Marty Michener wrote:
> No better than the simple wind screen on the mics that you buy for $40 with
> each mic, I am afraid.
>
> I generally handle wind with modifications _to_my_own_behavior_. I move or
> I avoid it, where possible.
>
> I find by lowering the mic location toward the ground pointing upward, into
> a slight hollow, or behind my body or a tree, or by just moving so I can
> point the mic straight up or down wind - I minimize the mic-vortex noises,
> hoping to find a clear aiming shot to the sound source.
I do this too, but it has it's limitations. I was recording last night
in a 4mph breeze. Not steady but gusty. No cover except the car and my
body, which were not enough. The M/S setups using the furry cover did
pretty well, the SASS, for which I only have Crown's wind cover needed
some help. I need to sew furry covers for them. I'm also thinking about
sewing close fitting sleeves for each mic inside the zeppelins in the
M/S setups out of elastic speaker cloth. A ultimate layer of protection
from what gets in. That may make it less often I have to use the furry.
There is a difference between a rycote zeppelin and the Sennheiser ones.
The lining of the zeppelin in the rycote is kind of like flannel, more
wind stopping than the very fine screening that Sennheiser uses.
> With a parabola, of course, you can often use the body of the parabola as a
> wind shield.
The rycote cover for the telinga is quite good at handling the at mic
sounds. You can get up to where the wind is buffeting around the dish
before having problems. It would be easy to make as it's just soft
fleece cloth that's got a elastic in the edge and fits over the dish
opening covering the mic.
> We have also posted before a lot of stuff on wind sounds BESIDES those
> created by moving air vortices at the microphone - leaf noise especially -
> that limits the quality of many sounds you get during windy conditions.
>
> In Monteverde, Costa Rica, while I was there on two trips for a total of 7
> days, there was never any real calm time. You really had to get creative
> to get close to a sound source, yet have your mics pointed at a relatively
> silent background - treeless if possible to avoid the ubiquitous
> leaf-noise. With Bell-birds, the sound is among the loudest air-borne
> avian vocalizations, so almost anywhere will do. With the Catharus and
> Myadestes thrushes, I am afraid, most of mine do have a "roar" in the b.g.
> typical of mountain forests - especially my recordings of C. fuscater and
> C. aurantiirostris and M. genibarbis in Jamaica and St. Lucia!
>
> For me, wind is part of the "rush" of these habitats, however, he said
> lamely.
This is a separate issue, and I often don't worry about recording that.
It's part of the natural sound.
> So Walt, keep us posted on any solutions you come up with - yours are
> usually the best anyway.
You have seen the ones on the M/S mics I use, which are standard
Sennheiser gear. The problem with crossed shotguns is it's a big kit. A
lot to enclose. I'll have to design a frame to support it, fit that with
the plastic canvas craft mesh, line that with a fine windblock layer,
then sew a furry to go over that. Doing that in a simple, practical way
is not going to be easy. It's actually one of the reasons why I like M/S
over X/Y setups, a lot easier to enclose in protection.
Walt
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