Ever wonder what mic you should buy?
I get questions about mics. What do I use in my webcast? What mic do I recommend?
Sound quality can be huge determinant in whether people keep watching your video or not. Bad sound means a bad video. While I don’t try to bill myself as an audio expert, I can offer my experience with mics that I’ve personally used.
I compare 6 different mics in this episode:
Audio-Technica Pro 70
Sennheiser EW 100
AKG Perception Presenter 45
Blue Yeti
MacBook Pro internal mic
Microsoft LifeCam Studio internal mic
How about your mic experiences? Please share your thoughts in a comment. 🙂
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BACKGROUND OF THE SHOW
The Rosa Media Productions Webcast is a proof of concept project I launched when I wanted to determine the business value of a webcast using entry level equipment. I have a background in elementary education and had experience making videos and putting together on-campus broadcast systems on the cheap. When a new school client asked me to set up a broadcast studio that would use the Internet as its distribution system, allow for multiple camera capture/switching, and not break the bank. I put together this system based around Telestream’s Wirecast virtual switching software. Ada Harris School News (grades 3-6) under the leadership of Mark Grisafe has gone on to knock it out of the park with their system.
I soon began to dream up other uses for the set-up ranging from an inexpensive way to throw together email marketing videos to a way to capture and live edit a low cost instructional course; from an entry-level seminar archiving tool to an entrepreneurial online video show.
I put together my system and now have started this show as a proof of concept. I’m actually much more comfortable behind the camera than in front of it making most of my money producing videos for and about clients. Even when I was running a daily broadcast in my former career as a tech teacher, I tried to keep the live editing to a minimum. I’d rather knock off the rough edges in the editing room. However, having an opportunity to edit and host a video show is an excellent opportunity to grow my skill set and put the system through its paces.
I’ll be trying to give my own critique of my shows in the comments on my website. I welcome your input and questions. Hopefully over time we’ll see improvement in my abilities and the quality of the show.
Content-wise: I’m overall satisfied with how this turned out although I wish I had been more concise. I actually had another version of this that ended up being something like 24 minutes long… No, please! Hopefully this comparison adds value and answers some people’s questions about the mics used here.
Technically-speaking: I’m actually disappointed with the overall sound quality of my webcast. I would give it a 6-7 out of 10. I listen to a podcast like Cliff Ravenscraft, Michael Hyatt, or Dave Ramsey and I hear the richness of their audio. I would love to deliver that. I think my pro video services start to approach that. But this entry level webcasting system is not there. It makes sense to me that putting $1599 into audio equipment is going to bring a much higher level of quality than the $231.50 I put into mine.
Paul Clifford at Tech, No-Babel http://trinitydigitalmedia.com/category/podcasts/tnob/ has told me how adding a compressor/limiter or a signal processor to the system helps with the sound… The ones Cliff Ravenscraft and Robbie Ferguson talk are around $400.
This kind of pro audio is actually all new territory and a growth point for me. For now I’m going to stick with my entry level system in the spirit of the proof of concept idea…. and staying in my budget. 🙂