UNIT 25: Sound Recording

Signal Paths and levels, audio-file formats

 Analogue sound waves replicate the original sound wave (what we are
recording)
 Digital sound wave only replicates the sampled sections of the original sound
wave.

The potential accuracy of an analog recording depends on the sensitivity of the

equipment and medium used to record and playback the recording

Digital audio fidelity depends on the rate at which the recording equipment
sampled the original sound wave over a specific increment of time. Even with the
newest technologies and techniques, digital audio still cannot create exact
replications of an original sound wave.

Analogue & Digital converters

Analogue to Digital converter (ADC) and Digital to Analogue converter (DAC) are
both crucial components when electronically recording sound. A simple way to look
at analogue signals, is as ‘real life’ sound signals. Therefore, the two converting
interfaces are crucial in order to convert the analogue signals into a digital version, in
order to allow electronic equipment to process the signals.

The way in which an analogue signal is converted into a digital signal is through
sampling the sound wave at regular time intervals, (as shown on the diagram below).
This is because, analogue sound signals have a continuous sequence and therefore
the values of the signal are continuous too. When turned into digital signals, the
values of the signal are broken down into sequences, formed through automatically
formed sample times of regular time intervals.

This diagram shows a continual signal (also known as an analog input),   turning into
a digital signal.
In order to reconstruct an analog sequence digitally in a way that the sounds similar,
there are various factors that can help this. For example, if the original analog signal
is slow in this example, and therefore it is easier to digitalize it. Another factor which
can help reconstruct the sound as accurately as possible is the resolution of the
ADC.

Sound Decibels

First thing to understand about decibels, is that they are the measuring unit for sound
intensity. The way this is measured is through comparing the power level of an
electrical signal with a given level on a scale. This helps to picture the change in
sound level in dB, to things such as loudness perception.

There are some safety and legal guidelines which must be considered when
recording sound. It is crucial to be aware of these in order to record at an optimum
level, to respect the laws and permanent risks related to hearing. For example,
sounds above 85db are known to be harmful to the human ear, and depending on
the time you are exposed to these high-level sounds and how often, the health
impact can be more or less significant. Usually, after being exposed to sounds over
the risk limit, that’s when your ‘ringing’ in your ears appears.
This chart shows some examples of familiar sounds to their designated noise level in
dB. For example, on average, a normal conversation is 60dB whereas a sports
crowd can be up to 120 to 129dB (although this noise level can be harmful).
Therefore, when recording sound, it is always important to keep the noise level in
mind, in order to record at an ideal optimum level.

Optimum Recording Levels

There is something called the permitted maximum level (PML), which is very
important when professionally recording sound. This is used to indicate the
highest a piece of hardware or program can go without the sound “clipping”
(which is another term for distorted sound).
In order to achieve the optimal recording levels, it is recommended that you set
the sound level quite close to the PML but without reaching or exceeding the
limit as this will cause the signal to be distorted therefore massively decreasing
the quality of sound.

The way ‘clipping’ is usually indicated in digital software is through a red light,
as a warning that the sound level has reached or exceeded the PML. If the
colour which appears is yellow, then what the software is trying to indicate to
you is that although the sound level
is acceptable, it is also approaching
the PML. Lastly, if the colour
appears to be green then you have
nothing to worry about as the sound
is acceptable and no distortion will
ruin the sound.
(An example of this is shown
below).

Optimizing output:
 Enclosure
 Surface Area
 Sound Dampening

Quick guide into how to avoid clipping:

1 – Choose the right amp

2 – Set your gain properly
3 – Avoid the bass boost

Lossless and lossy

Lossless compression: The audio quality doesn’t change or get worse when using
lossless compression (as the name indicates). The only thing which lossless
compression does to a sound file, is that it compresses the file, therefore decreasing
the size of the file by up to 50%, yet not losing any of the sound quality, therefore
making it a very useful process. Furthermore, lossless compression is reversable
process, meaning that the file can always be restored back to its original state.
Some examples of an open source lossless compression formats are FLAC and
ALAC.

Lossy compression: This type of compression permanently removes data; it

achieves far greater compression than lossless as it disregards less critical data as
not all data in an audio stream will actually be perceived by the human ear. It
reduces perceptual redundancy by identifying irrelevant sounds in the recording that
it is compressing, and then almost getting rid of these. Some examples include high
frequencies or sounds that occur at the same time as louder sounds are these would
be typically very hard to hear anyways.

Due to the way in which lossy compression compresses sound, the quality
somewhat decreases, therefore making lossy compression unsuitable for some
professional sound recording engineering applications. Although it is used in wide
range of applications, very popular amongst users, specially MP3 as it doesn’t take
up that much storage whilst still maintaining adequate quality. An example of an
open source for alternative lossy compression is Ogg Vorbis.

Audio file formats

What are File extensions?

File extensions are set by the characters at the end of a file name; for example .mp3
or .aiff. The purpose of the file extension is to indicate to you what type of file it is,
and tell the software which programs can open that file and which can’t.
There are many type of file extensions and formats such as uncompressed,
compressed lossless files and compressed lossy files.

The BWF (short for Broadcast Wave Format) is a file format for audio data only. It
can be a very useful file format as it also contains metadata which is a necessity for
all broadcast applications. It is an extension of the Microsoft WAV audio format, and
it is also the most popular recording format for file-based recordings such as
television and radio production for example. What it does, is exchanging audio
material between various different equipment based on different computer platforms.

Uncompressed

 WAV: This uncompressed lossless audio file was created by Microsoft and
they are now the standard PC audio file format. It is recognizable
by its file extension ‘.wav’, or sometimes it can be written as
‘.wave’. They can also be quite spacy, taking up an average of
10 megabytes per minute of sound.
Due to the fact that they are compressed and therefore
retain the best sound quality, they are mainly used by
professionals in the music recording industry.

 AIFF: This uncompressed audio file was developed by Apple and has the file
extension is either ‘.AIF’ or ‘.AIFF’, (usually in windows software
the file appears as .AIF whilst with MacOS software, it usually
appears as .AIFF). They also take up a generous amount of
space, roughly the same amount as a WAV file

 PMC: Also commonly referred to as ‘Pulse-code Modulation’, is an approach

to digitally represent sampled analogue sound signals. It is known to be used
in telephones and Blu-ray discs. The way in which it works is
through taking these analog signals and take rather large
number of samples at regular intervals in short amounts of time,
making it good quality. When using recording software, it
usually uses the PCM format to initially work with, and then
later converting it to another audio format such as MP3.
Furthermore, when played on speakers, audio files such as MP3s (which are
compressed files), are decompressed back into the PCM format. This is an
example to show how the PMC format is reversible.

 Compact Disc Digital Audio: Developed by Sony and Phillips, Compact Disc
Digital audio (CDDA), it is the standard format for audio
compact discs, which is why it is often referred to just as
‘Audio CD’. These types of files are created by the
operating system of the CD to represent the audio tracks,
meaning that this file can only be played from a CD. It is an
industry standard file format that serves the only purpose of encoding music
on CDs. CDDA files can’t be played on other technologies such as computers,
they must be converted to a different format such as MP3 in order to do so
first.
Compressed Lossless Files

 Apple.mp4: Apple lossless data is written with the filename extension of

.m4a. This extension is also used by apple for lossy ACC audio
data is an mp4 container. The M4A file quality and file size is
known for being better and smaller to other file formats such as
mp3, therefore making it a very efficient file format.
Furthermore, some of the reasons why when encoded at the
same bit rate, M4A files sound better than MP3 files are; the
smaller block size of samples (allowing more sound detail), the larger block
sizes in stationary signals (meaning less data can represent a portion of the
sound that isn’t as complex), and lastly, the compression based on perception
(losing sound data that isn’t audible to human ear without notable affecting the
quality). Some of the programs which can open these M4A files are
QuickTime and iTunes amongst a few others.

 ATRAC: The Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding, is a binary audio file

mostly used by Sony devices, such as PlayStation. This type of file can only
be launched with certain applications. There are many upsides to this file
format, for example, they occupy only a small amount of storage on a digital
player, which allows more free space for more files. Not only that, but they
also don’t drain the battery the same way other file formats do. The advanced
Lossless version of the ATRAC file is quite new and meets the CD quality
playback yet compressing the data to almost half the original size of the file
without deleting any of the information.

 MPEG 4: This type of format is a media container, for both audio, video and it
may even contain 3D objects, text and other types of media. It
is a standard media format and supports many different types of
audio and video codecs. The majority of MPEG 4 files are
written down with an .mp4 file extension when saved. Some of
the uses for this file format include compression of AV data
(which is for streaming media), and voice data for things such
as telephones, and broadcast TV applications for example.

 Windows Media Audio Lossless: This is an audio file format created by

Microsoft, that compresses an audio CD. Also known as a
WMA file, the windows media audio is a series of audio codecs
and their corresponding audio coding, and its regular format is
lossy, but there is also a lossless version of this audio file
format which provides the highest quality out of the two, for
ripping audio CDs.

Compressed Lossy Files:

  MP3: This is a strictly audio file format which is very popular and often
used to store audiobooks and music with a decent quality
(almost like the CD sound quality), although this quality
depends on the bit rate that has been used for the lossy
compression of the file. An MP3 is an audio file which has
been saved in a compressed format to take up less space
(roughly 1/10 of the size of a .WAV file). The grand majority
of portable music players, such as iPods are designed for MP3 files, and is
also supported by a rather large number of programs.

 Vorbis: This is audio file format is an open source audio compression

format which was created in order to replace the proprietary
audio encoding formats such as MP3, as it is free and
patent-free. It is written with the file extension of .ogg.

 ATRAC: The Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding, is a binary audio file

mostly used by Sony devices, such as PlayStation. This type of file can
only be launched with certain applications. There are many upsides to this
file format, for example, they occupy only a small amount of storage on a
digital player, which allows more free space for more files. Not only that,
but they also don’t drain the battery the same way other file formats do

 WMAL: This is a lossy audio file format created by Microsoft, that

compresses an audio CD. Also known as a WMA
file, the windows media audio is a series of audio
codecs and their corresponding audio coding.

Mono & Stereo recording and replay

 In monaural sound, as the name indicates, there is only a singular channel

that is reproduced through the speakers (whatever the number of speakers
is). This means that, since there is only one signal, this same signal is
replicated when played through all the speakers.
  Stereophonic sound on the other hand, uses one or more independent
channels (most commonly two) to feed the speakers, as you can feed the
different channels to different speakers. There are some advantages to this
setup, such as creating a sense of dimension, direction and space with the
sound, making this the most common stereo setup.

Microphones

 Lavalier microphones: When filming a presentation, or a scene in which the

characters are speaking but also moving around, this type of microphone is
useful as you don’t need to follow the subject around with a microphone as
they can subtly wear it with them wherever they go. It is a very small mic that
will always be close enough to the subject to be able to
successfully pick up their voice well. It is a good alternative
for recording speech in cases in which it is inconvenient to
be holding such a large piece of equipment such as a boom
pole, or keeping it out of the frame, if it is a wider shot.

 Condenser microphones: This type of microphones is most

commonly used when it is fine for them to appear on the shot or
only the audio is being used, such as in podcasts or voice overs.
This is because the microphone is placed very closely to the
subject, in order to fully capture the voice at a very high quality.

 Shotgun Microphones: Due to the pick-up pattern of these microphones, the

sound of the direction is pointed up can be isolated, which is a
major advantage. This means if the microphone is directly
pointed at the subject, it will only pick up a minimal amount of
ambient noise.

 Omnidirectional microphones: The most common characteristic of this

microphone, is its ability to pick up sound from all directions, as due to the
spherical shape of the microphone, all the sides can pick up
the sound with equal gain. Although they allow greater
flexibility for picking up sound equally from all directions,
which can be an advantage under certain circumstances such
 as recording a musical performance, it isn’t ideal for some other
circumstances.

 Bidirectional microphones: These microphones are able to pick up sound at

a very good standard from the frontal and back side of the microphone, but
quite poorly if the sound is coming from the either side of the microphone.
Although they are slightly less common, they are quite useful
for some scenarios, such as interactive performances or
lectures, where both the audio from the performer or lecturer
and the audience must be recorded with this microphone,
without recording any irrelevant ambient sound from the
sides.

 Unidirectional microphones: In contrast to omnidirectional

microphones, unidirectional microphones are built to pick up
sound with a very high sensitivity only from one specific side.

 Cardioid microphones: The places from which this type of microphone best
picks up high gain sounds are from the front and sides yet rather poorly from
the rear. An example of an appropriate scenario in which to use this
microphone, is during a live musical performance such as an
orchestra, as all the microphone can face the orchestra so
therefore the sound from the instruments are picked up by the
front and sides of the microphone, whereas the sounds from
the audience and ambient sounds from behind isn’t picked up
very well, if not at all.

 Hypercardiod microphones: Although the polar pattern of a

cardioid microphone is very similar to that of a hypercardiod, it
is more directional.

 Ribbon microphones: This type of microphone is known for being highly

detailed without crossing the line of being oversensitive. They are
bidirectional in nature.

Microphone Accessories
 Boom poles: This microphone accessory is most useful when
filming a live recording of interview or dialogue scene, in
which the subject isn’t going to be moving around too much. It
can be set up so it’s not in the frame but can still pick up well
the speech as the subject is mostly still. It is good for isolating
their voice from the rest of the irrelevant sounds in the shot. Boom poles are
suitable for both indoor and outdoor recording, although it must be kept in
mind that there might be some complications outdoors on a windy day.
  Pop shields: These are essential for studio (indoor) productions
when recording vocals and things such as voice overs. Pop shields
help prevent popping and banging noises. This simple piece of
equipment can make a big difference in increasing the quality of the
recording by filtering out unnecessary loudmouth sounds, making
the recording more industry standard.

Sound Recording studio equipment

This is some of the essential sound recording equipment for professional studio
recording sessions; Microphones, headphones, a computer, DAW, audio interface,
studio monitors, microphone stands and accessories such as the pop shield and the
required cables to connect all the sound recording equipment together.

 Power conditioner: What this piece of equipment does is consolidating the

power for all the cables being used down to only a singular cable, which is a
lot more convenient than having quite a few cables sticking out from each
unit.

 Rack mount: This piece of equipment allows various sound sources which is
a great advantage, especially since a more basic piece of equipment only
allows a very small number of simultaneous tracks. It has a very useful “rack
system” which allows to swap between the equipment to customize the sound
recordings.

 Preamp: This electronic amplifier is what helps avoiding noisy and distorted
signals by converting these weak signals into an output which is strong
enough for speedier processing and can also tolerate louder noises.

 UPS: Short for uninterruptible power supply, this back-up battery-like piece of
equipment is useful in case of an electric blackout, as it gives an extra few
minutes of power for safely saving and shutting down the computer, therefore
avoiding losing recordings or possibly damaging the computer.

Location Based equipment

Broadcast Recorder: Depending on the type of environment in which sound is

being recorded, there is specific equipment that will be more adequate to the
location. For example, TASCAM’s HS-P82 is a very good example of a recorded
which is specific to a location at the highest possible quality.

Handheld recorders: There is a very large number of different handheld

recorders (some more professional than others). These are usually
plugged into a camera, although these types of recorders are used a lot
less for professional shooting than broadcast recorders.

Cables

Analogue Cables

 Balanced cables: These types of cables are

somewhat immune to the outside interferences such
as frequencies which may interrupt the recording.
They have 3 wired: Ground, Signal (+) and signal (-).
The second signal is the one which allows noise-
cancellation and therefore is the standard cable used
in professional recording.

 Unbalanced cables: On the other hand, unbalanced

cables are best suited for other type of conducts,
such as connecting an instrument to an amp for
instance, rather than connecting microphones for
recording, although they are valid as well. They only
have to signals; ground and signal.

What happens when audio is processed by the signals inside of a balanced wire, is
that both the positive and negative wires would receive identical versions of this
sound signal, although with an inverted polarity from the negative wire. Whist both
wires are gathering noise as the two signals travel inside the cable, the polarity of the
negative is inverted up until reaching the opposite end of the cable, where the
polarity is then flipped back to match the polarity of the positive again. As the
background noise patterns then remain on opposite polarities due to this process,
they cancel each other out. This is how balanced cables are able to cancel out the
unuseful noise from the original signal.

As this process doesn’t take place inside an unbalanced wire as it doesn’t have a
negative and positive signal, the background noise can’t cancel itself out.
Cable Connectors

There are three different kind of connectors which a balanced analog cable can have
at the end and each of them contains three contact points which are the ones which
allow for the cable to carry the signals from the different wires (positive, negative and
ground). These are the types of connectors:

 TRS: This connector can connect both inputs and outputs. It also
has 3 surfaces on the end – these are the sleeve, ring and tip.

 XLR Female: This balanced connector is the one which would

connect to the microphone but can also connect to various
hardware outputs too in order to receive output signals from an
external device. The contact point has 3 holes.

 XLR Male: This balanced connector only connects to hardware

inputs such as a mixing desk or active studio monitors. The contact
points consists of 3 pins.

XLR connectors are mostly used for audio and music applications as well as
microphone cables and monitor speakers, this is because they are always balanced,
and not only have a very secure connection, but are also noise cancelling as
previously mentioned.

 TRS & TS Connectors: Although these connectors can be used

interchangeably, they are both made for different types of
cables. Generally, TS cables have two contact points (the
tip and sleeve) and are used for unbalanced mono
signals, which are very often found in guitar cables.

On the other hand, TRS connectors can be used for both

stereo signals as well as balanced mono signals. They
have three contact points instead of two which (just like a
TS connectors) are separated by an insulating ring. The
third contact point is an additional ring which allows for
stereo signals.
  The Stereo Mini Jack connector: These balanced connectors, are also
known as phone jacks or headphone jacks, as it is the smallest type of jack
connector which are the ones usually found in phones. It is
typically used for analog audio signals and can have anything
from two to five contact points, although these are not very
common.

 RCA Connectors: These are coaxial connectors for unbalanced cables

normally used to carry both audio and video analog signals.
There are three colours; yellow is for composite video
signals, whereas read and white are for stereo audio signals.

 USB: Stands for Universal Serial Bus and it is a connector. It is widely

used to connect to many different devices as it enables communication
between the device and a host controller.

Digital Audio workstation

DAW: Digital Audio Workstations are software or hardware programs (sometimes a

combination of the two), designed for recording and producing sound files as well as
editing digital audio.

Acoustic Settings

Interior

 Bathroom: Since bathrooms are usually quite closed and small

environments, when recording sound in such a place, there would usually be
some ringing in the recording, making it a tricky place
in which to record general sound recording.
Reverberation in a bathroom is too strong and
therefore can make for loss of intelligibility ( meaning
that there’s too much indirect sound in relation to direct
sound).

Since the easiest way to fix the awfully strong reverberation would be to treat
the room by adding layers of heavy, porous materials such as a sound
blanket, so air pass through and sound waves can be slowed down or
absorbed. Another thing that can be done in order to correct this, is to use a
condenser microphone with a cardioid pickup pattern would be best for
 recording in a normal or small-sized bathroom. More specifically, I would use
an AKG C636 microphone as not only it has a clear and well-balanced
response, but it has an excellent feedback rejection.
Furthermore, it would also be appropriate to use acoustic
panels, as these will further absorb the sound reflections
which are bouncing from the bathroom surfaces, specially the
parallel bathroom walls, since in acoustics it is preferable to
avoid parallel surfaces on one part and dimensions which are
a multiples of one another.

On the other hand, recording in a public bathroom, which are usually a much
larger size, will create a reflective reverb effect on the sound. These effects
are created by the nature of the room as well as the size and generally hard
surfaces which will reflect the sound waves creating the reverb effect. These
effects can be recorded purposely as they created in the
sound recording rather than post-sound recording can be
useful for certain atmosphere or effects. This is why
recording in a bigger public bathroom, (which also has
less obstacles such as towels, curtains, etc.) will be more
adequate if this is the aim to the sound recording. In this
case, I wouldn’t use any of the sound blankets or acoustic
panels.

 Church:

Churches are known for a having very unique and distinctive acoustics in which to
record sound in. This is due to a number of factors, such as the architecture and
material of the walls. For example, stone churches are brilliantly sound proofed from
any outside interferences. In these types of churches, the majority of the energy is
reflected against the stone walls which is what generates the distinctive church
reverberation. When recording sound in a church, the level of reverberation isn’t
strong enough to become too disruptive to the original sound, but enough to create a
very dramatic atmosphere and effect to the sound
recording, which is a reason why it is a popular place in
which to record for cinematic purposes. Furthermore,
due to the inner architecture of a church and furnishing
(this includes the benches, pedestals, etc.) with has a
great variety of different surfaces as well as shapes, this
helps create a nice reverberation.

When recording sound originating from the altar of a church (or the front section of
the church), the sound is then easily projected through the entire church.
Frequencies are an important factor which should be noted when recording in this
type of space. For example, low frequencies diffract and go around any obstacle
from inside the church (such as benches or columns), on the other hand, the high
frequencies will reflect and therefore bounce from the obstacles. Furthermore, as a
church is rather large closed space, the direction in which the different frequencies
will move in the space should also be considered when choosing in which direction
or spot to record. Low frequencies are omnidirectional and high frequencies are
directional. If recording sound with low frequencies of below 500Hz roughly, these
could potentially become problematic as thee frequencies can cause feedbacks in
the recordings.

The best way in which to tackle these potential problems, is to choose

appropriate equipment, based on all the factors, to record sound in the
church. Personally, I would consider using a combination of dynamic and
condenser microphones, depending on the type of sounds I would want
to record. If I had to record louder and more frequency-varied sounds, I
would use a Shure SM57 microphone which is a dynamic microphone.
This is because this microphone is well adapted to recording in large rooms as it has
been known to be used in stages. For recording speech, I would use the Audio
Technica AT2035, which is a condenser microphone. The reason for this it’s that it
is a very good and yet affordable microphone with a cardioid
pattern which will be useful when recording in this space and will
capture the voice at a very high sound quality. Using panels or
diffusers on the walls of a church would be highly unpractical due
to the great amount of surface area that they would have to cover,
therefore using the natural acoustics of the space instead of other
accessories, seems adequate to recording in a church.

 Studio:

A studio is quite different sound recording environment to the other ones I have
previously mention due to the fact that they are specially designed rooms with the
purpose of recording in them, therefore the acoustics
are fantastic and there are no unwanted background
noises to worry about when recording. When recording
anything from music to voice-overs in a studio,
maximum sound quality is always expected as an
outcome from this.

Therefore, when recording sound in a studio, first thing I

would do is ensure that the studio is adequately acoustically treated. This includes
either acoustic panels put in place in parallel walls in order to absorb sound waves to
clarify speech as well as reducing general noise by limiting the
reverberation in an enclose room such as a studio. On a more
specific note, I would want to use diffusers in a studio I’m using
to record sound in. I believe these would allow the most high-
quality sound to be recorded as the diffusers would act to
disperse and scatter the sound waves and therefore greatly
reducing the number of echoes created in the room.
Furthermore, recording studio walls should be acoustically insulated so that sound is
not reflected but absorbed, allowing the sound quality to remain high.
Lastly, in terms of microphone accessories, I would want to
ensure I use a pop-shield which I would place between the
speaker (if recording speech), and the microphone. This is
because I believe they are essential, especially for studio
recording, as the speech is going to be in high definition and
popping and banging sounds from standing too close to the
microphone when speaking into it, may become a problem in the
recording. Pop-shields will prevent this from happening and making the recording
industry standard.

Lastly, the microphone I would use would have to be a high-end

recording condenser microphone, as condenser microphones would be
placed very closed to the source, which is perfect for a studio setting. An
example of a great studio microphone would be the AKG C414 XLII.
This microphone has 9 switchable polar patterns, which would
be ideal for any situation, weather if it’s one sound source or
multiple sound sources. This is an excellent microphone which
will help record quality audio, especially in a prepared studio
environment.

Exterior

 Field:

There are many different reasons for recording sound in

an outdoor space such as a field, for example, recording
and capturing ambient noise for a sound background layer
or simply recording audio during the filming of a scene.
When recording in such a space, the main problem that I
would come across would be the wind, which would
interrupt the recording. This happens because when the
air coming at speed hits the capsule in the microphone, it appears as a low
frequency rumble or distortion. Some of the ways in which to avoid this disrupting
sound, is to either physically cover the microphone from the wind with your body as
you record.

Personally, I would also use a RODE microphone, as all RODE

microphones offer some sort of wind protection for when
recording in fields. A great option would also be to attach a
VMP+ to the camera – what is great about the VMP+
specifically, is that you can use the high-pass filter which
removes most of the low rumble which would appear in the
recording due to the wind noises. I would use the DeadCat
VMP+ as it is a fantastic option to maximize wind protection,
which is a furry wind cover designed for the VideoMic Pro+,
which is a RODE microphone. This would be my ideal
microphone equipment for recording in a field.

 Busy public space:

 Whist recording in a busy public space, the problems I
might come across are almost identical to the ones I
could come across when recording near a road. In this
type of environment, there is sound coming from many
different directions and there is generally a great amount
of noise which would disturb a potential recording. Since
it is impossible to get rid of these surrounding sounds
coming from people walking, speaking, etc. the best
thing to do to ensure the best possible quality recording is finding ways to reduce the
surrounding noise so that that the speech I am recording is predominantly louder
than the rest.

Once again, the worst possible microphone to use in this type of loud outdoor
environment would be an in-built camera microphone as the sound quality would be
really low and all surrounding noise would be predominant. Instead, I would
consider, if it is interview between two people, or if there is only one subject/sound
source when choosing which microphone and accessories to use. In any
circumstance I would proceed to use a handheld recorder, because not only they are
a very conveniently small piece of equipment that will be easy to transport around in
a busy space, but it also provides good quality audio. These are often used for
outdoor interviews in public spaces at a professional standard. An example for a
good handheld recorder is the Zoom H1n. It has X/Y stereo microphones, which is
best for interviews due to the pick-up pattern. The in-built
filters help record clean and distortion free audio, blocking
out as much of the background soundwaves bounding off
every hard surface and coming from every direction.

In the case that instead of only having one subject to record

audio from I would use the Movo LV1B lavalier microphone,
as this can easily be used with the Zoom H1 cam recorder
through its mic-line. A lavalier microphone is a perfect
microphone for recording audio in a busy public space. Even though it is an
omnidirectional microphone, the sensitivity level can be changed around in order to
only pick-up a small range, that mainly concludes of the subject speaking, which is
ideally the best thing needed when recording in a loud public space.

 Near a road:

When recording in a location with a road or highway nearby, it is common to come

across some difficulties in terms of sound recording. There isn’t a filter which can
simply get rid of the road noises in a recording. Although there are some tools that
can be used to minimize specific frequencies, these won’t ever completely remove
this loud, disruptive noise. In such an open space, the
sound waves being emitted from the road, will be
projected in all directions and bounce off from other
vehicles and road signs or nearby obstacles, therefore
the sound will be heard no matter what and it’s a hard
task to ensure these noises are as minimized as possible
in the recording.
I would avoid using a mounted camera mic at all cost and instead
use a shotgun microphone, although they can only attenuate
sound, not reject it, which is a big misconception when it comes to
recording in this type of environment, but it would be the option.
Due to the pick-up pattern of these microphones, the sound of the
direction is pointed up can be isolated, which is a major
advantage. This means if the microphone is
directly pointed at the subject, it will only pick up a minimal
amount of ambient noise originating from the road. I would
specifically use the VideoMic Pro+ again, as it is a very high
quality and you can use the high-pass filter which removes most
of the road noises if the microphone is pointed at the subject.

Because shot gun microphones must be pointing in the direction

of the subject/sound source, during filming, the microphone should not appear in the
shot. Therefore, in terms of microphone accessories, a boom pole would be useful in
order to hold the microphone in the environment. Usually, the microphone is at a
high angle pointing at the source from a high angle, this is where the boom pole
would be very useful in terms of holding the microphone in place.

There is a last option which replaces the shotgun microphone with a lavalier
microphone. This would be best fitted for filming a scene near a road where instead
of being somewhat still, the sound source/subject whom is speaking, is also moving
around. It is a useful microphone as you can change around the
sensitivity level and don’t need to follow the subject around with
a microphone as they can subtly wear it with them wherever
they go. Furthermore, if the subject turns their back to the road
near them, their body would act as a barrier to stop the sound
waves from reaching the microphone and therefore barely
appearing in the recording. A good choice would be the
Sennheiser ME2 lavalier microphone.