A Talks : Mics

Hello Ladies & Gentlemen, welcome back to yet another instalment of A Talks: Mics, where we talk about microphones and how wonderful they are, well today I talk about the legend SM57, and its sound characteristics, also I talk about how difficult it is for someone to find accessories for these microphones in India and what you can actually do to find some of them near you without completely breaking the bank and end up paying like 3 times more! So lets go on today's journey and listen to the SM57 with its Windscreen the A2WS & some other microphones, some tests and some comparisons, in the end, the differences may be very minor but they are there and to some they might be material and to others they might not be of any use, but we are here to discuss, compare & enjoy microphones and all things audio. Today's episode contains a post processing test as well which can be heard at the very end of the episode, the reason behind including a post processed version of any microphone in a podcast or a test segment is to let the listeners know how the sound changes when some post processing is applied to the audio, what are the possibilities, what are the benefits, that someone might be able to come across by processing their audio, or simply knowing how important or unimportant it can be to process your audio, I hope this will be of some use to some of you out there and you might get something out of this endeavour.

Wishing you the best always, This is your host A, and I shall see you in the next one!

Ladies & Gentlemen, today while I was on a friend's Discord Server, I was a part of a discussion wherein we discussed preamps and Shure SM7B, yes, the usual suspect as always, and then I thought why not do some comparisons, so here is a short episode of A Talks Mics for you giving you a taste of various preamps while they are used with the SM7B. Again, the differences are pretty marginal but they are there,if you are using some studio grade headphones or monitors you might listen to the difference, otherwise you might not hear any difference whatsoever, so consider this as a nerdy perspective to things and enjoy yourselves.

Do Tune In!

Average RMS Readings For The Included Interfaces

Zoom U-22 : -65.06 Db (Gain 95%)

Behringer U-Phoria UMC-22: -64.16 Db (Gain 97%)

Audient EVO4: -63.02 Db (Gain 97%)

M-Audio Air 192/4 : -64.08 Db (Gain 95%)

Gear Used In This Episode:

Microphone: Shure SM7B

Audio Interface: Zoom U-22, Behringer U-Phoria UMC-22, Audint EVO4, M Audio Air 192/4

DAW: Adobe Audition

You Can Find A Talks Mics On:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ATalks_

Discord: https://discord.gg/k6qWDjNA

You Can Listen To A Talks: Mics Anywhere You Find Your Podcasts Including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Goodpods & Others Platforms

Ladies & Gentlemen, sometimes a discussion intrigues you so much that you are literally forced into performing some tests yourselves in order to reach a viable conclusion. The other day while me and a friend were discussing this issue, I thought why not do some testing for my lovely audiences so as to address this issue, and here we are. It has been discussed extensively especially in Voiceover communities that pointing the microphone directly in front of your mouth rather than pointing it at an angle to your mouth can improve the fullness and richness of the recorded sound, now is that just a myth or does it hold something which is worth noting down, in order to clear this up, I decided to do some testing and bring you guys another episode of A Talks: Mics.

Do Tune In!

Gear Used In This Episode:

Microphones: Rode Procaster, Lewitt LCT 440 Pure

Audio Interface: M Audio Air 192/4

DAW: Adobe Audition

Microphone Arm/Stand: Blue Compass, Rode DS-1

You Can Find A Talks Mics On:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ATalks_

Discord: https://discord.gg/tnRpDqjT

You Can Listen To A Talks: Mics Anywhere You Find Your Podcasts Including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Goodpods & Others Platforms

Compressors are probably the only piece of post processing plugins that continuously fascinate me and never fail to bring something new to the table, something exciting, something, warm, something punchy and definitely something interesting, In this episode I am also testing out the AKG D5 which just came in today itself so I decided to test out the TDR Kotelnikov on the new microphone and share it with all of you my wonderful audience.

Gear Used In This Episode

Microphone: AKG D5

Audio Interface: M-Audio Air 192/4

DAW: Adobe Audition

Hello Dear Listeners

How have you been? well today's episode of A Talks Mics features windscreens, with my recent acquisition of the Rode WS2 I wanted t test out if the windscreens are any good at all to tone down some of that obnoxious high end on a few microphones that can really be a matter fo concern to some people, so I decided to do a comparison on the lines of with the windscreen and without the windscreen format, so here it is finally, ready for all of you to dig into, hoping you all will like it, I shall see you in the next one!

Keep Recording!

Today's episode should not even be called an episode tbh, because this is just another sample I recorded to test out the "other" machine that I have and which I usually don't use for recording as much as I use my main machine, more on that in the episode btw. So the purpose of this testing was majorly boredom, I thought why not test out the other thing and let people know how important a quiet machine is for a person who is a recording enthusiast or a professional for that matter, also, it doesn't just stop there, the kind of microphone you use plays a pivotal role in this process as well, when you are surrounded by noises of various kinds, you must choose for yourself a microphone that is good at rejecting stuff and picking up the relevant stuff, that is your voice and not everything around you. So for this testing I chose to pickup a shotgun microphone which is really very very versatile, and you guys must already know it, it's called the Rode VideoMic NTG or simply VMNTG as I like to call it (long names are such a pain you see), so while using a microphone which offers fantastic rejection, the noise levels picked up by it from the fans on the machine are just so annoying (to me that is, would love to know what you guys hear and think about them). So eventually what was recorded as a sample is now a podcast episode, and only with the thought that I could maybe, just maybe, help someone out there with it, so here we go, here is the latest offering of A Talks Mics, dedicated to all you wonderful listeners.

Sometimes What Happens Is That While You Are Amongst People Something They Say Just Stays With You For A Long Time And Then Really Starts Haunting You, Well, One Of My Buddies Told Me Once That I Recommend The Q2U To So Many People But I Have Never Ever Tried It On Myself, Which Was Kinda True So Since Then I Had This Feeling That Alright, I Should One Day Be The Proud Owner Of A Q2U Myself, So Without Any Further Ado Ladies And Gentlemen, Today Finally It Arrived And Its Now In The Testing Arena.

I Did Not Process Most Of The Parts Of This Episode Except The Ones Where I Had To Do A Post Processing Test, The Entire Episode Has Been Of Course, Loudness Normalized So As To Resolve Any Level Matching Issues, What Happened Was Very Interesting, While I Started Doing The Comparisons, I Just Decided To Compare The Q2U With Only The Audio Technica ATR 2100 Microphone, But As Things Progressed, They Got More Out Of Control, And More Stuff Was Thrown In. This Could Sound Like A Really Overkill Comparison But Who Knows Someone Might T Some Benefit Out Of It Someday, So Well, Without Writing Much In The Show Notes And Just Lengthening Them, Lets Jump Into Today's Episode!

On Today's Episode Of A Talks Mics, I Talk About A Cheap Chinese Microphone That I Acquired For Around 15 Bucks, Honestly I Cannot Declare That This Is The Most Cost Effective Usb Microphone I Have Ever Used Or Come Across, Or Its The Best Sounding Cheap Microphone I Have Ever Used, No, Not At All, But What I Can Tell You Guys S That This One Is Pretty Usable, Workable And Passable, However Before You Go Ahead And Order This Microphone, Wait, Well, This Microphone Has A Serious Distortion Problem Even At Lower Levels Of Gain Which I Observed While I Was Editing This Episode And Then Immediately Decided To Send It Back Because I Am Not Spending My Money At Defective Equipment. In Regards To This Particular Microphone Or These Particular Kinds Of Cheap Chinese Microphones, I Have Infact Heard Many Of Them Causing Issues Or Simply Just Not Working Out Of The Box Or They Going Bad After A Few Months Use, But Thats A Risk We All Are Probably Aware Of By Now, Aren't We? So I Discuss About This Microphone Today And Giving You My Views On How I Felt About It And Whether Its Any Good At All

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On Today's Episode Of A Talks Mics, A Talks... Shotguns... And Why I Like Them, How They Are So Versatile And How This New Microphone Claims To Be The Grand Daddy Of All The On Camera Shotguns Out There, I Know I Know You Will Say A Similar Claim Has Been Made By A Deity Microphone As Well, But Definitely This One Has Just Something Little Bit More To Offer, So While We Go On Discussing This New Guy, Grab Your Popcorn And Drinks Coz This One Is Gonna Be A Long One! Cheers!

Do Tune In!