I beg of you...

I haven't posted in a really long time, as you can see. It's more the laziness in me than anything else. I think about blogging and even write it in my head but when the opportunity arises to actually put anything done, meh.

So today I figured maybe I should put something down. You see, if you follow me on twitter at @CoolGuyGreg, you may have seen me bitching about poor audio in online video and streams. So I figured maybe I'll explain to folks how to get good audio and who knows, just maybe someone will listen and I can once again hear what may be some good content.

The technology, both online and off, has finally gotten to a point where anyone can record and post videos to a website or social network. I think this is grand. Although it makes my job as a multi-media producer a bit harder to sell professional video at times. I am pleased that folks have finally come around to the benefits of what a video can offer to their brand or cause or whatever.

But lets keep in mind folks that you are still speaking to an audience with short attention spans. An audience that at times will multitask while watching your video of you interviewing the next online star. If the audio is poor, it's very likely that you'll loose your audience before they ever hear how to start that next big pyramid scheme.

You see, audio is very subconscious. An untrained ear will not be able to tell the difference between good audio and poor audio, unless it's really bad or a side-by-side comparison. But with poor audio, at a subconscious level, your viewer's attention begin to drift and they begin to think of other things even to a point of changing the channel. How many videos have you watched online where you maybe had to back up and watch something over again? Or you don't quite recall what you just watched was about? Very likely the audio was poor. You can usually get away with bad video, but not bad audio.

Now, let's talk about how you can improve this. It first starts with camera selection. As sad as it may be, not all camcorders have an external audio input. For example, The Flip family of camcorders helped usher in this DIY video revolution but for some reason left off the external audio input, and even more mysteriously continues to leave it off. An on-camera mic may be fine if you're a foot or two away from the camera and in a somewhat quite surrounding, but when you try and conduct an interview with an on-camera mic from 6 feet away, well...IT SUCKS. So, if you haven't yet purchased a camera make sure you find one with this feature.

"But Greg, I've already bought a camera without an external audio input", no worries, I'll cover this later. Just let me finish with the folks who like to do things right the first time around. :)

So, now that you have a camera with an external audio input lets look at you audio choices. The biggest excuse I hear from folks is that you can't get a microphone without spending hundreds of dollars. Horseshit? Spend a few minutes doing some research on this great but little known website called Google and you'd be amazed at what you'd find.

For you penny pinchers out there, try the Sima SDW-150 wireless microphone. Is it any good? I have no idea, but it was the cheapest one I found at about $58. Frankly I wouldn't spend less than $100 myself, but that's me.

My recommendation and still affordable would be the Audio Technica Pro 88W and the Azden WLX Pro. Are these "great" mics? Not by any stretch, but I've used them both and they work great for the kind of online videos you'll be doing. The great thing about them both is that they come with camera shoe mounts/adapters to put on the camera. Also, if you invest in a 1/8" to 1/4" cable, you can plug the transmitter into a sound system.

For those of you who are big spenders or pseudo audiophiles, my personal choice and mic that I use, the Lectrosonics 100 Series. This is a great microphone but comes with a hefty price and is not necessarily made for smaller consumer cameras. If you're wanting one of these, lets chat.

So now, for those of you who already have the cameras without an external audio input, fear not. There is light at the end of the tunnel. Get yourself a portable digital audio recorder like the Zoom H2 Ultra. This is a great little recorder and actually does a great job recording audio. You can hold it in your hand or plug in a lavaliere and slip the puppy in your pocket. These devices record to some flavor of flash media and can easily be imported into almost any editing program. When editing the audio to the video, use the crappy audio from the camera to help you match them up.

I hope this stuff is helpful. Let me know if you have any questions. Hopefully someday I can watch a DIY online video interview and be able to watch the whole thing all because I can intelligibly hear it.

Internet video worth watching

Video on the internet has become commonplace these days. Unfortunately about 90% of it is crap. Anymore than 60 seconds and you're on to the next video. A musician buddy of mine sent me a link where he and some fellow musicians were featured on a NY based music blog site, hoovesontheturf.com. The sites owner, I only know her as sarahana, shoots video of the musicians performing and I must say she does a superb job. The videos are creative but beautifully simplistic and in my opinion, that is refreshing. You won't find her using every effect you can find in the box. Instead you have a beautifully shot video that you can't stop watching. Her camera moves are smooth and subtle, never jarring. It appears she uses mostly natural light and all the performances are unrehearsed and 'real'. You get the sense you are there with the musicians rather than watching a video. Her color-correction is tasteful and adds to the enjoyability of watching. Of course to any great video you need great audio. The audio in the videos are clearly nat sound, but it lacks the 'tinyness' you can sometimes get with onboard camera mic. My assumption is she is sweetening the audio a bit. Another great thing is that she is posting the videos to Vimeo which keeps the videos high quality rather than YouTube which re-compresses the video so much it's hardly enjoyable. Overall, sarahana is a talent to follow and her site is now one of my favorites. Thank you for making available great and enjoyable video that is clearly top notch. It's too bad she's not local to Seattle so I can hire her.


Luke Winslow-King at the Secret Garden, pt 2 from hoovesontheturf on Vimeo.