Recording sound separately

Tim Myers · October 21, 2005

I need to record sound separately from my camera, and then get the recorded sound into my computer. How do I go about doing this? I haven't got more than a couple hundred dollars to spend and no clue what to even use to record sound in such a manner. Any ideas?

Theo Lipfert · October 21, 2005

Rent a Marantz compact flash recorder and a shotgun mic. The marantz connects to your computer via USB, and it sits on your desktop like a hard drive. Then all you do is drag the Wav files over, and drop them into Premiere, FCP, Avid -- whatever you are using to edit.

Good luck.

Theo

Bozeman, MT

Matt Irwin · October 26, 2005

No matter what you end up recording on, make sure you get a slate and hit the sticks close to the mic. It will be much easier to sync in post.

Grainy · October 26, 2005

wait wait wait a sec... are you talking about film or video?

just to review, in film, to record SYNC sound, you'll need:

1 - a QUIET camera that runs at constant 24 fps

2 - a sound recorder that also runs at constant 24 fps.

Getting this stuff over to your computer can be done in a variety of ways.

Just want to make sure the shorthand I'm seeing here isn't misleading someone.

G

Mike Nutt · November 3, 2005

OK, so say you have an Arri BL with a crystal sync motor and a Tascam DAT. I don't understand how you're physically supposed to connect the two. I mean, does the crystal motor regulate the DAT's power supply? That doesn't seem right. What is the "4-pin XLR" on the sync motor for? I assume that's how the actual syncing is taking place...?

David Mullen ASC · November 3, 2005

OK, so say you have an Arri BL with a crystal sync motor and a Tascam DAT. I don't understand how you're physically supposed to connect the two. I mean, does the crystal motor regulate the DAT's power supply? That doesn't seem right. What is the "4-pin XLR" on the sync motor for? I assume that's how the actual syncing is taking place...?

You don't need to physically connect a crystal-sync 24 fps camera and a crystal-sync sound recorder (although many DAT's aren't crystal, they are close enough). You just need to shoot a slate and clap it at the head of the scene after the sound has started rolling, transfer the sound to your editing system, and line-up the sound of the clap to the image of the clap on the film. If this is a time-code DAT, you can also get a "smart slate" with time code displayed on it, "jam" it in sync with the DAT so that the same time code is displayed, and then shoot it at the head of the scene, then line-up the time code numbers on the DAT in your editing system with the time code numbers on the frame of film. But clap the slate just in case.

Or you can send your sound tape to the telecine facility with your film and have them sync it to your picture themselves onto the videotape. Either way, you need a slate at the head of the shot and you need to clap it.

Phil Rhodes · November 3, 2005

Hi,

Non-crystal DATs?

I'm not sure I've ever come across a helically-scanned tape deck that wasn't taking its servo controls from some kind of crystal timebase. Really?

Phil

Mike Nutt · November 3, 2005

So is the crystal motor on the Arri just regulating the fps, making sure it runs at a constant rate? Still curious what that 4-pin connector is for...

Thanks for your help.

Michael Collier · November 3, 2005

not that i would question Mr. Mullen. If he has seen it it must be so, but I remember one time I was designing a digital tachometer for a class and had a little microcontroller that i was programming and the crystal was like 4 bucks. 20 MHZ it would loose on clock cycle (+/- 1/2,000,000 of a second) a day.

I would be surprised that in a thousand dollar dat they would not have a crystal involved. There are even cyrstals in my X-box controllers.

I would also wonder just how efficient can charge-loop timers be, or even TTL given that temperature can affect the speed at which they clock.

November 4, 2005

I love this forum - feels like I'm back in filmclass techniques and technologie. All this sophisticated syncing is nice, but is it really necesairy with the short sceenes most of us use. How much deviation can you have in a 6 second sceene (which we find long nowadays) even if you record with your granduncles reel to reel from the 60s and use a springwound camera that shoots approximativaly 23 to 26 frames per second. I find it possible to sync sufficiantly most footage with most recording devices as in a sceene you have rarely many instances where you need exact sync. I would start thinking about the problem if I wanted to shoot talking heads in minute long interview sceenes for example. My advice would be: Use a good old noisy slate, and make your film without any further worrys about syncing. You will be able to pull it together in the edit.

Grainy · November 4, 2005

Two things come to mind:

1 - crystal sync/timecode = constant speed guaranteed.

Otherwise there can be drift -- regardless of whether you're taking about digital, analog, or whatever.

2 - if you're shooting for quick-cutting, you still want solid elements in longer takes for your footage. A general rule is ten seconds on each end of a take, just in case. You don't want to get stuck in edit, with all your filmstock shot, actors gone home, etc. and realize you're missing a beat here and there beause you were too cheap to give yourself some coverage on either end.

That said... yes, online editing gives more leeway and it can certainly be done that way. It'll be a big hassle, though. Be SURE and keep very detailed and complete camera and audio logs!

Good luck

G