Today I did a field test if my ZOOM Q2 HD. I took it to Clear Creek Metro Park an hour southeast of Columbus Ohio, went a mile down a trail to an isolated ridge, and put it on a tripod. Then I sat there for an hour. Most of it was audio, set at a 150 degree stereo spread, but I got a few minutes of video too. Audio Sound Quality was set to PCM 96/24, which is a very high quality setting. Lo Cut was off, as was auto gain and sound monitor. Video quality was set to HD720/30, which is good for online content but not high enough to be sent to a television using the built in HDMI output. This is one of the last quiet spots near Columbus Ohio that is open to the public, so I was intrigued to get audio from here of the woods on a cold Thursday afternoon in January. I was surprised by the amount of birds! Having never field tested this camera before, I turned off the autogain and cranked the input gain all the way up. I wish I hadnt, because now theres a lot of hiss due to the very very quiet environment not feeding the preamp with signal to keep the noise down (signal to noise ratio...duh, think Brandon!) Also, were I to do this again, Id have turned the Lo Cut on. As youll hear in the video clip, there is a lot of very low end rumble that comes in when the wind hits the mic capsule. I dont yet have a windscreen, so the capsule was being hit by a gentle breeze and it sounds like bigfoots bastard wasp mutant stepson on steroids buzzing close to the mic. Thats not taking place in the audio only recording because I changed the angle and apparently the wind wasnt hitting it at that angle. I also shouldve taken my AKG K240s with me so I could do a test record and listen back to hear that these problems were taking place, but thats a hard learned lesson for next time. Anyway, Im waiting for someone to run his waves restoration bundle on it to see how it would sound without the preamp hiss. Next time, Ill take headphones and test the levels before committing. The recording was secondary to just getting out for a bit into some quiet, but were this planned better Id have been better prepared. Heres the audio. Im sitting 5 feet from the mic, but the preamp is so hot that when I open a bottle of mountain dew it sounds like Im doing it in the mic. I tried to sit very still for this, but when I would turn my head it would pick up the sound of my clothes. In other words, this mic is sensitive! I was impressed by HOW sensitive! https://dropbox/s/kgve46mndul1y9l/woods.wav?dl=0 Heres the video. Youll hear the amount of camera handling noise this thing has in this clip (I trimmed that out of the audio version). This version also has the wind hitting the diaphragm in a way that makes it sound like an angry mutant insect flying closeby. https://dropbox/s/1aj2wzhkamk1eny/ZOOM0017.MOV?dl=0 I may put this on youtube too after I get the noise reduced version back.
Posted on: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 02:58:32 +0000
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