Camera audio from mixer

Beware of wireless legacy... best would be to sync the video with the audio later.

 

I think I understand the need (or desire): The camera is so far from the mixer that a long cable run is impractical or inconvenient?

I don't have a specific product in mind, but it might help just to state:

You want a transmitter at the mixer end, one which connects at mic level or line level, whichever is most practical;
You want a receiver at the camera end which connects to the camera at mic level.
The connectors are important, as different manufacturers use different connectors.

It sounds like a call to a "live-sound sales consultant" at a large retailer is in order.

 

I’d record audio and video separately and sync in post as @GrapeBass suggests.


the mix from the board may not be optimal for your final product. Then there’s the wireless latency problem.

I’d think about getting an outboard mic for the camera. There’s many specific mic solutions for that use case. Otherwise a long cable from an AUX output from the board to the mic input on the camera. But that will be mono.

 

I believe the OP is interested in wireless because he cannot run a cable due to proximity.

 

Record audio from the board, mix it and sync to video seperately, thats what we just did with one of the bands I do live sound for.

Here is an example audio was recorded on my X32 Xlive to SD Cards, on 2 seperate nights, then synced to video,
Video was shoot on both a number of Zoom cameras, as well as one stationary larger camera,

luckily their tempos are very consistent, and I think they did a good job of matching it.

 

If you record a performance with more than one camera and a good audio source, you can compost a multi-camera shoot. Use the audio recorded on the cameras to help sync with the good audio. It's obviously simpler if you just use one camera and an audio source.

 

I agree that mixing and synching post will yield better results. I you are trying to broadcast live, this of course won't work. I've had some luck using OBS Studio freeware. I don't do it enough to have learned how to do it right, but I have friends that live-cast using it with different video and audio sources.

 

Yes, but the audio captured by the camera is used to sync the audio from another source. When you sync the video and audio you can delete the audio that was captured by the video camera. It's done all the time.

 

Record a multitrack of the mixer audio separately--most modern digital mixers can do this. Then create an optimal mix in your DAW and sync with the video later.

 

What if you made a 'Sum' drop from the board into the camera? All stage mics and no extraneous noise from a built-in camera mic? Does yours have a mic in jack?

 

I agree with what others have said - if it's possible, record audio and video separately and sync in post. It's more work but yields better results.

If you are considering this for a live stream and syncing in post is not an option, you may actually have better luck with wireless video than wireless audio. You could set up your broadcast rig closer to the mixer and connect a wireless camera to a local network. Software to handle this would likely be less specialized, as well.

Note that many mixers will allow you to send an aux L/R feed via XLR to another device, such as a Zoom or Tascam field recorder. If your camera only has a single mic input, you'd have to check output level and impedance, and you'd still lose the stereo field.

If possible, unifying audio and video in post is the best choice.

 

This is what I do (although I record from a room mic because I actually do like catching some of the crowd excitement).

Currently using Corel VideoStudio, cost me about $70. VSDC is another one I used in the past. Very affordable (~$15/yr) but it got a bit buggy when I was trying to work with a lot of cut/paste clips or several different layers of video, which is why I moved on from it. If you're doing straightforward stuff it might be right for you.

In both cases, you put the unfiltered video into the video layer and then drop the recording into the audio/music layer. Use the audio from your camera to sync properly to what you recorded. Then mute the audio in the video layer so all you hear is the recorded audio.

 

We were just discussing this more and another point to this we found is when you post to Youtube even though you may think you have your sound and video synced, their compression algorythim uses variable frame rates, it will make it so it doesnt look synced anymore, apparently you need to use uncompressed video as your source.

 

Good advice on here. I'd also record separately - like to a digital recorder at the mixer end, and of course the camera. Sometimes a bit of camera audio is good for ambience. Some software - including I think Final Cut Pro for example - will automatically align the audio tracks.

 

Here's the problem with getting a feed from the board: Your board is setup to sound good in the room - taking into account the stage noise from the amps and the acoustic drums. So in your feed from the board, your guitars are likely to be too low (because you've only added what was needed on top of what their amps were producing) and the drums will be very low (because they are very loud on their own, so you only add a bit in the PA, if any). That's why you instead want a multi-track recording, with everything mic'ed up, that you can mix later so it sounds good on its own.

OR- you can get a good external mic for your camera and record the sound in the room as is, which is (in theory) already mixed to sound good out in the room.