- Here's a fun little fact for you.
Did you know that you actually have
two audio channels on your camera?
Most people, when they look at their camera
and they see that one 3.5 millimeter microphone input,
think they just have one.
But here's the thing,
that audio input is actually made up of
two different channels.
There's the left and the right.
And when we combine them like that, we call it stereo.
Now, typically when you plug a microphone
into an input like that,
what's happening is you're taking a mono source
or a single source,
and you are separating it into the left and right channels
and recording it equally on both.
So then when we listen back to it,
it also plays at the same volume on both
our left and right speaker or left and right headphone.
And we hear it as if it's up the middle.
If you do have headphones handy,
this would be a great time to put 'em on.
(jaunty music)
I'm currently only playing out of the left channel.
I'm currently playing only out of the right channel.
I'm now playing an equal volume out of both
the left and right channels,
which should make me sound like I'm in the center.
But what if you could split that input so that you can plug
one microphone into the left channel,
one microphone into the right channel.
You're gonna have a whole lot more versatility in what
you can do with your audio setup,
just plugged into one camera.
And that's where we get to my new favorite
run and gun audio setup.
Now recently I made a video about the Deity D4 Duo,
and they've done exactly what I'm talking about here.
All within this microphone.
There are actually two microphones here,
one on the front that goes to the left channel
and one on the back that goes to the right channel.
So it splits them between those two channels that you
have on your camera, all within one cable.
Now, while that's very cool in its own right,
where it starts to get really awesome is the fact that
they've included an input that overrides
that back microphone or right channel
so you can plug whatever you want into it.
Just around the time that the Deity D4 Duo came out,
I also got my hands on the Rode Wireless Go system.
The star features of the Rode Wireless Go
are the fact that it's tiny and it's super easy to use.
You can basically turn it on and it just works.
But what I found super magic is when you combine
the Deity D4 Duo and the Rode Wireless Go system.
So I've got the Deity D4 Duo on my Sony A6600
currently plugged in, sitting on top,
like a normal on camera shotgun microphone.
But what we're gonna do is we're going to add the Rode.
I've got an extra cold shoe over here
because of some of the accessories that I use.
And then I'm just gonna plug it into that second channel.
So it's now overriding the back microphone
on the Deity D4 Duo.
And I'd love to just take a second and admire how little
space this all takes up.
And if you're not like me,
and if you don't have all the accessories
so that you have a second cold shoe,
you can actually just clip this on to the cable coming from
the Deity D4 Duo.
It just takes up so little space.
It's so nice for run and gun.
The transmitter for the Rode Wireless Go actually has a
microphone built right into the top of it there.
So I could just clip this on
and we could be done at this point.
But it's also got a microphone input so that you can plug
whatever you want into it.
And in my case,
I personally like to use a wireless lav.
Specifically, I've been liking the Deity W.Lav Pro.
(lofi hiphop)
So I can toss the transmitter in my pocket,
and then I can clip this onto my shirt,
or I can just stick it right onto my chest
using some rycote stickies.
Now it's in place, and for me,
that means I can just leave it there
for the remainder of the shoot.
Recently I made a video that was all about
how to make better travel videos.
And I was hiking around and I used this setup and it was the
perfect balance between high quality audio
and a super easy setup.
The only downside that I've run into so far is the fact that
even though the D4 Duo is a decent microphone,
I've got some other microphones in my arsenal that I would
prefer to use as the on-camera shotgun.
And it would be nice to be able to use those in conjunction
with the Wireless Go.
But that's where you're kind of limited with this specific
setup because the D4 duo is also the thing that's
doing the splitting.
The simple fix for this would be if you had a piece of
hardware that would do the split for you,
that you can plug any two microphones into, and those exist.
I have one at home,
but it's a little bit bulky and it kind of takes away from
the run and gun ability of this small, easy setup.
The thing I'm talking about is the Saramonic SRPAX1,
and it allows you to input both XLR or 3.5 millimeter
on the back, and then it comes out single on the front.
So you can plug it directly into your camera.
It's also got individual control over the volume
of each channel, which is really handy.
But the thing that I found out about it that I really
didn't like was that the battery runs out
really fast and you need to have
a nine volt battery in this for it to work.
That being said, Rode has a new cable coming out
that's just a splitter cable.
So you should technically be able to plug the one end into
your camera and the other two ends of the splitter cable
into your two audio sources.
So I should technically be able to use any microphone
then the Wireless Go both plugged into the camera.
And just by chance,
before I finished making this video Rode actually
sent out that splitter cable.
So we'll talk about that in a little bit.
But the question that some of you might be asking
at this point is why would you want to do that?
Why would you want to have two audio sources to deal with
when you could just throw a microphone on or have a lav mic?
Well, the first thing that comes immediately
to my mind is coverage.
For example,
if you're close to the camera like this,
and the microphone is on the camera,
chances are that on camera microphone
will pick things up well.
But if I decide that I want to move around,
run across the field, do anything like that.
Maybe I want to be over here. I want to be over there.
Then that on camera microphone's
probably not going to sound as good.
And so it'll be super handy if you have that other channel,
the lav mic that goes with the sound source,
so that can just switch it over in post
and you never lose your subject.
Generally,
I do prefer the sound of a shotgun microphone
over a lav mic, but if you're running and gunning like this,
and you have the camera with the microphone on it,
you gotta be really close to the microphone,
to the camera to get that sounding good.
The second thing is just for backup.
So if you're already kind of a lav person,
you like to use lav microphones, that's great.
You can use this set up so that you have a backup sound just
in case let's say your wireless cuts out or your batteries
die on your wireless system.
Then you've got that backup microphone.
So at least you have some kind of sound and it doesn't just
completely cut out.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
For example,
you could walk away and use the lav for just dialogue.
Whereas you're recording all the ambient sound with the
on camera microphone.
So you can mix that however you want in post.
But that brings us to another very important point.
You need to know how to split the audio channels
for mixing in post.
So we're gonna check that out really quick here.
Kicking things off with Premier Pro,
but here are the timestamps for the other two programs.
Headphones are definitely recommended,
and here's what it sounded like straight out of camera.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
For example, you could walk.
So we're simultaneously hearing these shotgun on the
left side and the lav on the right side.
The first thing that we're gonna do is copy down the
audio by holding alt or option, and then dragging it down.
But the problem here is that at this point we can move one
of our audio sources separately from the other parts,
and we want them all to be linked together.
So what we're going to do is we're going to right click on
the video and we're gonna hit Unlink.
And then we're gonna highlight all three of the video and
the two audio sources,
and we're gonna click Link
and now they all move together.
And then what we're gonna do is option click on one of
the audio sources and hit Audio Channels.
We're gonna choose that the left channel goes out
both the left and right speakers.
And hit Okay.
And then we're gonna do the same thing on the other side,
but with the right channel.
So the right channel is gonna be going out both
the left and right speakers.
And so now you'll be able to hear both of them
at the same time.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
For example, so you might hear a slight phasing
because they're both on top of each other.
Here's the shotgun.
And there are all sorts of creative things
that you can do with this split microphone setup.
For example.
And here's what the lav sounds like.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup, for example.
All right, moving on to Final Cut Pro.
Here's the original audio again.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
So we're hearing the shotgun out of the left ear
and the lav out of the right.
We're gonna go ahead and select our clip
and then come up over to the top right
and click this little audio icon.
If you're not seeing this,
you can click these three lines up in the top, right.
And right here is our main audio.
We're gonna change this from Stereo to Dual Mono.
And what that's gonna do is it's going to play both the
left and right channels that we have recorded
out of both speakers.
So we've already got them both coming up the middle.
It should sound something like this.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
So we've got that phasing going on because they're both on
top of each other.
We're going to right click on our clip and we're gonna
hit Expand Audio Components.
Now we can see both of our channels and now we can
right click on one of the channels and choose to Disable.
This is just one of the ways that you can do it, of course.
Here's the lav.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
And then if we switch it over,
this is the shotgun microphone.
And there are all sorts of creative things that you can do
with this split microphone setup.
And then if you're gonna go this way,
you can right click and hit Collapse Audio Components
once you've chosen which channel you want.
And finally on DaVinci Resolve
here is that original audio again.
And there are also all sorts of different creative things
that you could do with having.
Okay.
So we're going to start by highlighting our clip
and actually option-clicking on the audio
and holding option, dragging it down.
That'll copy it down. So we've got that double copy.
Again, just like Premiere,
the problem that we have right now is that
they're not all linked together.
So if we make edits or whatever,
it won't happen to all of them.
All you have to do is shift-click
both the video and both audios and then hit Link.
And now they'll all be together.
Next, we're gonna click on our clip,
right click and go to Clip Attributes,
and then we're gonna go up and change it so that
the first pair are both Embedded Channel 1
and then the second pair are both Embedded Channel 2.
This is sending both of them out the right and left.
So here they are both together.
And there are also all sorts of different creative things
that you could do with having the two channels.
And then if we mute this channel,
we'll get the lav by itself.
And there are also all sorts of different creative things
that you could do with having the two channels.
And then if we switch it around
we're going to hear the shotgun.
And there are also all sorts of different creative things
that you could do with having the two.
So this is the Rode SC11, it's a brand new cable
they just put out.
I'm sure there are other splitter cables like this
on the internet somewhere,
but this is the first one that I've had and tried.
And it works awesome. Exactly what I wanted it to.
Basically, you take these two ends, you plug one into,
let's say my Wireless Go system,
the other one into my Diety D3.
And then I plug the third end into the camera
and it works fantastic.
Again, like I mentioned before about the Saramonic box,
it's nice that you have the ability with that to adjust
the input volume of each microphone or source individually.
Whereas you don't get that with this cable
or with the D4 Duo.
I found that it's not a huge deal with the D4 Duo
and I have a funny feeling it will be the same
with this cable.
The nice thing about going with the cable again,
is that you can use whatever microphones,
if you want it to do two Wireless Go systems.
So you could have,
let's say an interview and both of them had
a Wireless Go system on it.
You could do it that way.
This is just one more step of versatility because you can
really plug any microphone source into both sides.
So, yeah, that's my favorite new kind of way
to set up my audio where I have these two sources
so that I have a backup.
And so I have versatility and depending on what kind of
situation I'm in,
especially when I'm filming myself like that,
I like to have both the on camera and the lav mic.
It just works really well for what I do.
I'll make sure to leave links to everything
down in the description as well.
I'd be really interested to hear what you guys think
of this setup, what you might do with it.
Make sure to leave a comment down below and on your way
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So you don't miss out on future reviews and tutorials.
Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you next time.
(lofi hiphop)