Webcam, Lights, and Audio for Remote Work, Podcasting, Videos, and Streaming

https://mattstauffer.com/blog/setting-up-your-webcam-lights-and-audio-for-remote-work-podcasting-videos-and-streaming/

by ryanmaynard • 6 years ago

309 129 6 years ago

I was a bit surprised to see the recommendation of another inline preamp in the chain with the Focusrite. He recommends a TRITON AUDIO FetHead Filter in-Line Microphone Preamp. Does anyone have further experience with this setup? I've been using my MXL Mics 770 Cardioid Condenser Microphone with a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 with nothing in-between. I know I've got the gain dialed up pretty high but it never occurred to me to put something else in between them. I'd love to hear your experiences and recommendations. Is an in-line preamp worth it?

meheleventyone2• 6 years ago

I don't see that recommendation in the article. Rather it's specific to the SM7B which is famously pretty quiet.

I use a Cloudlifter with my SM-58 just because the gain it provides is a lot cleaner than my interface (Audiobox iOne) seems to provide at the top end.

geerlingguy4• 6 years ago

It also gives you a little more headroom for doing things like talking at a greater distance from the mic (e.g. talk at 6-10" from the mic and still get great signal).

Of course, if the room acoustics are horrible, that's not going to sound nearly as good as talking close to the mic, but if you have a decent sounding room it is freeing to not have to be close (and a good mic won't necessarily sound worse at slightly longer distances).

echelon• 6 years ago

I use Scarlett 4i4, Cloudlifter, and a Shure SM7B mic.

Before getting the Cloudlifter, my audio was whisper quiet even with the gain cranked all the way up. I highly recommend it for a SM7B.

I couldn't be happier with my current setup. It sounds fantastic now.

rimliu• 6 years ago

Maybe worth noting that SM7B is a dynamic microphone and notoriously quiet one.

lostapathy4• 6 years ago

I run a Shure SM57 - which is not exactly the same mic, but it's a very similar dynamic microphone that's also VERY quiet. I run it into a Scarlett 2i4 - and it was terrible before I bought the FetHead. The preamp in the Scarlett just can't bring that microphone up to reasonable levels without picking up a LOT of hiss and noise - it sounded like garbage. Adding the FetHead totally fixed that.

You're running a condenser mic that's going to be a lot "louder" on it's own. Running the gain pretty high is fine if it doesn't seem noisey to you. It was 100% obvious I needed to do something else when I first attached my mic directly to the Scarlett.

schrijver4• 6 years ago

The preamps in your Focusrite are decent, and you have a condensor microphone which is probably louder than the dynamic microphone used for the video. You’re fine I’d say!

If you’d want more control over the sound before it goes into the computer, than a kind of channel strip unit with a preamp compressor and eq could make sense, although you can do all that in OBS as well.

m00dy2• 6 years ago

A little off topic: has anyone managed to have chroma key effect on Mac ? I'm also thinking to have almost same concept youtube channel. But, I also want to have chroma-key background. any ideas ?

DAlperin• 6 years ago

I think OBS will do live keying.

m00dy2• 6 years ago

I'm also looking for its virtual-camera plugin which is only window :(

osteele• 6 years ago

iMovie, Adobe Premier, Final Cut Pro, and Screenflow (screen casting software) all have chromakey.

The Zoom app, and the Logitech C922, each have live background replacement ("virtual green screen").

For post-production without a physical green screen, you can use a green rectangle as your virtual background in Zoom or with the Logitech, import into iMovie etc., and chromakey there.

lostapathy4• 6 years ago

OBS is a good solution if that works for you.

Also look at Black Magic ATEM Mini https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/atemmini - you need to connect a camera with HDMI output to it (i.e., something like a Panasonic G7) rather than a webcam, but it'll do the green screen in-device and output an HDMI signal. You can then run that into a USB3 HDMI capture device that will show up as a normal webcam.

tga2• 6 years ago

Check out http://camtwiststudio.com or maybe http://manycam.com.

SuddsMcDuff2• 6 years ago

I think the section on mics could be enhanced by explaining a little about the different pickup patterns available. A cardioid pickup is a lot more appropriate for these uses than an omni pickup would be. The author mentions the Yeti mic picking up a lot of background noise - I'd bet that that mic has an omni pick up pattern. Some mics even have a small switch which allows you to cycle between different pickup patterns.

EDIT: While I've always known them as pickup patterns, I've just noticed that Wikipedia refers to them as polar patterns. I assume this is a more universal term.

dalore• 6 years ago

There is a switch on the Yet that gives you 4 different pickup patterns. https://www.bluedesigns.com/products/yeti/

  - cardioid
  - stereo
  - omni
  - bi

ravenstine3• 6 years ago

I use my Blue Yeti on cardioid mode without headphones and the noise picked up is relatively minimal. My apartment is pretty quiet to begin with, but cardioid limits some of the noise and also seems to prevent feedback. (which is taken care of to some degree by the software, but I never have issues when cardioid is on)

klodolph5• 6 years ago

Most inexpensive mics ($100-$400) are cardioid only, but I’d say the most important information is how to do placement. Beginners think in terms of pointing the microphone at a sound source you want to pick up, but you should also think about what directions the microphone rejects and point the mic away from noise sources you don’t want to hear.

That, and stop putting the mic so damn close to your mouth.

whitehouse32• 6 years ago

It’s disappointing to see the Shure SM7B recommended so widely for use in residential environments. While Shure’s classic offering is popular among 2020 media creators (Joe Rogan, Bret Weinstein, and streamers like Tfue or SypherPK) it is still cruel and unforgiving of poor microphone technique, audio reflection, and background noise. Considering its high noise floor when driven by all but the nicest preamps, other options are just more attractive overall.

It’s not that the SM7B is bad. Like any high end tool it requires to skill (and other high end tools) to be effective. Even in amateur hands it can sound great. But for $350 the average podcaster, streamer, or remote worker can do much better.

Otherwise this article is great.

kwerk2• 6 years ago

What would you recommend?

whitehouse32• 6 years ago

Shure's SM58 and SM57 have the same capsule as the SM7B for 1/3 the price and fuss.

Like the Rolex Submariner, the SM58 has been cloned at lower and lower prices since its introduction. The design is solid regardless of the price point. Imitations from Pyle and Audio Technica sound great and cost less, but aren't as rugged.

If you _want_ to spend money for more pleasing tone the Beta 87A from Shure is outstanding. As are similar cardioid microphones from Electro Voice and Neumann

geerlingguy4• 6 years ago

I like the EV RE320; it's way easier to use (don't have to be a perfectionist for technique / distance, at least IMO as much as the SM7B), and it's usually discounted at least $100 less.

The Rode RE20 is a very similar mic used in broadcast radio scenarios almost as much as the SM7, mostly because it is so forgiving of poor technique, and when you have guests on radio shows, it's not nice (or often even possible) to force them to be a certain distance from the mic, and use a certain technique.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

You can spend $700+ on his high end audio recommendations but 90% of home office style recording environments (even with acoustic panels) are going to have a noticeable amount of background hiss (computer fans, etc.) get picked up and his set up doesn't account for that.

If you goto the OP's Youtube channel and listen to his recordings, for example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lh0sTxLs9VA, there is a HUGE amount of hiss / static in his audio, to the point where I would be uncomfortable listening to his voice for a long period of time at a medium volume. He's using the $400 Shure mic in that video too.

The $100 for the dedicated 2nd pre-amp with the Triton seems pretty wasteful. As an alternative, for $299 you can pick up the DBX 286s pre-amp[0] which also acts as a noise gate (helps filter hiss / static), de-esser, compressor and basic EQ together. It's an awesome piece of hardware and offers way more bang for your buck.

Also the AT2005[1] mic is a solid upgrade from the AT2100 that he recommends, and both are about the same price. IMO the AT2005 is worth using as an end-game microphone. The AT2005 is one of those crazy mics where it almost feels like it's mis-priced at $80 and the DBX 286 has enough knobs and buttons to make it sound good with a number of different types of voices.

Ultimately your real natural voice is going to play one of the biggest roles in how you sound in the end.

[0] https://amzn.to/2VPbmMc

[1] https://amzn.to/39hyQwI

(Yes these are affiliate links, I've been using both pieces of hardware for years)

ghaff3• 6 years ago

I'm somewhat guilty of it as well, but a lot of people geek out on the gear side and spend money to optimize a fairly small part of the overall audio experience.

Most of what I record for podcasts these days is on location anyway and I know I don't personally have a "radio voice." So I do what I can to get reasonable audio quality but don't sweat the details too much.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

I'm somewhat guilty of it as well, but a lot of people geek out on the gear side and spend money to optimize a fairly small part of the overall audio experience.

There's nothing wrong with buying gear.

It's just, he lists that set up as a "professional" podcast set up but forgot to mention the most important piece of hardware (or software) to get rid of continuous background noise.

If you're going to listen to someone talk for an hour, having a bunch of white noise hiss in the background is very tiring on your ears.

If you read that article without years of prior audio experience you might just blindly click those links and buy the top end set up, and then get upset that you just dropped $700 on a set up that sounds worse than what you could have gotten for $80 (+ free software) or half that in pure hardware but spending your budget on different hardware.

adamwathan2• 6 years ago

A noise gate does not remove hiss or static, it simply reduces the volume of the signal when it gets below a certain level.

As a professional audio engineer in a past life, I can say the SM7B + Triton Fethead is a great recommendation. The SM7B has very good off-axis rejection characteristics and will pick up _much_ less room noise than most alternatives.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

A noise gate does not remove hiss or static, it simply reduces the volume of the signal when it gets below a certain level.

But the end result is with a configured noise gate the audio coming out will not appear to have as much hiss or room noise.

Check out the Youtube video I linked of his. It's super noticeable. With Sony MDR-V6 headphones, I hear a huge amount of hiss in his audio. To the point where it's distracting and drowns out his voice.

I'm not trying to pick on you or him, but if I go to your most recent Youtube video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lf6dwipRYg, you can very much hear the same type of hiss within the first few seconds. I can't say for what what it is, but it sounds like your computer fan is spinning at 50% and it very much comes through. At about the 16:22 mark in the video, your fans appear to be spinning at 100% because it's much louder than before you started coding. It sounds like your computer is about to launch into space.

It looks like you have the same mic too.

I'm not saying the mic is bad, it's a really good mic. I just think the OP should have talked more about one of the biggest things that will kill a recording, especially when talking about "professional podcasting" and recommending high end gear.

For comparison, here's something I recorded with the AT2005 + DBX 286s acting as a noise gate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Xd84hlIjkI

There's no software processing here either and my room is not treated with acoustic panels. In fact, my office is almost a worst case scenario. It's a wide open empty room with hardwood floors, angled ceilings and almost no furniture or rugs. I have super loud computer fans too and I'm right next to a window.

Even at maximum volume (unrealistically loud) there's pretty much no hiss or room noise. At least nothing I can hear with the same Sony MDR-V6 headphones.

I'm sure I could get similar results with the Shure mic too (using the DBX), but I'm happy with the AT2005. If I ever upgrade mics in the future it would be to a shotgun mic so it's out of frame.

mikey_p• 6 years ago

I have alot of experience with live audio, and from my understanding I can't see what the point of the Triton Fethead is? Is that used in addition to the pre-amp in your interface? If so why? Does the SM7B have super low output? It's not used much live, but when we did, we never had trouble with level, and I'm pretty sure an inline pre-amp would have added more noise.

numpad0• 6 years ago

Partly as a reminder to self: how hard could it be to build a noise cancelling/phased array setup for streaming?

nickjj16• 6 years ago

If you're only concerned about OBS, it's trivial. You can use a VST (software plugin) without needing hardware or anything fancy.

lostapathy4• 6 years ago

I'm going to disagree on a lot of this.

The Triton fethead is just a "plug it in and go" solution in a lot of setups. That dbx preamp has a lot of knobs that, for the most part, need to be set right in order for it to work at all - let alone help the situation.

Also worth noting that the fethead is tiny - it sits inline with your cable, whereas that dbx requires you to mount 19" rack gear at your desk, which is a big ask for a lot of people.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

The Triton fethead is just a "plug it in and go" solution in a lot of setups. That dbx preamp has a lot of knobs that, for the most part, need to be set right in order for it to work at all - let alone help the situation.

But that's the thing. The Triton is just a pre-amp, the Scarlett also has its own pre-amp, but maybe it's not strong enough to drive the Shure mic (it's strong enough for most other mics).

The DBX also has a pre-amp but it does many other things to improve the quality of your audio where as the Triton does nothing except boost the signal. I would classify the DBX as very much helping the situation. Way more than just having a pre-amp.

whereas that dbx requires you to mount 19" rack gear at your desk, which is a big ask for a lot of people.

I don't think having a piece of gear on your desk is a big ask for a personal recording studio. It's not like you're sometimes streaming or recording your podcast at Starbucks. You also don't need to mount it. It sits flush on a desk without straining any of the parts or sitting uneven.

It's been happily sitting on my desk for a long time now.

Nicksil• 6 years ago

[0] https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004LWH79A

[1] https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007JX8O0Y

pc864• 6 years ago

Thank you for providing non-affiliate links for those of us who don't want someone else making money off our unrelated purchases in the next 24 hours.

52-6F-624• 6 years ago

home office style recording environments (even with acoustic panels) are going to have a noticeable amount of background hiss (computer fans, etc.) get picked up and his set up doesn't account for that.

You can definitely baffle a lot/all of that noise away, but you definitely need to be more mindful of your setup and not just have some wall-mounted panels and your tower right next to your mic.

I've been privy to some crafty home studio setups. It's workable—the first problem is paying attention/having an ear and the example you posted is so obvious I was surprised at it.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

the example you posted is so obvious I was surprised at it.

Yeah I was surprised too. Considering that clip is from the author of the post.

you definitely need to be more mindful of your setup and not just have some wall-mounted panels and your tower right next to your mic.

Mine is on the floor, under my desk, which has a large thick piece of wood (the desktop) as a barrier and it still comes through without a noise gate. My mic is on a boom arm like 5 feet above my tower (I use a standing desk) and the mic is positioned opposite of my computer to further reduce it picking it up.

Also, a lot of people use laptops as their main computer which is even worse. Chances are you'll end up with your laptop on the top of your desk instead of below it.

That's why I was so taken back by him creating this article without mentioning noise cancellation.

Fortunately I do have the DBX and the noise floor is almost silent without clamping down too hard on natural frequencies. I've recorded about 400 videos, some with the DXB and some without and there's such a huge difference.

balfirevic2• 6 years ago

As an alternative, for $299 you can pick up the DBX 286s pre-amp[0] which also acts as a noise gate (helps filter hiss / static), de-esser, compressor and basic EQ together.

Do you know of any device with similar capabilities but in smaller form factor (even if more expensive)? Something of the size of Focusrite Scarlett 4i4 [0]. Or at least not meant to be mounted in a rack?

[0] https://focusrite.com/en/usb-audio-interface/scarlett/scarle...

nickjj16• 6 years ago

The 4i4 is just like the 2i2 (which is what I use). It basically acts as a way for you to plug in an XLR mic (or instrument) into your computer. It's classified as a USB audio interface.

It won't help you when it comes to background noise cancellation or any type of processing. For that you need something like the DBX or you can find other hardware that combos as a USB audio interface + pre-amp + processor (with comparable options to the DBX). I don't know of any offhand but maybe something exists.

Also, you can go the software route too to avoid needing any hardware (and just use a USB mic), but it gets a little more complicated. OBS supports VST plugins which is straight forward enough, but if you plan to record in other programs you won't have those effects applied.

Or you can delve into the wonderful world of software based audio redirecting where you can redirect the output of a DAW like REAPER into another app as input to capture and process audio in real time. I did this for years until the software I used stopped working due to the author dying and his license server went offline. Alternative software doesn't exist on Windows with the requirements I had so I decided to go with hardware.

The cool thing about the AT2005 mic I recommended from earlier is it has a USB and XLR connector, so you can try both out.

schrijver4• 6 years ago

Don’t know of any small units that also include a noise gate but otherwise something like a http://www.joemeek.com/threeq.html could do the job. A compact channel strip. Plenty of these units and their predecessors on the used market too.

Running your signal through analog EQ and compression is super useful, because they’re intuitive to use (just twist knobs) and once you’ve got your settings dialed in, it will survive any OS update or kernel panic :) And you’d need some dynamics processing digital or analog if you want to approximate the kind of voice people associate with radio or voice over.

I think a noise gate is tricky though, if set up wrong it can make the audio sound choppy. If at all feasible, reduce the noise at the source. Especially if you use a compressor, because as great as it can sound, it will also amplify the noise. You might notice this less if the compressor has a very fast release time (i.e. its amplification drops out immediately after the audio drops below the level where it’s supposed to kick in) but also that risks making the audio sound choppy and unnatural.

busterarm• 6 years ago

I use the Shure SM7B + DBX 286s combo and it's _sublime_.

dundercoder2• 6 years ago

If you don’t have a really good quality preamp in your interface, the fethead makes making up the gain really well that the sm7b needs. Sooo much gain.

codetrotter• 6 years ago

Ultimately your real natural voice is going to play one of the biggest roles in how you sound in the end.

Therein lies the main problem for me personally.

Is there a way to train your voice to become more comfortable for others to listen to?

greggyb• 6 years ago

If you're serious about it, I'd look for a voice coach. It's likely easier to find someone who trains singers than who focuses only on speaking. That is fine. Vocal technique is largely the same.

Additionally, I'd look into something like Toastmasters. This will give you a great place to practice outside of formal lessons with a voice coach.

Being comfortable to listen to is about both your vocal technique - the mechanics of how you form sound - and about your content and delivery.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

Is there a way to train your voice to become more comfortable for others to listen to?

This is something I struggle with too honestly.

I've recorded 400+ videos and I still think my voice is -ultra- cringe and I feel like it gets worn out after talking for only maybe an hour straight.

So what I usually do is record for about 45 minutes, then edit for a few hours and then go back to recording when my voice is fresh. I drink plenty of water while editing too.

I don't have any professional advice since I'm just a dude who records screencasts. But I think my biggest problem related to getting worn out is I tend to talk slightly louder than normal when I'm recording because I still internally link loudness with tone variance and "energy". So maybe talking less loud, raising the gain on my mic and learning how to have more tone variance without talking louder would be something to look into. If I were to guess this is probably a common problem for many folks.

robbrown4512• 6 years ago

In that linked YouTube video, I didn't hear hiss or find anything objectionable in the sound. But I found it really distracting the way the microphone was so big in the picture. It even looked like it could be easily adjusted so the mic was in the same place but the stand was more out of the way. But if it was me, I'd go for a smaller / less obtrusive one even if the sound wasn't quite as good.

Funny how different people are sensitive to different things.

nickjj16• 6 years ago

Headphones play a big role here.

If I plug in my budget earbuds I can't notice anything but with my studio headphones (which I normally use for everything) it's super distracting.

iambateman• 6 years ago

I just did a bunch of this over Christmas, and it was a ton of fun to set up.

The way I see it...people work in these offices that cost hundreds of thousands, so I will benefit from looking somewhat professional on my calls from home.

One frustrating note: we use RingCentral/Zoom at work, and they only work with the Elgato CamLink once. After one call with proper video, I have to reset my PRAM.

kh_hk• 6 years ago

To be honest, investing in a whole studio setup for remote work seems to go against one of the biggest perks of remote work itself: freedom.

Stock is usually good enough. That money is better invested on a pair of comfortable headphones, and also some good on-the-go light headphones with micro to hold remote calls outside of a quiet environment.

ghaff3• 6 years ago

It mostly seems unnecessary even if I'm doing calls from my office, as opposed to when I'm traveling or otherwise not at home. I have a dedicated office with decent lighting (and not backlit) and a good Logitech webcam. That's more than a lot of people I work with have. Anything more would really be overkill and probably not even noticeable on a typical video call.

pc864• 6 years ago

Hell, I've been trying to get coworkers to just get webcams and it is an uphill battle. There is so much non-verbal communication that you lose working remote, it's harder still when you can't even see the person.

ericbarnes• 6 years ago

It seems like you are forgetting freedom means different things to different people. Look at the world outside your lens.

For me, freedom is not driving in rush hour and being home when my kids get home from school. Having a dedicated setup makes complete sense.

Proziam• 6 years ago

Freedom to arrange my workspace in whatever form makes me the most effective, productive, and comfortable sounds like freedom to me.

But most importantly, I'm 100% sure my expensive ($1500-ish?) audio setup has been a competitive advantage for me. I've had numerous people comment that they are relieved when they find out they can comfortably converse with me, and how outside the norm that is. From my own experience, I can attest that most people are oblivious to the discomfort they can cause by not putting reasonable effort into the quality of their team or client's experience.

Two things annoy me greatly enough to want to avoid having to work with someone.

1. Being late / unprepared / distracted in meetings

2. Having to tolerate a literal headache due to background noise, awful sound quality, or constant technical issues during a call.

Sholmesy• 6 years ago

Somewhat off topic, but I've thought this would be quite a useful thing to do just for helping my focus while working, kind of like having a permanant rubber duck.

Has anyone ever had experience of "live coding" at a company, and if so, how do you manage things like, not broadcasting a database secret, etc.

Are there any examples of companies letting people record their work? I remember a lot of videos floating around about "a day in the life at X" style things.

Cthulhu_• 6 years ago

Re: secrets, I'd say never work on production while streaming. Don't keep production credentials on your local machine either. Keep a local .env.development file with local credentials ONLY.

If you work in the cloud, usually database secrets and the like will be obscured as well in password fields. Same as in password managers, e.g. 1password has a 'copy' button, and displaying it is an explicit button you have to press.

mrdonbrown• 6 years ago

Actually, I just started doing this yesterday. I had streamed a handful of times on Twitch (channel the same name as my username here) for side projects before, but I just joined a startup as a co-founder and decided to try streaming during work hours.

A couple tips:

  - Use multiple monitors - this is almost a hard requirement
  - Separate secrets into their own files.
  - Exclude secret files from your IDE/editor search
  - Make the second monitor the main monitor so notifications and what not go there
  - On that second (or third monitor), put everything that isn't your editor

Be prepared for few to no viewers. Remember the point is to help keep you focused, not get attention.

zebrafish• 6 years ago

One item that the author didn't touch on was internet connection. I would imagine that streaming with a 4k camera, even with codecs and compression and stuff that i know little about, would both take a decent sized upload pipe as well as no capping on uploaded data.

Does anyone have more info about this piece of the set up?

geerlingguy4• 6 years ago

15-20 Mbps uplink will be enough for most situations, at 4K. It's not like you'll be streaming ProRes or some other minimal/no-compression data. You should be encoding a compressed stream and sending that to the streaming service. For 1080p, you can probably get by with 10-15 Mbps up, though it is better to have more bandwidth since you might have other things pushing data up at the same time.

dawnerd• 6 years ago

What remote meeting app even supports 4K? Of all the ones I’ve seen they barely can even do 720 and even then it’s almost always pixelated at some point.

geocrasher2• 6 years ago

I hope that nobody reading this thinks you HAVE to have these things to work from home. I've been WFH for the better part of a decade. Audio: A $25 Logitech H390. Video: A MS 720p webcam. Cost: Maybe $60 USD tops? I'm not in meetings all day, but really it's not that big of a deal when I am.

ravenstine3• 6 years ago

The value of a good mic for remote work cannot be understated.

One of the worst aspects of my job as a remote developer has been working with people with crappy microphones. I worked with one client whose conference mic was so low-fi that a lot of what they were saying in meetings was incomprehensible. (I told them about this, but they didn't seem to care, which is why I'm glad I'm not working with them anymore)

Going against what the author suggests, I purchased a Blue Yeti mic. The reason I went for it is that I want my coworkers to not have to strain to hear me. Ideally, it should sound as if I'm in the same room with them. With cardioid mode turned on, I can use the mic with my MacBook Pro speakers as the output channel and never have feedback issues. My home is quiet, so I never have issues with bad noises coming through. If I'm at a cafe, that's when I'll use my AirPods. However, I use my Yeti mic when possible. A few of my other coworkers have since bought a Blue Yeti or a Razer Seiren, and it makes a world of difference.

slantyyz• 6 years ago

I used to use a Snowball, which worked great, but it obstructed my view of my 4 monitor setup. I currently use a Blue Snowflake, and it's been working very well. It's small and inobtrusive, and I haven't heard any complaints about the audio for calls. For a podcast, however, I would probably go back to the Snowball or higher end mic.

kraftman• 6 years ago

I've had a very different experience. I work remotely and sometimes others at my company do, the people who are remote are always so much easier to hear than the people in big echoey conference rooms, no matter what mics they are using.

falcolas• 6 years ago

Another audio option I don't see mentioned often is a headset with a boom microphone. Some of my best sounding coworkers have these. They also typically have ambient sound rejection, meaning you can be in a relatively noisy environment (AC) and still sound good.

A nice pair of headphones can have a boom mike added with little hassle, using something like an Antlion Modmic.

uncensoredjrk• 6 years ago

Spending money on decent lights and cameras to then block the view with a GIANT microphone doesn't make sense to me. I've been involved with professional audio for 23 years--if I were doing this, I would use a decent single ear, earset style mic. That would keep the mic out of view, provide excellent sound quality, and keep the audio consistent if you turn your head (away from a fixed mic).

It actually drives me nuts when podcasters use the SM7B mic and have their low-end cranked or don't apply a strong enough HPF to compensate for the mic's proximity effect. That's incredibly tiring to my ears--I usually end up reducing the low end via my playback device's EQ.

99% of the pre-amp options don't matter as long as you get a strong, clean signal into a decent ADC stage. Spend your efforts on learning how to properly process the signal chain instead (apply High-pass filter, proper gain, apply dynamic compression, possibly EQ/de-ess, etc.).

Sorry for the rant. :)

klodolph5• 6 years ago

99% of the pre-amp options don't matter as long as you get a strong, clean signal into a decent ADC stage.

It turns out this is actually hard, when you use inexpensive preamps, typical microphones, and you’re recording voice at home. Getting a strong signal means more gain than onboard preamps in inexpensive interfaces typically provide, which is why you might want to get an outboard preamp or use an inline device like the fethead. Getting a clean signal means learning how to do mic placement, doing some room treatment, etc.

From what I understand, there’s a limit to how much clean gain you can get from a single amplifier stage, and it’s often just not enough. I was very skeptical about getting an outboard preamp but it ended up making a much larger difference than I thought it would.

emilburzo2• 6 years ago

I would use a decent single ear, earset style mic.

Any specific ones you'd recommend?

Pigo• 6 years ago

I recently got a green screen to use during my video conferencing. I thought it would be fun just to mess with my co-workers, make it look like I'm on the Mars or something. I've yet to figure out how to get it to work with gotomeeting/skype/hangouts video though. I've found apps that can do it for recorded video, but I suppose it's on the camera to have the chroma effect available. Which the one I have doesn't do. I don't want to spend too much just for a joke.

tga2• 6 years ago

Check out http://camtwiststudio.com or http://manycam.com.

emilburzo2• 6 years ago

Zoom has this feature built-in, it's called virtual background.

https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/210707503-Virtual-...

jnwatson2• 6 years ago

I've done it for shits and giggles. Every once in a while I set it up when the team needs a laugh. If you use Linux, it isn't too hard to set up a virtual camera source that OBS Studio writes to.

exabrial• 6 years ago

One thing he didn't differentiate on was the microphone and its appearance in video casting.

While there are many good choices, the Shure SM7B is the quintessential desk or studio microphone for recording vocals. However, it is a bulky monster and will take up a _lot_ of real estate in a video frame. If you're audio-only, that's not an issue, your vocals will sound awesome.

For video, I really think an off-camera mic on a boom stand in sound treated room is the best option for seated, stationary casting. Many hypercardioid vocal microphones most people have actually work fairly well in this setup. Treating panels doesn't even need to be expensive; this youtuber made really nice looking ones from towels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVEXp87TTrs

I don't like the sound or intrusive look of a lapel mic or the noise it picks up, for moving sequences, it's probably the best option unless you can hire a grip.

eropple2• 6 years ago

I love me a good boom mic (as mentioned in my own post I have a Synco D2, which is a shockingly good Sennheiser MKH416 knockoff, sitting above my head right now) but they do have disadvantages. If you have a mechanical keyboard, it's really hard to position one 1) out of frame, and 2) so the pickup area isn't gonna be going rattle-rattle-rattle.

There's no great middle ground. I'd rather have it than a SM7B, though, that's for sure.

dundercoder2• 6 years ago

Surprisingly the monoprice 600700 pencil condenser with a hypercardiod capsule works really well for this, and it’s way cheaper than mid range shotguns.

eropple2• 6 years ago

A few things:

- Sony makes great cameras but the lenses are expensive. You can get an old Panasonic GH3 and a camlink and the lenses will be cheaper, while the image quality won't (for this sort of use) be affected much at all.

- You don't need a freakin' SM7B for this stuff. I do audio engineering as one of my too-many side gigs and the most expensive microphone I own is the Synco D2, an interesting little MKH416 knockoff shotgun microphone. It was $225. It's above my head right now, I was on a call an hour ago. It's out of frame and it sounds great. While the PR40 (which personally I prefer to a SM7B) or the SM7B are great mics for what they are, the delta between them and much cheaper competitors is not that significant.

- You don't really need hardware to tune your audio stack, aside possibly from a preamp if you bought the wrong microphone (in this case, defined as "the SM7B"). Use your computer. It's fast enough, it can save multiple presets, and it will get out of your way.

- Software matters. I use vMix for everything: live streaming and recording. This is where I recommend spending money. vMix has a reasonably featured (for the purpose--videography and audio to go with it) audio system, able to use ASIO with Windows and to use VSTs. It can support half a dozen cameras (my road kit uses 4, my home setup uses 6) and as many voices as your interface can, while supporting multi-record for archival footage/alternate takes and a nice tablet-control interface that's topped only by Logic Remote in this space (and if you're only doing audio, Logic Pro on a Mac is a no-brainer).

joelrunyon• 6 years ago

I've been doing remote work and videos for a while. I sort of took my built-in camera for granted even though I've had better tools available.

Recently, started using the base logitech webcam and have gotten several mentions about how much better the video is from people on the other side of the calls. That sort of drove it home for me.

Don't know why it took me so long for it to "hit" - gonna probably pick up a couple things in this post - thanks.

PaulDavisThe1st3• 6 years ago

One small point I'd like to make regarding USB mics (and USB headsets): the #1 rule of digital audio is to only have a single sample clock for the entire system (the sample clock is the thing that defines when a voltage value gets converted to/generated from a digital sample).

Although I understand the plug-n-play appeal of these devices, they uniformly violate this rule because they cannot share whatever sample clock is being used for the other "direction" (i.e. the USB mic has its own clock, which is independent from the one used for playback).

Using these sorts of devices implicitly requires the audio software stack to do resampling to keep both input and output in sync with each other. For podcasting the change in quality that this causes is probably not an issue, but users should at least be aware this is happening under the hood.

You're much better off getting a cheap USB audio interface, an XLR mic and doing both recording and playback via the same device (with a single sample clock).

zigzaggy• 6 years ago

What would that look like? Can you provide a couple of specific pieces of hardware examples?

PaulDavisThe1st3• 6 years ago

Any USB audio interface such as those made by Focusrite, MOTU and many others. That plugs into your computer.

Any XLR mic, such as the Shure models mentioned in the article. That plugs into the audio interface.

Any (analog+wired) headphones (you'll have my MDR-7506s over my dead body). These plug into the audio interface.

Done.

sysashi• 6 years ago

I've recently made a present for myself on birthday - behringer umc22 + sm 58 mic. previous to that present were m40x headphones.

After using those headphones for couple years, I now see the difference between audio output of a laptop and simple interface like umc22 (which has own DAC + amp as I understand).

I have not found much use for mic yet (guess no one has called me since), besides recording birds outside, and generally having fun with it :D but I definitely love how headphones sound after getting audio interface (or DAC+amp part of it)

rasz• 6 years ago

Are you claiming to be able to "hear" resampling, and I dont mean 20 year old naive implementations like Cretive SB Live. Sample clock, and its phase is irrelevant as long as you pass Nyquist threshold, reconstructed signal will be indistinguishable from original.

You might want to read https://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

PaulDavisThe1st3• 6 years ago

I cite xiph.org/monty's videos to people all the time, just to be clear (I write a DAW for a living).

If you check out infinitewave.ca you will see that actually there are still lots of resampling implementations with notable artifacts, certainly when subject to measurement.

Can you hear them? Depends on the nature of the artifacts. I'd agree that in general, the answer is no.

Nevertheless, it is still wrong in my opinion for these mics to be spreading (or even being made) without it being clear what they imply for the user. You might not hear the effect, and you might not care, but you should understand clearly what using these devices require from whatever software stack you're using.

sbr4642• 6 years ago

Surprised the Blackmagic Design Web Presenter wasn't mentioned. It has several nice features including switching between 2 feeds without latency.

https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/blackmagicwebprese...

schrijver4• 6 years ago

I have the Elgato Camlink, which is way cheaper, but I’ve been wondering whether the Web Presenter would be a more foolproof solution. For OBS the Camlink is fine, because I’m able to get a signal by manually configuring the source frame rate. But non of the cameras I’ve tried will show up in Skype—or if they do, they drop out at some point. How is your experience with the Web Presenter, does it show up as a webcam reliably across software?

sbr4642• 6 years ago

From my experience it shows up reliably, using any web related platform, and also dev work with webcam related react/JS libraries, the BMD device works well. (No different than the built in Mac/etc camera.

mirimir• 6 years ago

I'd hate having a webcam for remote work.

I mean, I'd need to get dressed :(

ctingom• 6 years ago

I've recently been thinking about really improving my home office lighting setup. For example, most of my meetings are with Zoom and on video, and proper studio lighting can go a long way to making a good impression. We all want to look good, right?

Insanity2• 6 years ago

I've been thinking the same, well that I need to get better lighting in general - I have remote calls daily and during the summer that's fine because there's sunlight all the time whilst I'm working.

But now in the winter, it gets dark quite early and my normal room lighting is not bright enough. Doesn't make me look exactly as if I'm sitting in the dark but it's close to it :P

outworlder• 6 years ago

Mine is the C930e, but Wirecutter now recommends the c920s, which is cheaper and adds a privacy shield.

Ah, Wirecutter. The same guys who will one year absolutely recommend dual-hose portable ACs (and cite many sources, including the Department of Energy) and utterly demolish the efficiency of single hose models. Then, next year, say that this is not actually important at all. Because they are less practical or something. Which is an argument they themselves discarded just one year prior.

What changed? That's left as an exercise for the reader.

They may be fine if you use them to check products that you might otherwise have missed. But as far as recommendations go, I'm not sure they have no agenda.

Mikho• 6 years ago

Doesn't look like the author really did research on the equipment. Almost everything except maybe lighting is a wrong choice or combination.

TheBlerch• 6 years ago

Any suggestions for maintaining sound and video quality when you are interviewing/featuring someone remote, who does not have any special sound or video equipment beyond what they have on their laptop? Would you keep a modest kit with decent webcam and mic that you can mail them with a return label? I've heard of at least one podcaster doing this.

The comments here were as helpful as the original post - thanks all.

federalemployee• 6 years ago

I hate doing video on calls. But I might be more willing with a stylish red beanie. My appearance is my biggest concern and a stylish hat is a good idea.

Webcam, Lights, and Audio for Remote Work, Podcasting, Videos, and Streaming

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