Hello all, I shoot with a Sony VX2100, Beachtek XLR adapter, then a shotgun on camera and wireless lapel mic. When I go to edit, shouldn't I have 2 audio "channels"? Instead of constantly adjusting audio levels during ceremony, I thought maybe I could record both then edit/adjust during post?

Hi Darryn

Your Sony will have a left and a right 3.5mm jack which the Beachtek plugs into so you have effectively a Channel one and channel two via the XLR's ...you should be able to set levels on the Beachtek for each XLR channel and your wireless mic will go into one and the shotgun into the other.

In your NLE the audio from the wireless mic should appear on the top track of your audio if it went into Channel 1 on the Beachtek as that's usually assigned to "left"

Keep the levels independant of each other and use whatever sounds best in post.

Chris

As my good friend Chris says, you get Left and Right channels. The Beachtek will allow you to adjust levels during recording and in post you should see 1 TRACK with 2 Channels. Depending on your NLE you can either split them to 2 tracks, left and right, or you can copy and paste the entire track and make one of them LEFT only and the other RIGHT only. Adjust to taste in post, use one, the other or both.

As an example at a Church wedding on my "A" cam I'm running a radio mic on the groom and a radio mic on the lectern....I split the audio track at various points so when they do the readings I use the right channel only and dump the groom's mic but when it comes to the vows I'll use the left channel only as I need to hear the priest and couple.

Most NLE's will allow you to use left or right BUT the audio is still fed to both speakers when you render out the file

Chris

I run 2 lavs at the ceremony as well. I disconnect my hypercaroid from my A camera run my AT1821 dual channel receiver to the cam with 1 lav on the groom and 1 lav on the pulpit. this is a typical church setup for me. At the reception I run the hypercaroid to channel 1 and my trusty Sennheiser E604 drum mic in front of the DJs speaker back to the camera so I again have 2 seperate audio channels running, just like at the ceremony.
Now in post the I split the channel into 2 seperate tracks. One is left and one is right (pulpit lav and grooms lav). I use the best sounding channel for that particular part. IE when they're speaking at the pulpit, I use that channel only, use a little NR to clean it up and when Vegas renders it it becomes 2 channels again. so the sound is fuller than going thru one centered channel. Same for the grooms mic. For the reception generally the only thing I end up doing is adjust the levels a bit for the people doing the speeches since most of them don't know how to use a mic properly and for the music if the DJ gets nuts and cranks it to 11 on a scale of 1 to 10.
I've been using this system for a number of years and it saves me time in post and worrys while shooting.

Thanks guys, I think these answer my questions. My camera is not actually recording 2 audio tracks?

Hi Darryn

All cams run just an "audio track" but it has two channels ..left and right (unless your Sony happens to have a "stereo/mono" switch. On non XLR cameras they refer to left and right on XLR cams they refer to channel 1 and channel two but essentially it's still the same thing.. Your NLE will show up one audio track but with a left and a right channel and the Input 1 source from the Beachtek will normally show up as the left channel and the source thats in Input 2 will show up as the right channel.

With your NLE you can then select right or left or both and also can combine left and right so the audio is mixed (which you don't want normally)

What NLE are you using??? That might help us, but first make sure the Sony doesn't have a stereo/mono switch ... it must be left in stereo otherwise both inputs from the Beachtek will be mixed together (you don't want that either)

Don?? I actually made a little switch box on my cam so Channel 1 is always the groom mic and then I can also switch Channel two between the lectern mic (which is only needed for readings) and a Rode on the camera for ambient audio/backup

Chris

As a PC guy, I cut/edit with Corel VideoStudioPro and final assemble with Cyberlinks Powerdirector12. I also have Sony Vegas but am still learning. I see I can separate the audio and video tracks, I guess I was just thinking there must be a way to have both my shotgun and wireless tracks appear?

What I currently do is leave the grooms mic all the way down (right channel) and shotgun (left) cranked up. When its time for vows and rings, I turn up the groom. I wear powered/closed headphones to monitor. I learned that leaving groom off helps avoid clearing throat, whispering and other noises, but since the lectern was quiet this past Saturday, maybe I could have used an additional track from the groom.

In Vegas you should see a stereo audio track. If you right click on the track you can choose to use the left or right track alone or make a copy of either track and then you can mix or mute sections as you need.

Ron Evans

Just to be sure, you do have 2 cables going out from the Beachtek, left and right, correct?

No Warren, I have 2 "inputs" but only 1 output. Output is a mini-jack that goes into my one and only mini-jack input on Vx2100.My next camera will have 2 XLR inputs :)

Also, my Beachtek is set to mono.....

If you're set to mono, you're mixing both channels into one signal, then recording that one signal to both channels! There is nothing in post you can do to separate it. To record 2 tracks separately, you need a "stereo" output from the Beachtek to your VX2100. It's a "Y" shaped cable that joins together with a STEREO mini plug at the end. (A stereo mini plug has 3 rings on it, mono has only 2. Which do you have now?) Then set the Beachtek to stereo, and you should be good to go! When listening with a stereo headphone, you should be able to hear separate tracks, left and right.