I took my new NT4, my AT lavaliers and my 3 minidisc recorders out
camping in a forested area of wilderness last night (a block of land my
wife and I just became owners of) and so began discovering some of the
joys of field recording: combating extreme dampness, intermitent rain
showers, white noise sources, discovering the need for a third hand,
deficencies in equipment, getting spooked by hearing my own footsteps
from the wrong direction when listening to the mics with closed
headphones etc. etc.
The forest was quieter than I thought it would be and was dripping with
moisture and rain which made for lots of sharp plips and plops. And a
lot of running around to keep the mics dry. Given the reports on the
subject I was impressed with the amount of moisture the NT4 coped with.
Also the minidiscs worked flawlessly even when quite wet.
While recording the dawn chorus I had a tractor start up and go for an
hour in the distance and overnight I discovered that despite being a
long way from the ocean the mics were picking up the big swell ... A
beautiful noise for going to sleep but not ideal for my current
recording project. Taking a quick look in Audacity I was surprised by
how directional the distant ocean noise was - you can instantly tell the
orientation of the the NT4 or which side of the tree the lavaliers were
mounted on.
I am still extracting my 8 hours or so of recording from the
minsidiscs. I will post links to any particular highlights/ samples.
Some lessons for me:
Message: 1.
Subject: I need a holster/belt for my NT4 hand held shock mount so I can
manipulate the minidisc/ put on and remove headphones etc. all without
having to balance the shock mount anywhere wet or precarious. Luckily
my latest homemade shockmount is still 90mm pipe so I'm hoping I can use
100mm pipe to make a holster/belt out of.
Message: 2.
Subject: Need to make my trips on a Saturday night so their is a better chance
the dawn chorus won't be disturbed by distant tractors.
Message: 3.
Subject: Need to find a location further from the sea where I can camp in
privacy. Unfortunately most of the good car camping around here is by
rivers. I guess I will need to go hiking with my kit.
that's all for now.
Graham E.
"Microphones are not ears,
Loudspeakers are not birds,
A listening room is not nature."
Klas Strandberg
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