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Opinions on Camera Mounted Mic


Chris R

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A cameraguy I work with occasionally is buying a

HDX900 and asked me for some opinions on a good camera mounted mic.

Pani wants $1250 for their stock one so im sure there are some better options.

I was leaning towards an mkh50 for the cardioid type

sanken cs1 for a shotgun

Ive never really concerned myself with an onboard mic before so I'd love to hear

some opinions.

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Guest Eric Lamontagne

Start with a good shock mount and wind furry!

Go hypercard as the most directional mic. Use it for the close to camera audio and a good general sound. Or, using the ambient tiny mic setup.

A good mic at 3' is way better than an awesome mic at 15'!!!

Without a nice preamp, it would be a waste to mount a $2,000 mic on the camera!

Plus, you wouldn't want to work yourself out of a job now! Hehe.

Good Luck

Eric

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  • 4 weeks later...

I know this is an old thread guys, but everyone who responded missed something. The Panisonic HDX 900 has a 5 pin xlr type input at the front ment for use with the stereo mic that Pani sells with the camera. I don't know if that means you can substitute a mono mic with the proper connector in that situation or not.

That and most of the camera guys who hire me have long since sold their sound gear and hire me. The old school idea of the camera guy/gal having to own all the gear is long since dead and I'm happier that way. I like being the source for all things audio. They leave it up to me to provide the sound. The wya it should be.

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A little off topic but I was wondering if anybody has used the Holophone H4? http://www.holophone.com/products_h4.html the camera mounted 6.1 surround mic? I am doing a doc in January for the Discovery Channel and they want to use this in conjunction with the H2-Pro. I would feed channels 1,2 with the H4 going to 3,4. I then go off on my own to record wild tracks with the H2 and my Deva.

I just wondered how it sounds and if there were any little tricks I should know. I've had some bench time with it but never really used it in the field yet.

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A little off topic but I was wondering if anybody has used the Holophone H4?

John Garrett has used the Holophone mics a lot and has posted his experiences various places. He has a website but I don't remember the URL. You could contact him at his email address:

jgarrett @ world . std . com  (not clickable for security)

-  Jeff Wexler

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John Garrett has used the Holophone mics a lot and has posted his experiences various places. He has a website but I don't remember the URL. You could contact him at his email address:

jgarrett @ world . std . com  (not clickable for security)

-  Jeff Wexler

Johns website: www.soundcart.com

Eric

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I have used the H4 on a Discovery shoot recently.  Mounting in on the viewfinder or handle of the camera is probably not going to work, it is way too big (if the camera is always on sticks, should be OK...).  I ended up sticking it to a wireless receiver mounting plate on the back (side) of the camera (careful to avoid triggering the "zoom" button).  The pots are terrible and feel very fragile, the HP amp is very noisy.  Setting the levels was kind of tricky, but I think that was because of the "dirty" pot, the LED's would barely register even when wide open although it sounded acceptable through the HP amp of the F900.  That being said, you probably won't be able to easily monitor the thing anyway.  I could typically get 5 hours on 2500 mah nihm AA batteries, but the thing would just die, no low battery indication.  Oh yeah, check the levels on the front mic inputs of the camera, I think I had it set to -50, but do your own test!)

I thought about asking Holophone (they are here in Toronto with me) to upgrade the dinky pots and possibly make a cable/adapter to mount the mic head in the camera-mic mount and leave the "brick" on the  back of the camera where it is less intrusive to the operator.

-Jason

A little off topic but I was wondering if anybody has used the Holophone H4? http://www.holophone.com/products_h4.html the camera mounted 6.1 surround mic? I am doing a doc in January for the Discovery Channel and they want to use this in conjunction with the H2-Pro. I would feed channels 1,2 with the H4 going to 3,4. I then go off on my own to record wild tracks with the H2 and my Deva.

I just wondered how it sounds and if there were any little tricks I should know. I've had some bench time with it but never really used it in the field yet.

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Jason:

Thanks for the info, especially about the battery life. I guess if you put the H4 in the shoe it can make the 900 a little big at times. If we are doing interviews and it makes it tougher than it should be I'm going to loose it and then come back with the H2 latter. I could not find any info on Johns web site but I'll check around some more.

Chris sorry if this thread went off course.

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What is Pani?  A brief internet search turned up a company that does lighting.

A.

Pani is short for Panavision.

Eric

HA! Oh, I thought it was some code word for undergarments or something... Nevermind...

Actually, in this case I think we are meaning Panisonic. The original thread had to do with the Panisonic HDX900 and a new camera mounted mic instead of the $1250 stereo mic that Pani sells with it.

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HA! Oh, I thought it was some code word for undergarments or something... Nevermind...

Actually, in this case I think we are meaning Panisonic. The original thread had to do with the Panisonic HDX900 and a new camera mounted mic instead of the $1250 stereo mic that Pani sells with it.

Actually it's PanAsonic.

Eric

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Yeah, uhhhh.... my bad. Stuck here in Billings, MT doing a couple of stories for Inside the NFL, waiting to get the heck out of here, bored out of my mind and I can't spell. Must be the combo stench of oil refineries and horse crap!

Thanks for the correction, but still it was Panasonic and not Panavision.

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  • 1 month later...

When I have been using a camera like an HVX 200 I find attaching my Sanken CS-1 on a shock mount that rides with KTek and a shoe adaptor. What I like about this mic is, in edit, the mic seems to represent what I as an operator heard myself. Very documentary it is tight enough to get the proper angle and it just seems like that was what I remembered hearing if I was not on headphones. Very realistic.

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