This is a follow-up to the previous Blog Post where we looked at the Kodak Zi8 video camera. One of the features that attracted me to the Kodak Zi8 in the first place was the external microphone input, that allows you to plug in a separate mic… in the test today I used a cheap stereo lavalier mic.
Video Transcript :
I’ve just come downstairs into the garage so I can do a test of the microphone that comes with the Kodak Zi8 camera. The onboard microphone I’ve found in quiet circumstances is a good microphone. If your downstairs in a garage like this, or in a room thats pretty quiet, then using the onboard microphone is a good choice because it gives a good sound.
Now if your in an area where there’s a bit of noise though, then you need to go up from there and maybe use a lavalier microphone. And a good lavalier microphone will help cancel out some of the background noise and will also give you a better overall sound.
What I’m going to do right now is, I’ve got a little stereo lavalier microphone and I’ve got that attatched to my shirt collar and I’m just going to plug that into this little camera, just to let you see (hear) the difference. I’ll jusy do that right now…
Ok, weve plugged in the lavalier microphone and you would have noticed a little bit of a difference to the audio. The advantage of using a separate microphone is that you have the oportunity to improve the quality of the sound. The lavalier microphone I’ve just plugged in does still pick up a lot of background noise but it also gives more importance to the audio from the speaker which is me.
The onboard microphone I found generally tends to blur all the audio that it records, so if there is any outside sounds, apart from the speaker, then it tends to blend them all together and gives you one great big shamozle of sound. And the speaker generally tends to get blurred into the background. With the lavalier microphone that doesn’t happen. It takes the speakers voice, in this case mine, and gives it a highlight, making it louder than the background noise, and thats what you want.
Anyway, thats the end of todays test. Thankyou for watching Pro Blog Tips video tutorials, and we’ll speak to you again soon.
Wemaster Update
Have included the FLV player below that is playing the same video from above. This was done to test a new FLV player that I will be using on this website… just need to try out a few versions first. I like this FLV player because the html code generator is easy to use, and the FLV player looks nice. Plus the video starts to play at full size… not like the one I have been using that starts at 4:3 then stretches to 16:9. The stretching problem was a Flashvars setting that I was not aware of… now fixed.

Normally when I have to create a video clip that requires chroma keying I'd use my Canon XH A1. Today I felt like having a go at using the Kodak Zi8 pocket video camera that I've been testing for audio quality. The results I got were pretty good considering the cost of this little camera. The video sample clip is only very short, but it does give you a chance to see just how good this little video camera performs. Video transcript : Welcome to Pro Blog Tips video tutorials. In this edition were going to do some Chroma Keying of a video....

Video Transcript : Were out on the road today doing a test of the Kodak Zi8 Camera. At the moment I've got the onboard mic being used and as you can tell, its pretty loud, pretty noisy in the vehicle that I'm recording in. But were going to show you a microphone that you can use when you have to get out on the road to do your little "Run and Gun" shoots. Its called the Countryman Earset Microphone and weve found that when your out on the road in a very noisy envirenment, like for example at a sporting event, or....

Video Transcript : Welcome to Pro Blog Tips video tutorials. In this episode were going to be reviewing the audio that you get with the Kodak Zi8 camera, and in particular, were going to be trying out the Sennheiser ME 67 shotgun microphone, which were going to be plugging into the side of the camera using the external input. One of the biggest advantages of this camera is the fact that you can use an external microphone. Click here to view video twice as largeMost of the cameras that are on the market, in fact all of the cameras on the market....

Kodaks Zi8 is a high definition camcorder that records 1920 x 1080p video at 30 frames per second (fps) in the H.264 format. The Zi8 competes with products such as Pure Digitals Flip UltraHD and Sonys Webbie HD. Kodaks pocket camcorder has a few tricks that the others dont such as digital image stabilization, face detection, and an external microphone input. Kodak Zi8 At a Glance The Good: Excellent video quality, easy to use, strong feature set, large LCD screen and external mic input. The Bad: Slightly clumsy user interface, little internal....

Kodak's Zi8 is a high definition camcorder that records 1920 x 1080p video at 30 frames per second (fps) in the H.264 format. The Zi8 competes with products such as Pure Digital's "Flip UltraHD" and Sony's "Webbie HD". Kodak's pocket camcorder has a few tricks that the others don't - such as digital image stabilization, face detection, and an external microphone input. Kodak Zi8 At a Glance The Good: Excellent video quality, easy to use, strong feature set, large LCD screen and external mic input. The Bad: Slightly clumsy user interface, little internal memory. Video & Photo Quality Using a 1/2.5-inch, 5-megapixel....
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Posted by Jaron in the catagory of... Video Blog Posts