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The Shure SM7B (buy here) is probably the most popular microphone on YouTube for things like podcasts and indoor spoken videos to the camera. It’s for good reason, too. It’s a decent microphone at a reasonable price point.
But it’s not perfect. The biggest issue is that it’s quiet, often requiring an extra preamp in your signal chain. Well, Shure has addressed this with the new Shure SM7dB (buy here). This mic features a built-in preamp for a stronger signal.
I have to admit, I’m surprised it’s taken this long for Sony to jump into the tiny microphone market. They’ve been making wireless mics for years, so why the wait? Well, whatever the reason, they’re here now.
Sony has announced three new microphones, well, technically two, but one of them is available in two flavours. There are the ECM-W3 (buy here) and ECM-W3S (buy here) dual and single wireless kits and the ECM-S1 (buy here) podcast mic.
It seems redundant to call a wireless microphone “cableless”. But if there’s one consistency with the plethora of wireless microphones on the market, it’s that they need a cable to send audio from the receiver to the camera. The new Godox Virso still requires that cable, but for Sony shooters, the Godox Virso S doesn’t. Instead, it communicates with the camera directly using the multi-function hotshoe.
With that one exception for Sony shooters, these microphone systems are similar to other devices of this type. There’s a receiver that goes on the camera along with one or a pair of transmitters. Each transmitter features a built-in microphone and the ability to plug in a wired lavalier mic. The transmitters can also record internally to microSD cards for up to 400 hours of recording.
Comica has released the Comica CVM-VM30 (buy here), what they claim to be the world’s first wireless shotgun microphone. While there are a number of modules out there that allow you to add wireless capabilities to an existing XLR shotgun microphone, this is a little different. The Comica CVM-VM30 super-cardioid shotgun microphone has a 2.4GHz wireless transmitter unit built-in.
As well as its wireless output capability, the Comica CVM-VM30 also offers analogue output and digital USB audio output. The analogue output isn’t via a balanced XLR socket, though. It’s a 3.5mm socket for plugging straight into your camera. The digital output, on the other hand, lets you plug it straight into your computer or mobile device.
Sennheiser has today announced the new Sennheiser Profile. It’s a USB-powered condenser microphone designed for live streaming, podcasting and voiceovers. As a USB microphone, it plugs directly into your desktop or laptop, but you can also use it with tablets and smartphones that sport a USB-C port.
Being a desktop microphone, the overall look is quite familiar. We’ve seen it before in countless microphones from other companies. But the Sennheiser Profile sports a number of buttons and dials that are extremely useful for working with a microphone on the computer, as well as a 3.5mm headphone output for live monitoring.
Just about everybody in the photo and video industry knows who Rode is. They make the microphones that many of us use in various circumstances. They’re also quite popular for streamers and podcasters, too. But now, Rode’s separating out the podcasting and live streaming side of things to a whole new brand, Rode X.
They’ve launched the new Rode X brand with three new products. There’s the XDM-100 dynamic USB microphone, the XCM-50 condenser USB microphone and the Unify virtual mixer application. Both microphones are designed specifically for gaming and streaming. As such, they’re all-in-one self-contained systems that connect directly to your computer.
There are more people creating video content now than ever before. This means there are also a lot of people creating bad videos than ever before, too. Many of them aren’t really bad videos, as such. They just often have really crappy sound. Newcomers to video often think that they can rely on the internal microphones of their mirrorless cameras or smartphones, but you really can’t.
This video from Sennheiser has been out for a little while now but we haven’t shared it here before. It offers up a lot of valuable information on microphone choice. Alex Knickerbocker introduces us to the main different types of microphones and when and how we might want to use them to get the best results possible.
If you don’t know much about audio choosing a microphone can feel a little overwhelming. It’s like learning a whole new language full of omni-this and cardioid-that. But it really doesn’t have to be so complicated. Sennheiser’s Simon Beesley walked DIYP through choosing the best microphone for the job at hand.
So which microphone will cover all of your needs? “It’s a very good question,” says Simon, “realistically it depends on what you’re going to do, the type of working environment. There are lots of questions to be answered before you can select the ‘best’ microphone. There is no fix-all for all scenarios”
SmallRig is on a mission. They may be small by name, but they have big plans. Initially known for their camera cages, rods and handles, they’ve been scaling at an incredible rate and are excited to be expanding their range of products to better serve their customers.
DIYP had a chat with Wilson Chen from SmallRig about where the brand is headed and what we can look forward to seeing in the near future from them.
It’s like everybody’s jumping onto microphones right now and not being one to be left behind, SmallRig’s decided to have a go at their own system, too. It’s called the SmallRig Forevala W60 and like pretty much all of the other recent small wireless microphone releases, it runs on 2.4Ghz. It’s a dual microphone kit that comes with two transmitters with built-in omnidirectional microphones and one receiver.
It promises low-latency transmission (as low as 10ms) at up to 100 metres away, with adaptive frequency hopping to ensure 48Khz 16-Bit audio without interruption. You also get most of the usual features you might be used to, like a low-cut filter to get rid of rumble and background noise as well as mono or stereo output from the receiver.
Udi Tirosh is an entrepreneur, photography inventor, journalist, educator, and writer based in Israel. With over 25 years of experience in the photo-video industry, Udi has built and sold several photography-related brands. Udi has a double degree in mass media communications and computer science.
Alex Baker is a portrait and lifestyle driven photographer based in Valencia, Spain. She works on a range of projects from commercial to fine art and has had work featured in publications such as The Daily Mail, Conde Nast Traveller and El Mundo, and has exhibited work across Europe
Dave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.
John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
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