A second option is to bypass the
camera completely and use an external audio recorder. “We always
recommend the use of an external recorder, such as an Edirol,” says Adrian
Kelterborn, a producer at Magnum In
Motion. An external recorder captures
high-fidelity sound with the XLR inputs
and audio monitoring capability lacking on DSLRs. However, since the audio
is being recorded externally, it needs to
be synced up after the fact with software like PluralEyes, which uses audio
recorded by the camera to harmonize
the sound and visuals.
The third option is to use a mixer/adapter, such as those made by Beach Tek or
juicedLink, which can collect audio from wired or wireless microphones and feed it
back into the camera (eliminating the need for post-shot synchronization). “It saves
time in the editing process, but there are challenges too,” notes Rick Gershon, a cinematographer and producer at MediaStorm. “You can monitor the sound going into
the adapter, but there’s no way to monitor what’s going into the camera.” If a cable
comes loose or the internal levels in the camera are off, the audio could be seriously
affected without you knowing it, he adds.
Often, photographers will employ these approaches in combination. For instance
John Lavall, who has directed documentary films and videos for editorial clients, relies on the Azden FMX- 42 mixer with wireless lavalieres and a boom as a primary
audio source with a Zoom H4n recorder as a backup.
Go Solo or BuDDy uP?
Whatever method you embrace, recording professional-grade audio can be a logistical challenge—if not a chore—for photographers who prefer to keep the focus on the visuals. In those cases, it’s better to have someone else worry about
it. “The best experience I had with sound was when I had an assistant doing it,”
Dimmock recounts.
It’s difficult to do all the audio by yourself and still have a redundant set of au-
dio files in case of emergency, Lavall adds. For this reason alone, he says, having a
partner who can rig and monitor a second set of mics and recorders can be a useful
insurance policy.
StorytelliNG
After all the technical problems are ironed out, issues of craft and composition come
back to the fore. While the photographers we spoke to had different approaches to
gear, the audio set-up followed a familiar pattern: wireless lavaliere mics on a subject with wireless boom microphones providing both a back-up to the interviewee
and a source of ambient sound. Kelterborn notes that ambient sound is often overlooked by photographers, but it provides crucial context.
“At the end of an interview, we advise recording about three minutes of the space
to capture that ambient sound,” he says. “It can fix some holes in the editing pro-
cess and it also can help you capture sounds that are specific to your story.” Just
don’t go overboard. “Too much audio recording can slow down the editing process,”
Kelterborn adds. “You need to have a goal in mind for your sound before you start.”
Anderson discovered that his sound editor liked multiple sound sources to play
with. “I used to think that a good, clean lavaliere recording of a subject was all you
needed and that the other channels I was recording with the boom and the camera
were just tossed by the wayside,” he says. “Turns out my editor likes to mix in the
other channels to give it a more naturalistic sound. He even used the camera’s own
mic audio a bit, which shocked me.”
At the end of the day, it comes back to remembering a truism about sound,
Dimmock says. “As photographers we don’t always understand its importance, but
viewers do. And they have a very low tolerance for bad sound.”
