Hello Phil and the Rest of RU-vid. Being that you've given us so much information on how to let us do things, be it mapping for setting up microphones, I thought I'd at least give some information back. Having produced music with vocals as the main focus, I thought I'd share some tips. 1. ALWAYS, and I mean ALWAYS check if you're recording to mono. As stupid as it may sound, some mics do record in stereo-which is completely stupid as you want your voice to be heard on any medium of sound. If your mic is on stereo, it could cause some phasing. (Phasing being sound of the exact same soundwaves hitting each other and canceling out. i.e. NO SOUND) 2. Never bring up the bass in a voice. Like in tip 1, you want your voice to be heard on any medium. Some phone speakers/shitty headphones can't produce bass as well as others. Meaning, you'll end up losing a lot of quality within your voice. If you want to be heard and keep it "pro," try cutting off anything below 100hz. Then adjust anywhere between the 200hz-10khz freq range. Only do slight bumps in dBs though as the mid-range is very sensitive. 3. If your mic does just pick up low volume, try to find a normalize tool within your audio editor. This brings the highest points within your audio to exactly 0dB without clipping. Clipping is digital distortion of audio and happens when audio goes over the 0dB threshold.
+Lazaro Aguilar You can bring up the bass but not that much audacity isn't the best program for bass boosting but a voice without bass is better to listen to. You said that shitty speakers and headphones can produce bass as well yes they can but you have to aim for the best sound on the average quality of most speakers and headphones. And most people don't have bass boosting headphones or speakers.
i love this post because i listen to so many podcast/info style videos and i hate when i hear the guy talking 80% in on ear because they are not recording in mono
Hey Philip, I just wanted to say that this is one of the very few videos I always keep coming back to on RU-vid. This has helped me immensely on very many different projects. Thank you so much!
I watched this video ages ago but today I was doing a university project where we needed a clip with commentary and I remembered this video and used these tricks to get good audio for it. Thanks!
Phil, lemme just say this. *THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS VIDEO!* Holy hell, I thought I will never be able to have consistently good audio quality with my videos, but after I tried these tips out, my recordings sound AWESOME! Thanks again, Phil, you are _the best_!
You may have not known this but you have just saved my life. THANK YOU SO MUCH! I been having this problem and all my musician friends never told me what you just did with such precision.
I have a laptop from 2003 (Dell Latitude D600) and I manage to get really good audio quality with its built-in microphone by reducing noise, boosting bass and high treble (14KHz+). It's almost studio quality
I use the same microphone and so does my friend. But background noise is extremely loud. We both use Audacity for recording as well as noise removal (I actually find the best effects is to use Noise Removal *Twice* - first time at -10 sensitivity, then re-selecting the background noise and doing it again but this time at 0 sensitivity) 3kliksphilip Steve Goergen Any suggestions for this specific microphone? It's about a foot away from my mouth and about 45° away from where I talk. I don't have a popfilter.
To get my recordings as consistent as possible, I also use the compress and normalize tools. I haven't really used the leveler, because the previously mentioned tools usually get it sounding good. The equalize tool is also a good one if you want to fine-tune how your voice sounds. I love Audacity.
DavidJonSpem Well my speakers are getting quite old... It's a Logitech X-530 surround system. Could that be it? I never noticed any lack in quality though : /
Vulture153 most of the time speakers with speakers it can be that the noise in your surrounding area is the same as in the in the video a little bit noise that you wont even hear
Apparantly this can also be used to make a recording of a vinyl sound "better". I've had a digital file of It's a long way to Tipperary laying around and decided to improve the audio, because the recording wasn't done with a good recordplayer.
Well done. The video construction is concise and informative with a large portion of sarcasm. (Makes the medicine go down a little easier). You've got a like and comment from me sir.
I like your humor. Instead of using Amplify to make the volume consistent throughout your recording though, I would suggest using a compressor then hard limiter.
To make your clip a lower volume I would suggest to go with normalizer instead of amplifyer and lower the volume. Oke normalizer is trying to get all the volumes and peaks at the same volume level but it is better to listen to a consistant volume level than peaking sounds with a quieter voice.
Hello Phillip, I've been using a Samson mic with a 3.5 mm connector for the past few months. The problem I have with this is that the volume (or input) of the mic is very low no matter what I do. I am completely stumped, is it just a shitty mic or what? The specific model is a: "Samson Q7 Handheld Dynamic Microphone"
New podcaster here and I am furious with all the cords and mess. you are hilarious! thank you for making me feel like less of a dick for not wanting to be bothered by cords
Which do you prefer: Desktop mics or headset mics? I personally own a headset mic that was decently expensive, but I have never been satisfied with the quality (maybe I'm just not used to hearing myself speak). Either way, I'm curious as to what you think is better in terms of quality.
I wish one could have such functions built-in when talking with friends in csgo, discord, teamspeak, skype etc... I bet that they do have function like that in their softwares, but not every softwarehave it , and not specific for my situation with my background noise and my microphone.
It may be worth mentioning that you could use a compressor to not have to record at lower levels or speak louder to the mic, at least if you have the money to burn on a compressor.
It is possible to get great results from a rather cheap microphone, just as it is possible to get horrible results from a professional one. I happen to own a Rode NT1A microphone, a highly praised and generally beloved mic, yet the raw recordings can be quite horrible if let's say your pc is loud, you set the sensitvity too high on your mixer and a loud car happens to drive by your house (even though your window is closed and you yourself might not even have heard it with your headphones) and so on. Here's what i'm trying to get at: In the end it's worth more to have a somewhat soundproof place to record than to have the best mic. If you have a great mic but record in a shitty location, well.. now you have pretty good recordings of horrendous background noises which not even a brush tool can remove entirely without messing up the voice itself. That means that you'll either have to use a combination of a general brush for any kind of consistent background noise and lots individual brushes (or other correction methods which i won't go in to now) to remove the inconsistent sounds one by one, resulting in a mediocore and inconsistent recording. Moral of the story: Take care of the recording location first and buy a mic later, even if it's a cheaper one. It'll safe you a lot of time, the results are going to be better in the end and you'll feel really cool when recording in your own little "studio", no matter how amateurish it might be.
Philip, The samson mic u have in this video is the exact one I have. I stopped using it because it didnt sound good, but do you know how to fix the quality for that specific one?
I'm using the Zoom H4N and the thing I'm annoyed with is mouth noise, the microphone is so good it picks up the sounds from my saliva ^^ I need to use de-kliking filters
The Samson Meteor is a pretty microphone, but unfortunally, the background noise is way too present. You can check that i'm not alone to hear it, do a simple search on youtube for "samson meteor noise", you'll see. Ok, the noise I have is around -40db, but it makes it unusable for any "serious" recording. Use it for skype or what's app.
@@markusvdt2540 with an aux 3.5mm jack or possibly a usb port, for the latter i assume 2.0 as i believe a toothbrush wouldn't support usb3. i am aware that there is adapters between the two however i do not the know if the compatibility between the two would be substantial enough to record audio or even if said adapter/ multi cord would supply enough voltage and or amperage to be able to sustain a level of power consistent to keep it on and the recording of audio at once, as i am not an expert on the subject i hope this explanation is substantial enough for now, however i will be doing further studies upon this subject in the future. thank you and goodbye
I have a Meteor Mic, though I don't use it anymore as it is way too sensitive. It picks up all little things around me, even more so than my condenser mic.
HOw do you get your audacity settings to apply to your mic? I will get my audacity recording to sound nice, but If i go into cs my mic will be just as bad, no change. IS there a way I can get my settings to apply from audacity to apply to my mic permanetly?
