I took the MP out last night for the local firework display and also took my new Tasman DR-05 sound recorder to see if what the quality of it was like. I took off about 800 meters away from the display and had the sound recorder resting on my bag pointing towards the display and flew about 400m away from the fireworks.
The display lasted about 25 minutes and managed to capture 22 minutes of it before the having to land due to it starting to rain. I was gutted I missed the finale as that’s when they set of the big boy’s. I had to ditch the last few minutes of video as the low battery beep was sounding and the sound recorder picked it all up.
All in all I’m impressed with the quality of the sound and think it adds a little something to the what would be silent drone video. Only thing though it was a right pain in the arse timing the bangs with the video but I think it came out OK. I have edited it down to 6 minuets as 20 odd minuets is far to long for a video.
Thanks all, @tgcumbria a lot of playing back and forward and sliding the sound track in the editing timeline to match it up with the video. I know that you see the fireworks a split second before hearing the bang in real time but when I done this in the vid it looked wrong so I just timed it to show and hear at the same time for the video.
Great vid - and the sound sync was the first thing I noticed. Bloody excellent!
Just two things …. being really picky ….
The focus doesn’t seem to be spot on … a difficult thing to achieve at night I’ve found myself, especially using smaller screens.
In a recent thread I mentioned that I was thinking about getting a large (VERY cheap!) tablet - and specifically for focusing more accurately at night was the only reason to possibly get one. Being night time, screen brightness is not important … so really cheap should be fine.
Sound - yes - bloody good sync and really creates a superb atmosphere …. but with distance the higher frequencies fade first.
Depending on what audio editing software you use (or the excellent built in Fairlight in DaVinci Resolve), if you lift the higher frequencies - to bring out that typical firework crackle a bit more - and probably lower the mid range a little, too.
Once you get the overall crackle sounds coming through you might then find lifting the lowest frequencies to boost the “boom” sounds improves it further.
But I’ve found it’s the crackles that needs to be a little dominant to give the illusion of being closer to the action.
As I say - being really picky here … especially on the audio side which will be subjective at all times.
I don’t have a decent sound recorder for Saturday when I hope to get some firework shots …. which is now bugging me. I’ll see what my phone can pick up and try applying some of the above.
I’m going to mess around with the Tascam and the audio settings in Magix to see what they are both capable of but I must admit the original sound out of the Tascam is a lot better than I expected so like you said with a bit of sliding the graphic equaliser I think it will be a good little recorder
This is what i use for my recordings out in the field .
Tascam DR 60 MKII . Fits nice under the DSLR and also great on it’s own .
You still did a great job …
Thanks @shane9377 I did a bit research when I was thinking about a recorder and Tascam seemed to be a good make and the DR-05 was the the best choice for my needs and funds. A film maker came to my work a few months ago to make a promotion film for us and he said that his Tascam was spot on.
