Mics for iphone. Opinions?

[Marshall]

Here's a video I made in church of a guest performer, John Gurera. Just hand held iPhone with Zoom iQ7 mic

[JackB1]

I just picked up a Shure MV88 to record live gigs and maybe some youtube
cover songs. I'll report back how it works out soon.

[JackB1]

Great song Marshall!

Question....What App are you using to shoot the video with on your phone?
The native camera app, the MOTIV video app or something else? Does the audio need editing or is it OK "as is"? Why is all this editing needed? Can't you
get a complete video/audio from just using the iphone?

Originally Posted by Marshall

Here's my latest home video; iPhone XR, Shure Motiv microphone. Audio edited in Audacity. Video edited in Cyberlink PowerDirector

[Marshall]

Originally Posted by JackB1

Great song Marshall!

Question....What App are you using to shoot the video with on your phone?
The native camera app, the MOTIV video app or something else? Does the audio need editing or is it OK "as is"? Why is all this editing needed? Can't you
get a complete video/audio from just using the iphone?

I'm using the native camera in the iphone. I used the MOTIV video app once. It does something with focusing. It's not automatic. And thus the whole video was out of focus. **pissed me off** So I went back to using the iphone camera ap. The Motiv app is still using the iphone camera. It saves the file as an MOV file just like the iphone. I figure the MOTIV video ap just does some things with focus and editing. And I can handle that later.

No, you don't need to audio edit later if you can get the levels set correctly up front. I usually do a fade-in and fade-out of the audio at the start and finish of the audio file, just for smoothness. I can clip out any loud bangs or coughs from the crowd. I'm not changing the color of what I get from the microphone. I use the video editing to do zoom and cropping for a better composed video and fade-in and fade-out. I can rotate the video if the camera stand is not vertical. But the video from the phone and the audio from the mic are really what you see and hear.

[JackB1]

Here is a video I took last night with the Shure mic. I used the MOTIV video app and set it on the “music preset”. I adjusted the levels beforehand. Let me know if you guys think this sounds better than the usual recording with the iPhones built in mic. I think it does.

[Marshall]

Oh it definitely sounds better than the iphone mic.


Here's a video I just put together from my show on Tuesday evening. The audio was straight out of the Shure MOTIV. All I did was fade the audio in and out at the end. Other than that, it's the simple file from the video. There's about 1:10 of talking if you want to fast forward to the music.



I use video editing software to add text and to fade the picture in an out. I also crop the video to fit the screen better. I used the native video camera App in the phone.

[Howard Emerson]

Perhaps this will be helpful regarding the Shure MV88 & Motiv app. I just put the mic near my Fender Princeton Reverb Reissue, and set the app to the 'guitar' icon. I did monitor with my headphones for a quick level check, and listened to a little replay.

I think it does a really good job, especially compared to the builtin mic in the iPhone 6S.



Regards,
Howard Emerson

[martingitdave]

I have the MV88. It's much better than the internal mic, but you may find that the Zoom recorders sound better. [Edit: listened to Howard's video above. I must be doing something wrong. Howard sounded great and has his grove on. :-)]

[JackB1]

I agree that the MV88 sounds better than the iphone's internal mic, but is it worth $150 for the incremental gain?

I find that setting the mic levels correctly is a must for good recordings. I haven't messed to much with any of the settings yet though.

Originally Posted by martingitdave

I have the MV88. It's much better than the internal mic, but you may find that the Zoom recorders sound better. [Edit: listened to Howard's video above. I must be doing something wrong. Howard sounded great and has his grove on. :-)]

[JackB1]

How do you monitor with headphones? After I plug in my iphone into the lightning connector, there's no room to attach headphones. I am guessing you are using a pair of bluetooth headphones?

Originally Posted by Howard Emerson

Perhaps this will be helpful regarding the Shure MV88 & Motiv app. I just put the mic near my Fender Princeton Reverb Reissue, and set the app to the 'guitar' icon. I did monitor with my headphones for a quick level check, and listened to a little replay.

[JackB1]

here's another clip I recorded with with MV88

[Howard Emerson]

Originally Posted by JackB1

How do you monitor with headphones? After I plug in my iphone into the lightning connector, there's no room to attach headphones. I am guessing you are using a pair of bluetooth headphones?

Jack,
The iPhone 6S has a headphone jack. I am very hesitant to upgrade to a phone that requires Bluetooth headphones because I’m old fashioned.

That said, there is a ‘latency’ (I believe that’s the term) so that you really can’t monitor through the headphones, accurately, because there’s a little delay.

I think that the better MV88 package may address this because it has a headphone jack built in.

Best,
Howard Emerson

[JackB1]

Yes the better package has a headphone jack, but it's not worth it for me to spend the extra $$$ just for a iphone tripod stand, since I already have one.

I wouldn't care about the latency....it would just be nice to check out the sound before recording for real. Only way I can now do it is to record some and then play it back after.

Originally Posted by Howard Emerson

Jack,
The iPhone 6S has a headphone jack. I am very hesitant to upgrade to a phone that requires Bluetooth headphones because I’m old fashioned.

That said, there is a ‘latency’ (I believe that’s the term) so that you really can’t monitor through the headphones, accurately, because there’s a little delay.

I think that the better MV88 package may address this because it has a headphone jack built in.

Best,
Howard Emerson

[Yamaha Man]

I bought a Shure MV88 mic last week. I did some A/B tests with it vrs the built in mic The first thing I noticed was the was a large drop in hiss from the built in. The Shure was much quieter. The tone of the Shure was also much better. It's definitely a keeper if you make a lot of music recordings. I thought it was a very nice upgrade for a reasonable price. A good quality stereo Shure mic for $139 ?? Comes with free software app too... it's actually a no brainer.

[Yamaha Man]

Here's a quick sample recording using the MV88 and a Martin D-35....notice the dynamic range and how quiet the mic is...

https://youtu.be/bEXqlIZdZMI