field recording

djfm · Post by **djfm** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 5:44 am

i wanna do some field recording but cant afford the top notch recording gear. So i had look on ebay and found dictaphones. Are these up to the job? or is better to buy a recordable mndisc?
thanks in advance

kaffein · Post by **kaffein** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 8:17 am

If you want really noise and wobbly recordings sure. For an effect it could be cool...

I couldn't recommend any sort of tape or MD recording device after using flash based recorders... It's just a hassle IMO.

At the minimum I would suggest something like the Zoom H2 which isn't out just yet:
http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/H2/

I personally use a Tascam HD-P2 and a Shure vp88 M-S MIC, I'm quite happy.

Michael-SW · Post by **Michael-SW** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 9:20 am

If you are on a budget, a used DAT or a used Mini Disc player (with recording) should both be affordable. A DAT will give you excellent fidely but is quite bulky. A mini disc is also perfectly ok, but not as good as a DAT. Your problem will be to find a decent mic on a budget.

A dictaphone would only be useful if you are into extreme lo-fi. They are optimized to capture speach.

dave_house · Post by **dave_house** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 10:58 am

Hi djfm,

all my music is made from field recordings. I used to use a MD recorder with a sony ECM-DS70P condenser mic (cheap as chips on ebay). The MD player was fine while it lasted and I got some recordings I was perfectly happy with, but then it started wiping every disc I put in! I lost 2 months worth of recordings from South East Asia that way. Grrrrr!

So after 2 MD deaths I did a lot of research (I too was on a tiny budget and portability was paramount to me) and bought an iRiver H120 for £100 on ebay. I highly recommend it. I nearly went with a HiMD but some people have complained about DRM issues that mean they can't access their own recordings! Plus they are expensive. The H120 is discontinued but a thriving internet community supports it and they crop up all the time on eBay. The benefits of the unit are:

- llightweight, small and cheap
- Makes CD quality, lossless WAV recordings which are downloadable directly onto your computer
- 20GB Hard Drive (H140 model has 40GB)
- Updatable firmware - swap to Rockbox ( http://www.rockbox.org ) for a much better suite of recording options
- Provides plugin power for DCM-DS70P
- has built in mic if you're desperate
- Its an MP3 player too!

I'm very happy with the iRiver H120. For its price and size its a really amazing bit of kit. I've only met a few people who've got one but everyone says the same thing, plus a couple of friends who've bought one on my recommendation have been very happy, too.

Check out my tunes if you want to hear what Ive recorded on it ( http://www.thereverseengineer.co.uk ) - theres few untweaked recordings Im afraid but all the sounds (other than those on the Concentrated Living album) are derived from field recordings from the H120. If you want me to send you a 'raw' recording, PM me.

Good luck!

slatepipe · Post by **slatepipe** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 11:56 am

quoting dave house - "I used to use a MD recorder with a sony ECM-DS70P condenser mic (cheap as chips on ebay). "

i use plenty of field recordings to make my tunes too and this setup is exactly what i use. plenty people grumble about the quality of minidisc but ive always found my sharp recordable md to be perfectly adequate. the mic is fine too, quite sensitive so i have to use a minijack extension or it picks up the sound of the md electronics.

dictaphones are no good if you want clarity but i use them too as i like the lofi graininess they produce

i also use the voice recorder on my nokia for its extreme lofi ness

check out this track i made entirely from nokia recordings and mixed in ableton which i got on my secret test page

http://www.slatepipe.co.uk/pages/secret.html

kaffein · Post by **kaffein** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:29 pm

MD quality is about the same as a 128kbps MP3, ATRAC compression is meh.
HiMD is uncompressed CD quality 44.1 16bit, but theres still that process of having to re-record everything back on your your comp or sampler in real time.

With flash or HDD based recording it's "record/stop and hey theres my file!"

Good game.

fatrabbit · Post by **fatrabbit** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 1:59 pm

There's the Edirol R09 or Zoom H4. No need to mess around with MDs or tapes.

badnicki · Post by **badnicki** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 2:20 pm

I've got the Edirol R09 and LOOOOOOOOOOOVE it. However, it's not necessarily what I would call "cheap." It cost me $500ish and then I spent another $500 on a great Audio Technica AT822 mic and want to add a preamp to the arsenal soon...but, having said that, the Edirol doesn't need an external mic at all....the only downfall I have noticed is that it's built-in mics cannot handle anything stronger than a light breeze and then it's noise everywhere.

Uses SD cards and AA batteries...

djfm · Post by **djfm** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 5:01 pm

slatepipe wrote:quoting dave house - "I used to use a MD recorder with a sony ECM-DS70P condenser mic (cheap as chips on ebay). "

i use plenty of field recordings to make my tunes too and this setup is exactly what i use. plenty people grumble about the quality of minidisc but ive always found my sharp recordable md to be perfectly adequate. the mic is fine too, quite sensitive so i have to use a minijack extension or it picks up the sound of the md electronics.

dictaphones are no good if you want clarity but i use them too as i like the lofi graininess they produce

i also use the voice recorder on my nokia for its extreme lofi ness

check out this track i made entirely from nokia recordings and mixed in ableton which i got on my secret test page

http://www.slatepipe.co.uk/pages/secret.html

wow im very impressed by that and all that was produced by a nokia phone?
thats awsome
good job

Sales Dude McBoob · Post by **Sales Dude McBoob** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 5:18 pm

I use my video camera as a field recorder. I have a little Panasonic PVGS200. It has a mic input, so I use a Sony 908 microphone:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1 ... c_for.html

It's a bit of a pain in the butt to then have to capture the Mini DV footage with Final Cut, then export the audio and mess with it in Live, but hey, I didn't have to spend $500 on a recorder!

djfm · Post by **djfm** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 6:53 pm

i have deciced to buy a mini disc recorder from ebay
which model do you guys recommend?
i have been looking at a sony mz n710

icedsushi · Post by **icedsushi** » Fri Aug 10, 2007 7:08 pm

I'm not familiar with mz n710, but make sure you get one that records in linear PCM and has USB .wav import capability for your OS. Then you're not wasting time and sound quality by re-recording to your CPU.

I have the mz-m200. No fuss, no muss getting the recordings into the computer. Just drag and drop and it works with Mac.

The only thing about the mz-m200 is it's a little slower finding tracks than my mz-m100 used to be. It takes about a second after you press play to start the track, where the mz-m200 was almost instantaneous. But the mz-m200 has added capability to import ATRAC over USB in addition to .wav files.

The included mic with the Sony MD's is actually pretty good. I've been getting nice recordings with it.

I've also got some high end MD compatible condenser mics from soundprofessionals but they're almost TOO good. They pick up a lot of bass (wind rumble) which tends to overload your inputs when switched to high sensitivity.