Topic: Music Fanataic - Newbie Taper

[cvarona]

Hey guys,

Im here to ask a few questions if you could please help me answer them.
I am a cinematographer and editor usually working with music.. well there is also an act i am doing a documentary on, and I need a way to tape their shows better because the audio on my camera just does not cut it.

4 things you need to know:

1. I would usually be taping inside of clubs and bars
2. Im not looking to spend too much money, but I am looking for "Decent/Good" Quality.
3. I travel with tons of equipment, so i need something portable.
4. It is a LIVE band (saxophone, electric bass, drums, 2 mc's and a keyboard)

1 thing i need to know:

1. Which recorder should i purchase? I know the basics of audio but am  new to recording so cant piece together all the odds and ends.  Need a fully functional setup.


--
thats about it... if someone could please help me out it would be GREAT help.

THANKS

[dorrcoq]

How much is "not too much"?

[cvarona]

hm i would like it to be around 300$ but maybe i get close to 500... what are my options.

[rastasean]

Why not patch into the soundboard at the club?
H120 would solve that.

[cvarona]

Well sometimes not everything is mic'd.


whats the h120? and theres nothing that could record live from like the center of the club/bar picking up ambient noise etc? like a live feeling?

[Neilyboy]

On the real cheap search amazon for a zoom h2 or h4 (check yard sale as well). Get yourself a stand and there ya have it (I don't know how well this will perform over your camera but im sure it would be much better).

Otherwise for your price range hit up Chris church here (Checkout his thread in Retail Sale) His new CA-14's are supposedly pretty awesome (I myself wish I had the cash to buy a set now).

http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,90474.0.html

then all you need is a simple recorder which can be had for ~100 bucks (iRiver, Zoom, Edirol).. You can put together a decent rig for ~400 bucks.

Neil

[Neilyboy]

Here is just one of many samples recorded with Chris' mic's

http://www.archive.org/details/moe2008-04-11.ca-14.flac16

search the forum for 'Church Audio CA-14' and you should find a bundle of them..
His package that he offers for about 300 shipped (on sale through may) includes mics (two stereo sets) and the preamp all you need is a recorder.

Or if you want also browse around on the soundprofessionals website..
many people enjoy these: http://www.soundprofessionals.com/cgi-bin/gold/item/SP-CMC-8
keep in mind if you go that route you will also need to provide power which they also sell for about 100 bucks..

[cvarona]

thanks neily..

if anyone else has any other suggestions let me know!

totally new to this, sorry

[Ekib]

Does your videocamera has a seperate mic in ?
If yes , all you may need to get is a mic and an attenuator cable. A friend of mine is recording a lot of concerts ( metal ) and most of the videocamerás don't have a LOW or -20 Db switch . So you will get overloading which causes the audio to clip. This is called brickwall.
Please take a look at this thread :

http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,121925.0.html

My friend's using an attenuator cable in combination with a pair of Core-Sound mic's. It works perfect now.

There are so many different mic's. The key is to make sure you don't get brickwall !

[ilduclo]

should be able to get a Sony d50 with that amount, simple and makes pretty good recordings without external mics

[su6oxone]

should be able to get a Sony d50 with that amount, simple and makes pretty good recordings without external mics

Yeah, I agree with the suggestion of just using the internal mics of a recorder.  There are a bunch of recordings that someone made using just a Zoom H2 on archive.org and they sound pretty 'decent.'  I don't know if I'd bother with external mics, just get a light stand and stick that baby on it. 

http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=taper%3A%22Paul%20%26%20Kim%20(PGroove_Lotus_Fan)%22

[pgroove_lotus_fan]

should be able to get a Sony d50 with that amount, simple and makes pretty good recordings without external mics

Yeah, I agree with the suggestion of just using the internal mics of a recorder.  There are a bunch of recordings that someone made using just a Zoom H2 on archive.org and they sound pretty 'decent.'  I don't know if I'd bother with external mics, just get a light stand and stick that baby on it. 

http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=taper%3A%22Paul%20%26%20Kim%20(PGroove_Lotus_Fan)%22

That dude upgraded. 

I was actually quite pleased with the H2's performance.  My initial intent was to make sure that cool (to me) shows in Nashville, Huntsville, and Chattanooga got taped in some fashion.  I had attended a bunch of shows in '07 that no one recorded.  I wish that I had joined this site earlier, though, because those "decent" sounding shows were all run at straight 16/44.1 instead of boosting the bit depth to keep more detail in post-processing.  The H2's three position sensitivity switch is less of a handicap now that I've read enough stuff on this site to know to run 24 bit.

paul

[Church-Audio]

I like the tascam dr-1 if you dont want to spend alot of money the built in mics sound pretty dam good. for the price it cant be beat the next best thing is the Edirol r09hr but you need to get a pair of external mics with this because the internal mics are not that good.

Chris

[Craig T]

I recommend Church Audio CA14 cardiods ($120)> Church Audio ST9100 pre ($140)> Tascam DR07 ($150).  Great value for about $410 total.  Leaves you some $ for accessories such as a stand, mounts, SD cards, rechargeable batteries, etc.  Another option is the Sony D50 ($500) using the internal mics to start.

[yltfan]

If you can find some used Nakamichi CM 300 mics, I think that would be a good way to go. No preamp or battery box needed, just some weird 9v batteries ($10-12 each, but last forever). You could plug those into any of the recorders mentioned above, point em at the stacks and get good tapes pretty easily.

Not sure if this stuff is still available, but:
http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,116076.0.html