This post is to go with my YouTube video aimed at showing how we can overcome the Smart Phone’s most serious drawback in video production – the poor quality of the Audio you get through the built in mic. It is possible to convert your phone into a powerful recording device using a great smartphone microphone – Shure MV88.
Great camera but not so good microphone
Whilst the video tends to be really good (all things considered), the audio isn’t so great as the built in microphone is mainly designed to capture your voice in the optimum way for making phone calls.
When you record the piano, you have a really wide range of sounds to capture – from soft, high notes to thundering bass notes (or indeed from delicate bass notes to piercing octaves at the top of the piano). The only real solution is to have a different way of capturing the audio.
What options do you have?
I did at first think about some type of Home Studio set up (as I’d seen people like Paul Barton and Josh Wright speak about).
A full audio set up would involve several pieces of equipment. For a typical Home Studio type set up (which is predominantly focussed around a computer) you would need:
- Computer
- Microphone(s) – one or more reasonable quality microphones
- An Audio Interface – you can’t plug a microphone straight into your computer so you plug the microphone into the interface and the interface into the computer
- Microphone stands and cables
- Monitor Speakers – specialist speakers used to play back from the computer – or Headphones
Can you do it on a budget?
However, whilst researching on Google, I was amazed to see that in fact there is a really wide variety of microphones available at many different budget points that plug directly into your phone (with or without an inexpensive adaptor). Here, suddenly you no longer need the Computer, the Audio Interface or the Monitor Speakers … with a single, plug and play microphone you can completely change the game.
Shure MV88 to the rescue
After quite a lot of reading and watching YouTube videos, I eventually opted for the Shure MV88. It’s a stereo, condenser microphone which plugs directly into the lightening port on the phone. This isn’t the cheapest one available, but on balance seemed to have the best general feedback. However, if you’re planning to do a lot of recording, then you’ll soon get your money’s worth.
Take a detailed look at the Amazon link below. Amazon will also help you here by suggesting what people also looked at when considering this microphone.
I also found this article useful when considering which one to buy.
See the difference for yourself
If you have your headphones to hand, try listening to my YouTube Video from 09:00 minutes … it has one recording using the phone’s built in microphone and then the same piece recorded using the Shure MV88 microphone.
I’m sure you can hear we already have a dramatic improvement in terms of audio quality – but it doesn’t stop there.
Consider also the Shure MV88+
There is equally a Shure MV88+ which is a great option. It has one important advantage in that it works also with Android/Windows devices as well as new iPad models which have a USB-C connection. The MV88 itself will only work with lightening ports. If you’re interested to see how the two compare side by side, you can check out this shoot-out video on my YouTube channel.
Get the App
Now for the real bonus! What you probably don’t realise immediately is that now you have the Microphone, you can actually turn your smartphone into a portable Audio Recorder – yes, you guessed it, because there’s an App for That! If you are using either of the Shure Microphones, you can download an app called ‘Motiv’. Many other microphones also come with an App so you’re by no means tied into buying a Shure mic.
With this app, we’re really able to start taking control of how the microphone will capture the sound. One of the first useful things we can do is to set how loudly the microphone will record sounds – what the pros call the ‘input gain’. This helps to avoid distortion – something very prevalent with the built in microphone.
Once we plug in the mic and open the app, as we make noise, the app has meters which show us when the sound the Microphone is receiving is too loud for it to record properly (or too quiet for it to hear).
By watching carefully that the meters don’t go red in the loudest parts, you will ensure no distortion (also called clipping). You simply adjust the ‘gain’ by moving an on screen slider.
Maximise the stereo effect
The next trick is to set the way it will pick up stereo sounds. As I said earlier, the Shure microphone is a ‘Stereo’ microphone – that is to say that it will record sound so that when it is played through stereo headphones (or good speakers), you get that familiar stereo sound (slight differences in what sound comes to each ear) we’re now so used to on our TVs and other music devices.
In the Motiv App, there are different options. The best I’ve found for the piano is the acoustic setting (depicted by a little guitar image). When you select this, you can also control the angle from which the mic will pick up sound. You have the option of making this narrower or wider. So, if you have the phone pointed towards your piano, set the Mic so it only pics up sound from in front and less from the side and behind. The microphone will then help to filter out any sounds coming from outside this area.
You can now use the phone’s standard Camera App to record and your external microphone will automatically be used for the audio. The Levels and Stereo setting you did in the Motiv app will be applied automatically for you.
The App, however, has many other powerful features that I’m sure you will find to be of interest.
Tips to remember
Two top tips though to definitely remember
- put your phone onto ‘Airplane’ mode to avoid any noisy bleeps whilst you record (I’ve forgotten to do this more than once and it’s very annoying).
- make sure you have enough free memory on your phone – video file sizes are surprisingly big
Going to the next level
Now that you have a microphone, there are lots of other things you can do. What about adding Reverberation and Equalisation? Do you have trouble getting a perfect take in one go? Why not edit out mistakes! To help you discover what’s possible, check out my YouTube Playlist and download my free eBook series.
Most importantly, have fun!
