Canon T3i and audio levels

[Brian Tori]

I know the camera has manual gain control, but does it also show audio levels on the LCD or do we have to wait for magic lantern?

[Keith Betters]

You can see the levels when you are in the menu, however once you start recording you cant see them nor can you access the menu. I really do appreciate them adding the levels but monitoring while recording is very important. Hopefully they can fix this with a firmware update!!!

[Brian Tori]

Thanks Keith. I'm sure the Magic Lantern firmware will have this eventually.

[Keith Betters]

Yea it probably will but the problem is I am moving away from magic lantern. I have been having some problems with it as of late. For one, sometimes it hangs when recording. The bad part is, when it does that, it doesn't even finish recording the clip all the way. So when you try to play it back, it will not play rendering it useless. I can't have that, I also can't have-not recording audio. Sometimes it just won't record the audio. I don't know why but the video will be there but the audio will be completely silent. I mean I over ML but it seems to be too unstable for paying gigs. I plan on using it on occasion or more for non event shooting, but as far as weddings, oh no!!!

I know there are plenty of people here who have had no issues but for me that's what I have experienced!!!

[Gerry Gallegos]

Record separate audio. problem solved

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by Gerry Gallegos

Record separate audio. problem solved

That doesn't fix the fact that the camera has hung & you need to remove the battery to unlock it. Magic Lantern is too unstable for any shooting where you cannot re-shoot e.g. weddings.

[Bruce Foreman]

Every time we see a report indicating some malfunction, failure, or instability under ML we have the "true believers" posting something like this. They are quick to point out "I have run this without any problems at all".

This is irrelevant to the guy who is experiencing a problem. And chances are if he sends his camera in to Canon for warranty service, they will find the ML changes in the firmware (the "bootflag" that makes the camera look to the media for the ML files) and they will likely declare his warranty null and void FOREVER. In addition they may refuse to do any repairs even on a paid basis.

Canon should have included the features ML adds. But they didn't and they do not like having their code in the firmware altered or "reverse engineered". They stopped ML development for the 7D cold by incorporating a firmware update counter along with a counter limit in a firmware update. When Tram Hudson hit that "limit" his 7D stopped accepting further updates. He was stuck with the last "trial" modification and cannot even go back to original firmware version.

I don't care who runs what, I just don't have a "dog in this hunt", but the "true believers" ought to be trying to find this guy a REAL solution that addresses his full problem.

[Keith Betters]

Originally Posted by Gerry Gallegos

Record separate audio. problem solved

I do record seperate audio with a zoom h4n and a zoom h1...however this makes syncing audio in post a nightmare. I did a wedding a few weeks ago and had about 30 clips from one of my cameras with absolutely no audio. What made it worse was it was the reception and people where dancing and the camera was moving around on a flycam...So I had to try to compare it to the other angles from my other camera. Nonetheless I finished it but I want no parts of that again, it took way longer than it would have if it recorded audio like it should. ML should enhance the Cam, not trade functionaries.

Anyhow, like I said, I'm an advocate of ML, but I'm a bigger advocate of things working like they should. Again, I don't know why it does it but it does and so now for my paid shoots, it will not be used!

[Chris Barcellos]

I was one of the original testers of Magic Lantern in the 5D when Trammel Hudson was first developing it. At that time, the product was very basic, and only did a few things, and as a result, was eventually stabilizied.

The developers of ML for the T2i took off from there with a fast moving campaign which added more and more bells and whistles. As a result, the potential for conflict in the systems increased. Add to that the fact that Alex over there seemed to turn out a new version twice a week, the versions never had a chance for extensive testing before the next version was out.

In the meantime, on the 5D side, Antony Newman was developing a new 5D version that has some very nice stuff on board. He has been doing it mostly on his own, and dealing with school too.

To me, the necessity for something like Magic Lantern was the sound issue. In many situation I work my way around sound problems using double system sound and Plural Eyes. But when you can't do that, and you need decent sound, in camera, Magic Lantern is the thing you will probably have to learn to use at this point.

The other features are extra and most of the time I disable those. But I have one favorite in the new versions, and that is the inclusion of a false colors mode to help you set usable exposures with a minimum of hassle.

Ultimately, you h ave to decide whether the risk of some undiscovered bug that will brick your camera is worth it. I have had plenty of problems with many versions, but I have never come close, in my mind to bricking a camera.

Losing a shot is another issue. Its not something a narrative film maker is overly concerned with, because with Magic Lantern, you know when something is going haywire, immediately, and you just do another take.

But as to event work, I would be damned sure I had thoroughly tested the version, and knew the pitfalls before I used it.

[Nigel Barker]

Last week I attended a one day seminar on DSLR audio held in Bristol here in the UK by Rycote. Philip Bloom & Dan Chung were among the speakers & they each said that Magic Lantern was too unstable for them to use.

[Gerry Gallegos]

Well there are a few things we forget.

A. ML is under ALL circumstances an "experimental" Hack, use at your own risk.

B. Canon pre-amps sux badly (lots of discussion on this in the past) not to mention you cannot monitor audio, which on its own is a bad idea.

C. you are using a Stills camera that was NOT built to work like a Video camera.

D. Syncing audio is a lot better than turning your camera into a Paperweight.

E. Accept your camera for what it is and don't pretend its what it wasn't designed primarily to do. (record separate audio and accept that its the best option for doing video with a stills camera).

All your gripes can be solved by accepting the concept of separate audio and syncing manually or with Plural eyes. not to mention Audio will be considerably better.

Just my 2 cents

[Charles Newcomb]

I don't remember what version of ML it was or for which camera it was, I just remember when I went to the site the first thing I saw was a bold, upper-case disclaimer warning that ML could damage my camera. That was as far as I read. Pass... even though I had donated ten pounds to the developer who was doing the 60D hack.

As far as audio is concerned, on both my 60D and my 5D I've discovered if I crank the gain down to a notch above off, then input my Rode Video Mic Pro at full 20db, or input audio from my Sony wireless mics, I get pretty sweet sound. Here's a sample from the Sony wireless YouTube - ‪Here, fishy fishy‬‏

By the way: I use a simple 1/8 stereo Y cable so I can monitor audio input as it happens. It works great. It would be nice to be able to "ride" the levels, but that ain't going to happen; and if you need audio that sophisticated, you should have a soundie on set, anyway.

[Keith Betters]

Originally Posted by Gerry Gallegos

Well there are a few things we forget.

A. ML is under ALL circumstances an "experimental" Hack, use at your own risk.

B. Canon pre-amps sux badly (lots of discussion on this in the past) not to mention you cannot monitor audio, which on its own is a bad idea.

C. you are using a Stills camera that was NOT built to work like a Video camera.

D. Syncing audio is a lot better than turning your camera into a Paperweight.

E. Accept your camera for what it is and don't pretend its what it wasn't designed primarily to do. (record separate audio and accept that its the best option for doing video with a stills camera).

All your gripes can be solved by accepting the concept of separate audio and syncing manually or with Plural eyes. not to mention Audio will be considerably better.

Just my 2 cents

I agree that I do know it was experimental and risky to load. I am not completely writing it off. But like Nigel said for events I can't reshoot, its a no no. Also, its one thing to get bad audio that you can synch to good audio. But sometimes magic lantern will not record audio at all!!! But its all good, I'm not here to bash magic lantern, I actually appreciate the software. I just want to share my experiences with my bretherin out there. It has a place in my arsenal, just not at live events. Plus, I have a t3i and that has some features that I want out of my t2i

[Gerry Gallegos]

I am not trying to bash ML either, please understand that.

What I am trying to clear up is that when we use DSLRs for video work we are asking alot from these cameras that was not its primary intent.

Using ML is a very cool tool, but if you're in a place where you're charging money for your services, well then the prudent thing to do is to allow yourself some security and create a workflow that doesn't put your work knowingly under iffy conditions.

For less than $79 bucks you can pick up a Tascam recorder from Guitar Center that has nice metering as well as the capability to monitor what has actually being recorded versus monitoring what is being sent to the recording media. $79 bucks is less than 10% of the price of your camera and will give you a BETTER sound as well as the comfort in being able to monitor what is actually recorded in real time with real time meters. all this for the trade-off of syncing in post. It should be a no-brainer, why risk it? the recorder is smaller than a pack of cigarettes , again a no brainer.

If you must have a camera that gives you what a DSLR does but also does audio decently they make them... but they are 3 to 5 times the price of our DSLRs.

We are getting a phenomenal deal achieving the looks we get from these cameras, but the caveat is in order to do audio well we have to look outside the box (literally) .

I personally think its a small price to pay considering as little as 5 yrs ago most of us could only dream about having the capability to get the quality images we get today with these DSLRs.

ok that was another $0.02

[Keith Betters]

I don't know if the last post was directed at me or in general, but I record audio to a Zoom h4n and a zoom h1. But, if I import a 12 minute clip from my t2i that was recorded with magic lantern and it has absolutely no waveform to sync to, that makes it very difficult to sync. On a standard ceremony its not to difficult but on a reception where I'm moving around with a flycam and shooting a totally different angle it becomes extremely difficult.

However, that problem is null and void now because I will not be running magic lantern on any camera that will matter. I may run it on a camera that I'm using for creative shots.

Well, these cameras may not be specifically designed for video, but the fact is they have the feature and canon and other companies continue to improve the video capabilities of these cameras. So, I'm not sure if the attitude of its not intended for video should be one that I have. I agree we have to work around its shortcomings, but at the end of the day video is video. No matter how or what its shoot with!