Making Your Own Podcast, Episode 3: Audio

Audiences and customers are more willing to endure poor video quality than they are poor sound quality. Audio has to be a big priority when shooting your podcast, which is made harder because on-camera microphones suck! So, how do we solve it? The biggest podcast we publish right now goes to about 1400 EMS leaders across the world. We use a “dual system”, where we record audio to an audio recorder and video to the cameras. We’ll show you what we use and why it works, but we’ll also talk about how to “single system” it – how to use the video camera to record better sound. We use the Canon HV20 camera, so a single system has to include an XLR adapter. We use, and prefer, JuicedLink. Since we use mics requiring phantom power, we use the CX231. I show off our audio tech’s bag, which includes a Roland/Edirol R-4 mixer/recorder, and while that’s how we get sound it’s not required to get great sound. We do it because of the metering and filtering features, and it records four discrete channels – really useful for a multi-person interview or short movie. So, what mics do you get to listen to? We boom the Oktava MK-012 microphone over my head. The MK012 with the cardioid head is great for indoor sound. We lav me up with two wireless systems – both Sennheiser eW112. The eW100 series is a great wireless system, but the stock mics from it are kind of crummy. We upgraded to the Countryman B6 and B3. The B-6 is half the size of the still tiny B-3, and the only reason I had them both on …