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Audio Options for Camera with 3.5mm Jack?


brightnight

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I received some really helpful feedback from my previous post but had a few follow up questions I was hoping to get advice on. To recap: I’m filming outdoors with remotely triggered cameras but need professional quality audio. The camera will be housed in a waterproof Pelican case, triggered to record on motion, and there will be hundreds of clips every week.

 

The simplest way to include audio with the video would be to record the sound on the camera because syncing up the sounds for hundreds of clips a week would add significant time and complexity so I’d like to avoid that path if I can record at the same or similar audio quality.

 

Unfortunately the main camera I will be filming with (Panasonic GH5) films great video but only has a 3.5mm stereo jack for an audio input. There is a camera hotshoe XLR mic adapter but it’s expensive (DMW-XLR1 audio adapter is ~$400) and I’ll need multiple setups so that approach will be cost prohibitive. If I used something like a Sennheiser 416 which has an XLR plug and used an XLR to 3.5mm adapter to connect it to the camera, would I be losing noticeable audio quality or is there a better approach?

 

 

Sennheiser KA 600 adapter:

https://en-us.sennheiser.com/ka-600

 

 

I would pass the Sennheiser 416 XLR into the waterproof case that houses the camera with some type of waterproof XLR panel mount female to male connector to get the mic signal inside the Pelican case, then use the KA 600 adapter to get the XLR audio signal into the 3.5mm jack in the camera.

 

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You could use a significantly cheaper recorder than the adapter you mention, like the tascam dr60d, which is made specifically for small cameras. The zoomf4 is another, albeit more expensive option. You could look in the second hand market.

The downside of having an external recorder is of course they need power too. In your scenario that sound kind of like a problem.. On the other hand, I don't know of any other solution that would make the sound work without batteries of some sort. 

 

The mkh416 wouldn't even make a sound of you just plug it in to a camera with an adaptor. You need 48v phantom for that mic. Excellent choice though. 

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If it needs to be an MKH416 or other phantom powered condenser, camera recording and your budget is tight, you might consider the comica linkflex ad1 or ad2, depending which is easier apply a long term power mod. There are even cheaper phantom power boxes that are easier to long term power, but I presume the linkflex devices do some sort of impedance transition but at least have some sort of attenuation/gain feature.

 

EDIT: There is a reason, why the DMW-XLR1 has that price. As far as I can see, all preamp and AD conversion takes place in that thing, not in the camera. The 3,5mm inputs of these photo apparatus things are not made for professional audio and your "quality bottleneck".

If you go with the KA600 you can try out something like this: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32723605432.html

Or check bhphotovideo for something more professional that meets your price range. https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?Ntt=phantom power&N=0&InitialSearch=yes&sts=ma

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4 hours ago, brightnight said:

There is a camera hotshoe XLR mic adapter but it’s expensive (DMW-XLR1 audio adapter is ~$400) and I’ll need multiple setups so that approach will be cost prohibitive. If I used something like a Sennheiser 416 which has an XLR plug and used an XLR to 3.5mm adapter to connect it to the camera, would I be losing noticeable audio quality or is there a better approach?

Save money by getting a Deity S Mic2 instead of a 416, then you can get yourself a DMW-XLR1 for every GH5

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2 hours ago, IronFilm said:

Save money by getting a Deity S Mic2 instead of a 416, then you can get yourself a DMW-XLR1 for every GH5

 

+1

All unbalanced mic level connection to such an input is at risk of getting unwanted sounds (like RF, GSM, Hum ...) into the signal. If I have to feed such a camera input with the mixer, i always go wirelessly to keep the "cable part" as short as possible (and have a proper level). That seems absurd, but the result with a good wireless system (Sennheiser 2000) is way better - and even safer - than via cable from to the mixer.

 

I know that DWM from the GH4 (is it the same?) and was quite surprised about the audio quality boost it adds to the camera. You get a good inputs (with P48), serious level potis, a good AGC (if you need it) and an LED meter. Perfect separation between CH1 and CH2. At the high and low end even better frequency response.

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33 minutes ago, Mungo said:

to keep the "cable part" as short as possible (and have a proper level).

One solid way of "shortening" the cable, is to come out of the mixer at line level and then attenuate the signal to mic level right at the 3.5mm input, i.e., in the cable connector. The signal in the long part of the cable is at line level and much higher than the interference and then the interference is attenuated along with the signal at the camera. This cable construction would be worthwhile if you had to go to a camera at mic level on a regular basis.

Best Regards,

Larry Fisher

 

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48 minutes ago, LarryF said:

come out of the mixer at line level and then attenuate the signal to mic level right at the 3.5mm input

 

I do that all the time. Well not all the time; for instance, I'm not doing it right now. But it's been pretty successful when dealing with longish cable runs, crappy environments, and consumer recorders.

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5 hours ago, Jim Feeley said:

 

I do that all the time. Well not all the time; for instance, I'm not doing it right now. But it's been pretty successful when dealing with longish cable runs, crappy environments, and consumer recorders.

Thanks for the real world usage.

Best Regards,

Larry Fisher

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Jim: "...for instance, I'm not doing it right now."

 

-- You made me laugh -- thanks! --

 

Besides feeding a mic level input, there are other instances where padding at the plug is useful. Some of the Panasonic camcorders have been better served with a -10dB nominal over a 0dB or +4dB nominal. A cable padded at the camera plugs optimized them. Likewise, if you're feeding an Arri Amira that hasn't been updated to the proper input level (The Amira originally shipped with a +8dB maximum line input) a 16dB pad can optimize gain-staging into the camera to allow proper headroom. Then, of course, there was the Red One that required a lower line level.

 

On a side note, I believe Red is still the winner for the number of different audio connections and varied levels that can be incorporated.

 

While we're giving awards, Sony, of course, takes the prize for the creativity of different locations where a headphone jack is placed on succeeding camera models.

 

 

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I had so much trouble with cables pulling out and unbalanced lines picking up crap along the way and the lack of headroom on the camera input with no monitoring making nasty peaks a real possibility that I gave up and more or less insist that we put midfi wireless RX on the cams.  This gives them a ref mix that's limited, at the correct level, with the correct connector and with no cable, and they post sync to my recorded audio.  This method has been SOP on most DSLR or Black Magic etc shoots I've done for the past several years. 

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I'm all for G3ish wireless to small cams, but you know: expain the options/benefits, choose your battles, move on. 

 

And I guess it depends on the gig. Like if a webcast is pretty much an afterthought for a panel discussion or music performance, so you have a decent FOH mix, but you have a pretty long run until you reach the iPhone or a burritocam and you're sending sound through the camera because the web team can't deal with the sync issues (though OBS can...), so the audio's not going to be optimal but you can make it better than crappy. Or if you're trying to solve a problem similar to this thread's OP: Remotely triggered unattended cameras.

 

I don't dig 3.5mm and HDMI, but I can't always avoid them.

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On 5/25/2020 at 1:49 AM, Mungo said:

I know that DWM from the GH4 (is it the same?) and was quite surprised about the audio quality boost it adds to the camera. You get a good inputs (with P48), serious level potis, a good AGC (if you need it) and an LED meter. Perfect separation between CH1 and CH2. At the high and low end even better frequency response.


The Panasonic GH4 has the DMW-YAGH, which wasn't so popular (needing external powering was its biggest downfall), the newer DMW-XLR1 for the GH5 (and works too on the GH5S and S1/S1R/S1H) is in my opinion a much better design for its purpose. 

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1028546-REG/panasonic_dmc_gh4_yagh_lumix_yagh_interface_unit.html

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1304877-REG/panasonic_dmw_xlr1_xlr_microphone_adapter.html

 

 

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