Videos of Acoustically-Coupled Audio Recordings

[morricab]

I truly believe that paying up for exactly the right tool is money well spent. The Canon XA50 has built-in XLR jacks which internally provide 48V phantom power.

So I plug the Earthworks microphones via XLR cables directly into the camera.

Yeah, my camera was purchased not thinking about making videos with it. Cool that yours has those options. There is no way to mount the microphones on the camera with some adapters?

 

[Ron Resnick]

Yeah, my camera was purchased not thinking about making videos with it. Cool that yours has those options. There is no way to mount the microphones on the camera with some adapters?

Oh, I'm sure I could jimmy-rig something by connecting a cold shoe, and then by screwing a dual mic frame on top of that, and then screwing the mic holders onto that.

 

[Believe High Fidelity]

I am doing a series of videos this week to see how close I can get to capturing the full extent of my system's performance for Youtube.

Each video will use the same track with various mic and preamp/interface combinations. The song I have selected for the test will be Mumbo Jumbo by Brent Lewis.

Level 1 Setup: Single Neumann U87AI, Vermouth Reference XLR cable, and a Beachtek audio interface/preamp
Level 2 Setup: Same as above, but a Xtuga audio interface/preamp
Level 3 Setup: Same as Level 2, but using 2 Neumann U87Ais
Level 4a Setup: 2 Neumann U87 Ais, Antelope Audio Interface, Vermouth Reference cables and Grace Designs mic preamp
Level 4b Setup: 2 Neumann U87 Ais, Antelope Audio Interface, Vermouth Reference cables and Elysia Audio mic preamp

Here is Level 1

 

[Ron Resnick]

Very interesting!

What device will you be recording to in each case?

 

[Bobvin]

I am doing a series of videos this week to see how close I can get to capturing the full extent of my system's performance for Youtube.

Each video will use the same track with various mic and preamp/interface combinations. The song I have selected for the test will be Mumbo Jumbo by Brent Lewis.

Level 1 Setup: Single Neumann U87AI, Vermouth Reference XLR cable, and a Beachtek audio interface/preamp
Level 2 Setup: Same as above, but a Xtuga audio interface/preamp
Level 3 Setup: Same as Level 2, but using 2 Neumann U87Ais
Level 4a Setup: 2 Neumann U87 Ais, Antelope Audio Interface, Vermouth Reference cables and Grace Designs mic preamp
Level 4b Setup: 2 Neumann U87 Ais, Antelope Audio Interface, Vermouth Reference cables and Elysia Audio mic preamp

Here is Level 1

Can we get an iPhone recording too, as has been said provides a rough reference? And is that a digital track or vinyl? Please describe the rig.

 

[Believe High Fidelity]

Very interesting!

What device will you be recording to in each case?

Level 1 is straight to the Panasonic GH5 because the Beachtek support 3.5mm out to the camera

Level 2 - 4 will be to a Macbook pro using a DAW and then I will have to do a still image and overlay the audio track on top of that.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Joshua, if you're aiming for highest quality, why not just use the two Neumann microphones directly into a Nagra or a Tascam high resolution digital recorder?

(My only objective with my experiment was to get away without too much inconvenience from the universally disliked sound of the built-in microphone in the Canon XA50.)

 

[Believe High Fidelity]

Can we get an iPhone recording too, as has been said provides a rough reference? And is that a digital track or vinyl? Please describe the rig.

I will start a separate thread in the Introduce Yourself section for equipment. I have been wanting to do so, but have been just too busy this year.

It is digital and I could do an Iphone recording at some point

 

[Believe High Fidelity]

Joshua, if you're aiming for highest quality, why not just use the two Neumann microphones directly into a Nagra or a Tascam high resolution digital recorder?

(My only objective with my experiment was to get away without too much inconvenience from the universally disliked sound of the built-in microphone in the Canon XA50.)

The genesis for this project is we are going into the Pro Audio market in addition to Hifi. Also my son is a musician and he is going to help run this part of the business and loves to mix/master and create content. So we made a deal, I would invest and he would do the labor. Eventually he will be running a studio and he will be producing music as a record label (like Octave Records) using the system to mix and master

All of the test recordings for this experiment are and will be raw. So no post processing of any kind.

I got the beachtek to take to Munich since it does exactly what you are looking to do. Same issue. The GH5 preamp sucks and the interface is small enough to run an outboard mic and support phantom power and record straight into the camera. Hope to provide some good coverage this year

 

[Rexp]

I am doing a series of videos this week to see how close I can get to capturing the full extent of my system's performance for Youtube.

Each video will use the same track with various mic and preamp/interface combinations. The song I have selected for the test will be Mumbo Jumbo by Brent Lewis.

Level 1 Setup: Single Neumann U87AI, Vermouth Reference XLR cable, and a Beachtek audio interface/preamp
Level 2 Setup: Same as above, but a Xtuga audio interface/preamp
Level 3 Setup: Same as Level 2, but using 2 Neumann U87Ais
Level 4a Setup: 2 Neumann U87 Ais, Antelope Audio Interface, Vermouth Reference cables and Grace Designs mic preamp
Level 4b Setup: 2 Neumann U87 Ais, Antelope Audio Interface, Vermouth Reference cables and Elysia Audio mic preamp

Here is Level 1

My first impressions are it sounds good but missing some spatial details, how does it compare to the in-room sound? Personally I'm not interested in an iPhone comparison but would be very interested if you compared the Beachtek to a 32bit recorder from Tascam or Zoom.

 

[Believe High Fidelity]

My first impressions are it sounds good but missing some spatial details, how does it compare to the in-room sound? Personally I'm not interested in an iPhone comparison but would be very interested if you compared the Beachtek to a 32bit recorder from Tascam or Zoom.

That is the result of the single mic. To get true stereo you need two mic in either blumlein or mid/side to capture the spatial cues.

For being a single mic it is pretty good. I would say a 5/10 in capturing the room. At most I hope to get to an 8 or 9

 

[Young Skywalker]

That is the result of the single mic. To get true stereo you need two mic in either blumlein or mid/side to capture the spatial cues.

For being a single mic it is pretty good. I would say a 5/10 in capturing the room. At most I hope to get to an 8 or 9

I wonder how a single Pearl M/S microphone (MS 8CL) into a Zoom F8n Pro recorder (which handles the mid-side decoding) would do. I believe this is what Moiz Audio uses some of the time. I am keen to dip a toe into this area as well, largely for entertainment purposes.

 

[Believe High Fidelity]

I wonder how a single Pearl M/S microphone (MS 8CL) into a Zoom F8n Pro recorder (which handles the mid-side decoding) would do. I believe this is what Moiz Audio uses some of the time. I am keen to dip a toe into this area as well, largely for entertainment purposes.

I have been down a fairly long rabbit hole of gear and testing already. Moiz uses a b9 audio csm88 blumlein mic and 1 b9 audio omni mic in a three channel setup that a fair amount of the Aries Cerat videos were recorded on. There are endless combinations of mics and recorders/interfaces to choose from. So the suggestions could be endless of what I could/should use and choose from.

In doing blind a/b testing of my DSD>PCM dac shootout there was a advantage of converting from higher sampling rates or from DSD to PCM and most recorders are maxed out at 192k (including the Nagra VII).

I actually started with Merging interfaces using their Pyramix software for DSD64, then 128, then 256. Where I am now is 384/24 just using a mastering converter and a separate dedicated preamp for each mic channel. I have advocated always that the preamp is the heart of the hifi playback chain and I reaffirm that for recording. However, even these can add a ton of coloration in a negative way (to my ears and purpose). I coudn't use popularity and acclaim to make selections as there isn't a motto of "true to source" in recording as much as it leans to "getting the sound you want". So many were designed to color the sound and impart a virtue to alter the sound to that manner. To give the vocalist, pianist, guitarist, etc the character they were looking for.

Mics are where I spent the most of my time really trying to nail down which mics had the least coloration on the sound and captured the most detail. At 7 grand for 2 mics there were obviously clones or alternatives that were a lot less expensive. However, many imparted a huge amount of coloration and none (including the U87 clones) were able to capture the level of detail the OEM U87 did. Even the vintage U87's had a darker sound quality to them which was great because at 10-20k for one used mic I wanted to avoid that. Ribbons had a wonderful tone, but failed to really capture high frequency detail. The AEA A440 would be my second choice if it could capture detail the same way.

I am happy with all of my choices as a final selection (especially the mics). Software as well. M/S is working better than Blumlein or X/Y in my room because it is pretty consistent at the distances from the speakers to nail down the center image while still getting the room.

 

[Rexp]

Here's a vid comparing the iPhone with Shure MV88+ to Tascam X6

And here's a link to some live recordings made with a Tascam X6.

Tascam Portacapture X6 | Audio Examples

SOS June 2023 Chris Timson These files accompany my...

www.soundonsound.com

 

[Rexp]

And MV88+ Vs Blue Yeti Vs iPhone

 

[stehno]

I listened to parts of Rexp's posted videos and wasn’t overly impressed with the MV88’s performance. Then again, IME sound quality can differ greatly depending on the MV88’s app settings - which could be quite different between users.

Four or 5 years ago I just so happened to choose the rather small Shure MV88 stereo condenser mic that plugs directly into my iPhone and never tried another mic.

With the MV88, if I decide to record what I’m already listening to, it takes all of 30 seconds to plug the mic into my iPhone and start recording. I can’t imagine things getting much more efficient than that.

For $150 I think the MV88 does a better-than-reasonable job across the spectrum. IOW, I think the MV88 does its part rather well to generally represent at least a remnant of the in-room performance.

 

[Rexp]

I listened to parts of Rexp's posted videos and wasn’t overly impressed with the MV88’s performance. Then again, IME sound quality can differ greatly depending on the MV88’s app settings - which could be quite different between users.

Four or 5 years ago I just so happened to choose the rather small Shure MV88 stereo condenser mic that plugs directly into my iPhone and never tried another mic.

With the MV88, if I decide to record what I’m already listening to, it takes all of 30 seconds to plug the mic into my iPhone and start recording. I can’t imagine things getting much more efficient than that.

For $150 I think the MV88 does a better-than-reasonable job across the spectrum. IOW, I think the MV88 does its part rather well to generally represent at least a remnant of the in-room performance.

In the second video, the youtuber felt the Blue Yeti in omni mode was more representative , which I agree sounded more like listening to a system than the rather closed in, less vibrant sound of the MV88+, so an omni mic maybe the best option for capturing system sound.

 

[stehno]

In the second video, the youtuber felt the Blue Yeti in omni mode was more representative , which I agree sounded more like listening to a system than the rather closed in, less vibrant sound of the MV88+, so an omni mic maybe the best option for capturing system sound.

Perhaps. Or the youtuber didn't have the MV88 settings optimally config'ed. That's my guess.

When I switched from an iPhone 11 to 12 about 3 years ago, I had to reconfure the MV88's settings after reinstalling its app. Thought I had reconfigured the app exactly as before on the old phone but the level of musicality was missing. I reached out to Shure support several times and I googled numerous topics. I even tried going back to the old iPhone but nothing.

I finally resolved myself to thinking Apple installed some stupid noise reduction system on the new iPhone OS. Then one day I switched one of the app's primary settings I thought I used on the old iPhone and the sound I was used to and hoped for was back.

It's that easy to make the MV88 sound less than stellar.

 

[Rexp]

Same track, different recorder, TAD is CD , Wadax is streaming?