Music Recording
Recording music is often more challenging than recording dialog, as many instruments produce sounds of a wider range of frequencies and dynamic range than the spoken voice. If we strife for good quality, then we need both better technique and usually more expensive equipment. The choice of gear that can produce good recordings have been coming down in price, however, benefiting the prosumer video makers.
You invariably need to use a dedicated digital recorder (unless you are sentimental and want to use tape!) and quality microphones. Until this year, the operator of the recording devices had to use experience and skill in choosing microphone preamp's input gain (sometimes referred to as "trim") as well as carefully set compressors and limiters, to get a satisfactory recording.
This year, however, have seen a quantum leap of technology, with the introduction of a handful of recorders that do NOT require any settings to produce perfect sound, as all parameters can be adjusted in post, and changed(!) without damaging the recording! We are of course, talking about recorders from Sound Devices and Zoom, that employ DUAL Analog to Digital (A2D) converters, coupled with 32 bit float recording, instead of the previous standard of 24 bit binary files.
We shall have a live demonstration of a Zoom F6 32 bit recorder at the club night, with hands on live music recording, comparing a traditional Sound Devices recorder to the F6.
Zoom F6
Sound Device MixPre 3 Mark II
As well as the F6 demonstration, we shall be looking at the similarities and the differences between these two products and offer some thoughts on making a buying decision.
|
