Michael:
I own a BP4025 and it has held up quite well for me. I travel with it a lot=
and
it just works. Last summer, I did a recording of the dawn chorus at the Dun=
es
National Lakeshore on through the early part of the afternoon. It was very =
humid
and got hot quickly. The BP4025 did just fine, but one of my AT4022s starte=
d to
make popping noises. I sent that mic back for repair and they replaced it u=
nder
warranty. So I believe that the BP4025 is fairly rugged and tolerant of
humidity. But I haven't tested it over a long period of time in extremely h=
umid,
hot locations. My guess is that if you let the mic acclimate itself gradual=
ly to
the environment that it will probably do just fine. It's very good for many=
nature environments and also for ambient sound recording in various urban
settings. For a one-point stereo mic, it is quite fine. The self-noise is a=
lso
on par with the AT4022 mics, so it is fairly low in level.
The sensitivity of the BP4025 is quite high, so it is easily affected by th=
e
wind. I have mine covered by the OEM windscreen which is covered by some fa=
ke
fur. Then this is placed inside a 7" diameter wire mesh sphere that is cove=
red
by more fake fur. This enables me to use it in fairly string winds with no=
problems. I have never used the Rycote baby ball gag, but it may give you g=
ood
protection. Let us know how it works out!
But for really capturing the space of most any nature environment I like a=
roll-your-own boundary array using two omni mics. The disadvantage of a bou=
ndary
array is that it is much larger and more bulky, but the sense of space is q=
uite
excellent. I did a recording of a Javanese gamelan session recently in a ro=
om
that was much wider than deep. When the director spoke and then when the
ensemble played, the sense of space and location was uncanny when listening=
through studio reference headphones. During the play back check in that roo=
m,
when the playback level was equal to the perceived room background conversa=
tion,
the imaging was such that you couldn't discern the real sounds from the rec=
orded
sounds. You get extremely close to that excellent space rendition in nature=
environments as well. But everyone's ear is different. But the BP4025 is st=
ill a
good workhorse.
-Greg
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