Having trouble understanding an audio concept
 

I feel this kind of seems like a stupid question
but I am confused so I'll ask.
I've recorded some loud bands. My mikes are
high sensitivity so I've used attenuators
to keep the cam pre's from overloading.
The result is that I can keep the pre's in
check, and the band music sounds alright,
but because of the high attenuation, crowd
noise is almost non-existant. You see the
crowd members dancing and yelling but all you
hear is the band.
Would I be better using a mike that is low
sensitivity (and not needing the attenuator)?
I would think: a high sensitivity mike with
an attenuator should equal a low sensitivity
mike without an attenuator.
But, I have also noticed that when you use
a low sensitivity mike (such as a dynamic)
for spoken word around a loud background,
that the background is much quieter
in comparison to the spoken word.
Ultimately, my qusetion is: would I get more
crowd noise by going with a low sensitivity mike
and not using the attenuator, than going
with the high-sensitivity mike with an attenuator?

Something I've done in this situation is to use a mixer with a secondary mic set-up. So, at the end of a song I increase the input from the secondary "crowd" mics. This is okay - at elast yo get some crowd ambience and you can always mix one segment into another in post. However, what I've decided is that I would really prefer to have another person dedicated to the audio so that I can concetrate on the video.

Also, if possible, once you have a mixer (and reasonable performing mixers are available under $100), tyr getting a direct feed from the sound board.

I like to ask a question I have a Sony FX1 HDV am I able to use the direct feed from the sound board with this camera and if so what would I need? I have been shooting my Nephews band allot and someone asked me the other night If I can do that a direct feed to my camera. Thank's for any info you all can give.

Chad

Move the mics so as to include the audiencce.

Regards,


Ty Ford

What you should be concerned about is the volume ratio between the audience and the live band. Attenuation does not affect this ratio. Recording either noise improperly can affect the ratio (i.e. too loud = distortion/clipping, too low = noise which can bury the audience sound) but that more or less is a seperate issue.

As Ty suggests, if you move the microphone closer to the audience then you will pick up more audience while the live band volume remains the same. This helps even out the volume ratio between the two.

In post production, you can affect the ratio between the two if you apply compression. Compressors are hard to explain, but more or less it's a good idea to try to get the right balance between audience and band when you shoot.

This is probably the inverse square law at work. The closer you get to the sound source with a microphone, the louder it gets.

It seems that a shotgun with good rear rejection like the AT4073 aimed away from the band/loudspeakers and toward the audience should help.

You really should record the audio off the sound board. That way you get the live mix already done and if the sound man lets you, add a crowd mic. The audio should not go to tape but into a seperate device such as a sound card or external cd recorder. That way, you can add this audio to the timeline andedit from within. Once I sync up the imprted audio with the tapes audio, I either mute the tapes audio or totally delete it and replace it with the new audio.