Brandon Maughan

I'm doing some photography for a very low budget documentary on forestry workers next weekend, so low budget that there is no sound guy and all audio recording has to be done in camera. I have zero experience with this and am looking for some advice as to how to get the best sound.

We're working with an external mic on a boom that is (unfortunately) not a shotgun mic, It has a variable recording angle of 90 - 180 degrees. There is going to be a lot of dialogue (interviews and such) that occurs outside as well as indoors. Nothing controlled, it will all take place in natural environments (ie - nobody sitting in a quiet room) so I'm anticipating a lot of background noise.

I have a set of good noise eliminating headphones...what volume setting should I have the "phones level" dial set to to most accurately reflect what is being recorded onto tape?

There is a dot on the audio level indicator, It is white when the levels are set to auto, and green when set to manual...what does this dot mean?

On the audio level indicator, where should the levels rise to for a normal speaking voice?

Thanks in advance for any help you guys can give me on this.