Better Audio for Video: Room Setup, Mics, and Fixes (Full Transcript)

[00:00:04] Speaker 1: Step up your setup. Even the most pristine quality video can be ruined with poor audio. Whether it's background noise, low volume, muffled recording, or too much echo, there are many factors that can ruin your audio. Good audio is really the backbone of high quality content. If you have any budget to spend, it should be here. First, consider your environment. In the room you plan to record, clap your hands. Do you notice an echo? If you're in a large room with hard floors and nothing on the wall, like a garage, it likely has a large amount of echo. Even small rooms with no sound treatment can struggle here. If budget allows, you can purchase acoustic sound panels to reduce this echo and reverb. I have panels on every wall and even the ceiling of this room. Otherwise, you may need to choose a room with carpet, rugs, or furniture to help reduce reverb or echo. If you'd like to hear the best room for audio in your house, it's likely a closet. When filled with clothes, the closet has lots of natural acoustic treatment, making it great for recording audio. After you decide on a room, investing in a good mic should be the first purchase in your gear collection. Starting at $50, you can get a great USB mic that plugs directly into your computer, iPad, or phone with a single cable. The Audio-Technica ATR2100X is a solid beginner mic, and it also has an XLR connection so you can use it in the future with full audio interfaces. For an upgraded sound, the Shure MV7 Plus USB mic is an excellent choice. This can be your long-term solution with many video podcasters using this model for years. It also has the flexibility of USB or XLR connections. And at the high end, many pro mics are XLR only, requiring a separate audio interface to be used. This can be a Focusrite, Vocaster Solo, a Rodecaster Duo, or any number of audio interface models. My personal setup is the Earthworks Ethos mic, which is about $400, and the Rodecaster Pro, which is an audio interface coming in at about $700. This combo works great and works well with Riverside. Now, before we move on to actually recording, here are three quick tips for how to get the best audio quality from any mic you use. First is proximity to your mouth. It's true for pretty much any mic that the closer it is to your face, the better it will sound. Try to keep your mic about three to four inches, or about the size of your fist, away from your mouth and at a 45-degree angle. Second, you'll likely need a pop filter. Getting close to the mic helps it sound better, but that can also increase mouth sounds, like when you say P's and B's, hitting a little too hard. You can get a windscreen or pop filter for a few dollars on Amazon. Lastly, even if you're using the built-in mic of your mobile device or computer, Riverside has a powerful feature called Magic Audio. This can make any microphone sound studio quality in addition to removing background noise, echo, and more. Here's a quick example of a noisy recording, then with Magic Audio applied. Every example you're gonna hear is with the built-in microphone on the iPhone. This is in an echoey environment, but when I enable Magic Audio, it's gonna cut down on that echo and reverb, focus on my voice, and make this sound studio quality, even though the environment is not perfect for recording. So here we are outside, lots of background noise. There's a waterfall going here. My pool pump is in the background, but when I turn on Magic Audio, all that background noise is gonna be cut out, and again, it's gonna be focusing on my voice and applying things behind the scenes to make it sound studio quality. Magic Audio makes a huge difference, and you can use it with any mic or device. Next, let's hit record and create your first piece of content.