OK, the neighborhood kids want to make a zombie movie. I know it's going to be hilariously bad, but I don't want it to be unwatchably bad.
I think I can get useable images with my old camera (TRV900), but I'm worried about audio. I'm a musician and generally audio-oriented person, so I know how important good sound is to a movie (or videogame). I think this tends to be the biggest giveaway of "home videocam" movies.
So what do I do? I basically have no budget. Maybe $200, tops. I'm mostly concerned with picking up good, clean dialog. The rest of the sound I can fill in with foley work if I need to (would be fun).
I was thinking of a mic on a really long chord, with one of the kids acting as boom operator, but I think I'd need an XLR adapter so I could run balanced cable, and probably a directional mic, right?
Then I was reading about people using MiniDics recorders. I could have one in each kid's pocket, with a cheap little lapel mic. Then I could dump all the audio into the computer and sort it out later. That's assuming I could pickup a few for under $50 off eBay or something.
Then I thought about portable flash-based recorders (voice recorders or mp3 players), and it seems like those would be even cheaper, smaller, lighter, and make getting the sound into the computer easier (drag and drop). Ideal? I was looking around at some models from iRiver, iAudio, and Olympus, but I have no idea what else might be out there.
Any recommendation? Assuming that I'm willing to put in the time in post production to import audio from various sources and sync it up, what's the absolute cheapest way to get good dialog recorded? Can anybody recommend any specific devices?
Cheers,
Eric
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Originally posted by Eric TetzI was thinking of a mic on a really long chord, with one of the kids acting as boom operator, but I think I'd need an XLR adapter so I could run balanced cable, and probably a directional mic, right?
Right. A mic on a long cable on a pole (or boom) is what almost all filmmakers do. As you know, the better the mic, the better the sound. And you know that a studio mic won't meet your needs. What you need is any long barreled mic. You want a good condenser mic with a ?lobar? pick up pattern to put on your boom pole.
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Then I was reading about people using MiniDics recorders. I could have one in each kid's pocket, with a cheap little lapel mic. Then I could dump all the audio into the computer and sort it out later. That's assuming I could pickup a few for under $50 off eBay or something.
Assuming you can get cheap lapel mics for $50 each, you will max out your budget at 4 mics. If you ever have more than 4 people speaking in a scene, you're out of luck. A cheap lapel mic has a horrible pick up pattern and are you planning on having each kid with a MiniDics recorder, too? 4 lapel misc and 4 MiniDics is starting to get expensive. And hiding the little mic and the wires can be a real pain. You will need very long wires for each set up unless you are going wireless.
Same with the portable flash-based recorders. Can you get them close enough to the kids mouths in order to get a good signal to noise ratio? If so, then that might be the best way. How many can you get for $200?
You might have to consider going over the $200 limit.
?URL="http://www.sennheiserusa.com/newsite/"?Sennheiser?/URL? is the mic most used by professional sound recordists. They are expensive and worth it. Check out the ME-66 and the ME-67.
?url="http://www.audio-technica.com/"?Audio-Technica?/url? is cheaper. Check out the AT835B. It?s a workable mic, a little muddy and not as directional as it should be. The AT835ST is a good mic for the price, but it, too, sounds a bit muddy - the vocals don?t sound crisp enough for me.
I?ve never used ?url="http://www.azdencorp.com/"?Azden?/url? mic?s. They?re inexpensive and I don?t hear too many good things about them, but if that's all you can afford it's MUCH better than using the camera mic.
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The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but progress.
Joseph Joubert, essayist (1754-1824)
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The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but progress.
Joseph Joubert, essayist (1754-1824)
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You might have to consider going over the $200 limit.
I can't. That's what makes it a budget. 🙂
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If you ever have more than 4 people speaking in a scene, you're out of luck.
I can write the script so that no more than 3 people talk in a scene. Audio's certainly not the only technical limitation I have to write around.
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Assuming you can get cheap lapel mics for $50 each, you will max out your budget at 4 mics.
I was thinking more like $5-$10, like the cheapie Sima lapel mic I heard demoed ?url="http://www.bealecorner.com/trv900/mictest/mictest.html"?here?/url?. Not great, but it's head and shoulders above the alternative: recording everything via the camera's built-in stereo microphone. I just want the kids to be heard.
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A cheap lapel mic has a horrible pick up pattern and are you planning on having each kid with a MiniDics recorder, too? 4 lapel misc and 4 MiniDics is starting to get expensive. And hiding the little mic and the wires can be a real pain. You will need very long wires for each set up unless you are going wireless.Same with the portable flash-based recorders. Can you get them close enough to the kids mouths in order to get a good signal to noise ratio? If so, then that might be the best way. How many can you get for $200?
I was hoping to eBay the recorders for like $30/unit (flash or MiniDisk based), so the total hardware would be around $100. I would make sure either had a mic input, so I could use a lapel mic. Pretty much anywhere I put the mic is going to be closer than the camera. I don't have a wide angle lense, so I'm just going to have to back up for a lot of shots.
I don't know, maybe there's another cheap way of doing it? That's why I posted here: hoping someone had some creative solutions for no-budget audio. Buying a $500 dollar shotgun mic would be great, but it's not an option.
But maybe if I could find one for $150 or something, that didn't suck too much? Again, I'm just trying to record dialog better than the built-in mic
My only concern with a boom is that it requires an operator, and that requires skill. These kids are all 10-11. Think one of them could handle it?
I was attracted to the idea of lapel mics simple because it wouldn't require a boom operator, and I wouldn't have to worry about keeping the boom/operator out of the scene, etc. But then again, I've never done it, so maybe it's not that bad and I'm just being paranoid.
Minimal dialogue, try to tell the story in pictures and with music. Write into the screenplay why there is no sound. Perhaps one character blares the radio to try to distract the zombies. Perhaps another character is hit with a board to the head (thought he was a zombie) and the sound goes out as he hits the ground, making an eiree parallel to his lost hearing. Perhaps the characters are terrified of making any noise to attract the zombies. Perhaps a combination of the three.
That way hopefully you can start with audio in a controlled environment, than when the zombies and action hits you worry about it less. Then if you can have the sound return at the very end. It could be really grim if the deaf character is taken down (camera shooting from his pov), then goes steady and the sound goes up so we hear screaming, gurgling and chewing followed by credits and music.
RJSchwarz
San Diego, CA
RJSchwarz
The other option is... rent a mike. You can probably blag a Senheisser 416, boom, cables and adapters for a week for $200.
The TRV900 produces pretty good pictures if it's lit half-decently; I've seen footage I shot on my TRV900 projected on a big cinema screen in the West End of London and while it was obviously video it didn't look too bad compared to other projections I've seen of movies shot on Digibeta and the like.
As mentioned, you may be saved by the characters being quiet to avoid drawing the attention of zombies; OK, you may want some zombie moaning noises, but that's easy to record with a cheap mike afterwards and just add onto the soundtrack... syncing shouldn't matter too much in that case.
