AGC defeated for Videomic and NTG-2

[Kevin Amundson]

Many of you who use either the D7 or T2i will know just how noisy the AGC (Auto Gain Control) is on these cameras. There have been some attempts to defeat this problem that have worked to a certain degree; namely Mike B's attempt: YouTube - Canon 7D/T2i AGC Bypass Trick as well as Dave Dugdale's attempt here: Canon T2i/550D 7D Disable AGC Automatic Gain Control Hack for the Rode Videomic

Dave described that the Rode Videomic doesn't work with the Dual Mono to Stereo connector because the Rode Videomic needs to carry the sleeve in your connections. He than states that he built his own connector and it worked great. The one thing he failed to do was describe the process he used, and for a non-electrical guy like myself I had to recruit the knowledge of my father to assist me in making a connector for myself.

That is why I built a little diagram here in hopes that it will assist those of you who wish to attempt this yourselves. I'm not great at explaining things, but I hope these pictures and the diagram will help.

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I started with a Stereo Splitter like this: Speaker and Headphone Splitter 3.5mm Stereo

You can see photos of the process here: Picasa Web Albums - 10908882701663803... - AGC Disabled

I clipped the wires. Once clipped, I designated one jack to be the RIGHT channel and the other to be the LEFT channel. On my designated RIGHT channel I spliced the tip from my designated Right input to be the Ring on my Stereo Plug. I then clipped the Right input on my designated LEFT channel to effectively make each Designated LEFT/Right Jack a MONO jack that carried the Shield/Ground.

Then I assemble the shrink tubing and I had a finished product that works great. I'll get a demo of the audio up ASAP.

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So what happens is the LEFT MONO and RIGHT MONO tracks are put on left and right channels of the stereo track. This allows me to attach my MP3 tone to the LEFT MONO and either my Videomic or my NTG-2(via XLR to 1/8") to my T2i and I get great sounding crisp audio after I fill right in PPro. I will post up a sample very soon, but in the meantime, I hope this helps some folks.