you can mix together the inputs from two wireless mics, for example. And if you’re a Sony shooter, the Sony range also includes UWP-D wireless units that go into the camera’s hotshoe and communicate with the camera via the MI contacts – so you don’t even need to plug in a separate cable. Sony also offers a duel input receiver, allowing you to connect two external wireless mics to one receiver. The camera then records them to two different audio channels, so you canmix later in the edit. It’s a neat solution.
to suit all budgets and sizes. Sennheiser and Rode are the two most popular with filmmakers, and companies like these continue to push the boundaries of what technology can do. If your camera is a traditional camcorder or cinema camera, it will have XLR inputs and very robust audio controls and amps for incredible sound. If not, you may wish to record to an external recorder, such as one from Olympus, the Zoom range or Tascam, which offers a variety of options. An alternative is to use a pro-style unit that takes XLR inputs and outputs them directly to your camera, such as the
IMAGE The Sony range includes UWP-D wireless units that go into a camera’s hotshoe and communicate with the camera via the M1 contacts – no separate cable needed
37
SUMMER 2020 PRO MOVIEMAKER
Powered by FlippingBook