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Got floored by the amount of audio wisdom on this forum that I wondered why I didn't end up here sooner. Needless to say, here I am, signed up with a new account. I'm a one-man production crew working for a tech start-up and we're looking to record some in-house instructional videos and talking heads for our app. Ideally I'd like to get some professional sounding audio but it's a bit hard to achieve that with the environment I'm working with. Our two-storey office is located right next to a busy intersection, and we're very open-concept so there's rarely a quiet space or time in the office. Right now I'm working with a Sennheiser ew-100 ENG G3 set and a Zoom H5 recorder, which quite frankly doesn't seem to cut it. From reading through articles and forums like this one, I've gathered that to get clean-ish sounding audio while recording indoors, I'd need something like a super or hypercardioid. However, I've also found that the Zoom H5 doesn't actually have a true line level input and the preamps generate quite a noticeable level of noise, so even if I get a new mic I might not get the result I want with the H5. This led me to find out more about more pro-level mixers like the stuff from Sound Devices, which sounds like a great investment but then there are budget considerations to worry about, and it's hard to make the execs see the value in something when you're the only one who can see it. Granted, all this product envy has led me to discover more about the world of audio than I ever anticipated, but I'm wondering if I'm reading too hard into this. Assuming the learning curve is not an issue, do I really need all these devices to get cleaner audio? It's impossible to treat the office space as the walls and windows are far from soundproof, I'd really hate to be purchasing sound blankets and the like because the constant setup/teardown would be a constant nightmare for every shoot (we don't have a separate room for recording) and the open-office concept makes it a nightmare to record clean professional-sounding audio. I'm also considering sourcing for a good sound isolation pod that we can place in the office to counter the external noise, as this option would have a two-fold benefit of allowing me to use my existing equipment more effectively while being able to provide a space that other people can use too. I guess I just wanted to canvas for opinions from anyone here who might have encountered a similar situation in their line of work. Being based in Singapore, there aren't a lot of resources for audio guys that have just started out (IMO) and I'm honestly a beginner in audio myself. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

I feel a more powerful need to replace my Oktava MK012 for indoor boom use. It's been doing well enough most of the time, but yesterday I ended up on a shoot with multiple cameras and really quiet talent. My wires worked really well, but the MK012 didn't cut it at distances as low as ~60cm (about 2 feet). I started hearing the self-noise of the mic (or perhaps preamp noise since I had to really crank it). Nothing overpowering, but enough to be quite annoying. I've been thinking about the upgrade for quite a while. I've got a 416 as my outdoor shotgun for now and I'm running DPA Core 4060s with A10s for wires. I'm pretty sure the 50 would match well with everything, but I really like how small and light the 4018C seems, not to mention that I've become a huge fan of the DPA sound by using the lavs and the 4017B. I still have a huge soft spot for the MKH50 though, it's a mic that I know and love, but it does color the sound quite a bit, the lows can be a bit much from time to time. Buying new, I could get the 4018C a bit cheaper, but a used 50 could be hard to find since they're really solid and people like them. What do you guys think? How do the two mics compare in your opinion?