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Recording Lav mics directly on person's body, but monitoring remotely
  • kronstadtkronstadt

    I've just had an idea that I wanted to share with you and ask if it would work.

    The setup that I want to achieve is: Lav mic plugged directly into Zoom H1, which remains on persons body (hidden under clothes), and records clean sound directly - no wireless intervention. The problem with such a setup is that there's no monitoring. So for monitoring alone I'm thinking of getting dirt cheap wireless transmission system (for under $50, I don't even know what options are out there) that would plug into the headphone jack of the Zoom H1 and transmit to the receiver that is plugged into a cheap field mixer. From there I should be able to monitor the dialogue between several actors with lavs on their bodies. I don't know if it would work? Any expert advice?

  • 5 Replies sorted by
  • Vitaliy_KiselevVitaliy_Kiselev

    Why make so complicated setup?
    And that you expect to monitor with cheap wireless system?

    If you need to monitor go wireless from the start. May be Samson DSLR system or similar things.

  • kronstadtkronstadt

    Why make it so complicated setup? Well, it's no less complicated then the usual setup. I'm just thinking of reversing the positioning of the recording device, and using more recording devices. Why? Because if you record with even expensive Sennheiser G3 system you still get a distorted/intervened signal into the recorder. For interviews it's okey, for a film it's not. To get a decently clean sound you will need to go to proper professional gear that runs in thousands.
    With this idea, I'm potentially recording DIRECTLY from lav mic into Zoom H1, and the wireless is only used for monitoring to make sure that the lav is not rubbing against clothes or something. So, to visualise, here are the 2 setups:

    Conventional:

    LavMic-Transmitter-Receiver-Mixer-Recorder

    My proposed:

    LavMic-Recorder-Transmitter-Receiver-Mixer

    Does it make sense?

  • fatpigfatpig

    I did this. Lav mic +zoom h1 - and h1 headphone jack connected to wireless cinch transmitter. very cheap. after distance of ~10 meters it starts to get a LOT of static.

    We used it for distances up to 50 metres, but then i had to get an extra amplifier to still hear the voice in all the static, which of course is amplified, too.

    it is not recommended if there is a better way for you ;) also, the external battery and the cables make the transmitter somewhat bulky.

  • kronstadtkronstadt

    @Vitaliy_Kiselev Thanks for the suggestion, I listened to Samson Airline Micro wireless UHF system here

    and even compared to such not-so-great system as Sennheiser G2 sounding even through a YouTube video , the Samson is a lot worse. So, for me, it's not an option to record with Samson Airline Micro. It would be great for the monitoring setup that I'm thinking of, but the £250 pricepoint is too steep for me. I'm looking for something a lot cheaper.

    @fatpig , which cheap transmitter did you use? Could you please post a link?

    The idea here is to achieve the greatest "purity" of sound for a minimal budget. A better alternative would be to use Letrosonics wireless system, but I just don't have £4000 for it.

    By the way, my lav mics are going to be either Tram TR-50 or OST-801. The discussion here is about the cheap transmittors that could be used just for simple remote monitoring.

  • balazerbalazer

    kronstadt, I think putting the recorder before the wireless transmitter is a good idea. But you can't go too cheap on the wireless setup: you want wireless that will be good enough to let you actually hear the audio problems that you are trying to avoid, without adding any noises that could mask other problems or not be differentiated.

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