Topic: Upgrade from inbuilt camcorder mic?

[dan355]

Hi im a bit of a novice, please forgive my almost total ignorance!

I have a Sony Mini DV handy cam, a DCR HC14E, I taped a small, loud club show with it the other night and the picture is great but the sound is pretty bad. That is the kind of show Im gonna be using it for. The sound was pretty distorted and sounded like it was topping out or peaking or something especially on the vocals. Im on a pretty tight budget so I was just wondering what would be a good way to improve the sound, would getting an external mic give better results? I had my eye on the Sony ECM719 or the 717 if I can get one. Would that help my cause for the moment untill I could afford some better equipment?
Thanks,
-Dan

[BayTaynt3d]

Does it have a mini-jack input for audio? Or XLR? Or nothing?

Can you manually control the audio levels or not?

Hopefully, you have minijack input for audio, in which case you can use an external mic terminated to mini, if you don't, you are screwed.

Hopefully you have manual control of the audio levels, if you do, then turn off AGC (auto gain control) and use manual levels (and turn DOWN the levels so you aren't clipping), if you don't you are screwed.

Next, you'll need a mic terminated to mini AND a battery box. The camera will only supply plug-in power to the mic, which won't cut it for loud shows -- you'll brick wall for sure. So, the cheapest thing to fix your problem is to get a BBox and some mics terminated to mini. You'll still be stuck with the SUCKY preamp and a/d in your camera, but at least you won't be distorting. Beyond this, things get complicated and expensive real quick. LOL!

[Church-Audio]

You need to attenuate the crap out of a Dv in order to use it for live recording, I make a preamp called the ST-9100 that will do just that. It has from 00- db to +20 db of gain via a gain control. And I have many customers that Use it with a pair of my cardioid mics for taping live shows. Pm me if your interested. You can, if you want something cheaper try a headphone attenuator its not the best way to go but, it does work and you can use a simple battery box and a pair of cardioids or omni mics your choice.

If you don't want to buy my solution thats ok. I don't want to come off as some one that is just trying to sell shit.
I have all the sales I could want right now, But I do have a good solution for your problem.

Chris Church

Hi im a bit of a novice, please forgive my almost total ignorance!

I have a Sony Mini DV handy cam, a DCR HC14E, I taped a small, loud club show with it the other night and the picture is great but the sound is pretty bad. That is the kind of show Im gonna be using it for. The sound was pretty distorted and sounded like it was topping out or peaking or something especially on the vocals. Im on a pretty tight budget so I was just wondering what would be a good way to improve the sound, would getting an external mic give better results? I had my eye on the Sony ECM719 or the 717 if I can get one. Would that help my cause for the moment untill I could afford some better equipment?
Thanks,
-Dan

[T-90]

You need to attenuate the crap out of a Dv in order to use it for live recording, I make a preamp called the ST-9100 that will do just that. It has from 00- db to +20 db of gain via a gain control. And I have many customers that Use it with a pair of my cardioid mics for taping live shows. Pm me if your interested. You can, if you want something cheaper try a headphone attenuator its not the best way to go but, it does work and you can use a simple battery box and a pair of cardioids or omni mics your choice.

If you don't want to buy my solution thats ok. I don't want to come off as some one that is just trying to sell shit.
I have all the sales I could want right now, But I do have a good solution for your problem.

Chris Church

Hi im a bit of a novice, please forgive my almost total ignorance!

I have a Sony Mini DV handy cam, a DCR HC14E, I taped a small, loud club show with it the other night and the picture is great but the sound is pretty bad. That is the kind of show Im gonna be using it for. The sound was pretty distorted and sounded like it was topping out or peaking or something especially on the vocals. Im on a pretty tight budget so I was just wondering what would be a good way to improve the sound, would getting an external mic give better results? I had my eye on the Sony ECM719 or the 717 if I can get one. Would that help my cause for the moment untill I could afford some better equipment?
Thanks,
-Dan

what mr church said is true, a headphone attenuator will work in this case...this is what i have used on the past coming line out of my jb3<ad/20<ps2<spc4's  into the sony cam mic input.....however i did recently get a pair of his cards and the st-9100 and i must say the difference running the st-9100 into the cam is night and day in terms of quality and overall control.....the headphone attenuator worked fine and i was happy with the results, but now with the church st-9100 i will no longer use that method.....the headphone deal will do the trick in a pinch for alot less, but i like the st-9100 in this situation from now on.

[Church-Audio]

I was going to send you a PM about the windscreens I hit the tickets thing insted and gave your a -T LOL so I had to give you a +T to fix it lol

Chris Church

You need to attenuate the crap out of a Dv in order to use it for live recording, I make a preamp called the ST-9100 that will do just that. It has from 00- db to +20 db of gain via a gain control. And I have many customers that Use it with a pair of my cardioid mics for taping live shows. Pm me if your interested. You can, if you want something cheaper try a headphone attenuator its not the best way to go but, it does work and you can use a simple battery box and a pair of cardioids or omni mics your choice.

If you don't want to buy my solution thats ok. I don't want to come off as some one that is just trying to sell shit.
I have all the sales I could want right now, But I do have a good solution for your problem.

Chris Church

Hi im a bit of a novice, please forgive my almost total ignorance!

I have a Sony Mini DV handy cam, a DCR HC14E, I taped a small, loud club show with it the other night and the picture is great but the sound is pretty bad. That is the kind of show Im gonna be using it for. The sound was pretty distorted and sounded like it was topping out or peaking or something especially on the vocals. Im on a pretty tight budget so I was just wondering what would be a good way to improve the sound, would getting an external mic give better results? I had my eye on the Sony ECM719 or the 717 if I can get one. Would that help my cause for the moment untill I could afford some better equipment?
Thanks,
-Dan

what mr church said is true, a headphone attenuator will work in this case...this is what i have used on the past coming line out of my jb3<ad/20<ps2<spc4's  into the sony cam mic input.....however i did recently get a pair of his cards and the st-9100 and i must say the difference running the st-9100 into the cam is night and day in terms of quality and overall control.....the headphone attenuator worked fine and i was happy with the results, but now with the church st-9100 i will no longer use that method.....the headphone deal will do the trick in a pinch for alot less, but i like the st-9100 in this situation from now on.

[T-90]

I was going to send you a PM about the windscreens I hit the tickets thing insted and gave your a -T LOL so I had to give you a +T to fix it lol

Chris Church

bastard 
+t

[guitard]

This might just be an odd case ~ but I'll throw it out there anyway, as it is relevent to this thread.

I have used an external mic with a video cam around ten times - using two different cams and three different mics.  Almost every time, there have been short dropouts in the audio, caused by the mic jack getting jostled around.  I usually film stealth on a mono-pod.  I don't jerk the camera around and I usually film from a seat.  It seems as though it doesn't take much movement at all to cause a dropout.  And unfortunately, there has never been alternate audio sources from these shows - so no way to fix the spots where the dropouts occurred.

It sounds like you're on a tight budget.  If that's the case, I'd go with a cheap, easy to use setup along the lines of a mini-disc and a Sony ECM-719 (easily under $100 total).  The audio results won't be great as far as audio recordings go, but they will be far superior to what you've been getting.  And since many audience videos don't have alternate audio sources recorded with quality equipment, even only having audio from the cheapo mini-disc recorder will make for a marked improvement that most video collecting fans will be very happy with.  AND you now will have two audio sources - from the cam and from the mini-disc.  Sometimes mixing them together produces an overall nice result.  If nothing else, if one has problems, you always have a second audio source to fall back on.

[dan355]

Hey thanks a lot guys & sorry for late reply, Ive been away. Chris your stuff looks perfect for what I want. Would the st-9000 work in my situation? (you mentioned its good for "most situations"). Any tips for how to put a headphone attenuator totgether to use in the meantime till I get some funds togther?
-Dan

[Church-Audio]

The headphone attenuator will work you will need a self powered mic and there is a question as to the ability for this self powered mic to handle the sound pressure levels. So try the headphone attenuator if it works great. If not send me a PM and I will help you out with a T.S member discount on what ever you want to purchase from me.

Hey thanks a lot guys & sorry for late reply, Ive been away. Chris your stuff looks perfect for what I want. Would the st-9000 work in my situation? (you mentioned its good for "most situations"). Any tips for how to put a headphone attenuator totgether to use in the meantime till I get some funds togther?
-Dan