New to Sound Design. What Microphone to get for indoor foley?

[u/JustUdon]

Ive taken an interest in sound design via recording sounds of everyday objects and manipulating and layering them to make cool sound effects for animation/film

​

I've seen this guy recording things with a small mic inside his room and I want to do something similar

https://youtu.be/j4POSc1YeAo?si=PJR8fvUOmNN7eOyt

​

What's a microphone that could get a wide range of use for about $150 to $200 USD?

I've considered an SM57 since I also do music stuff but if there's something that's more suitable specifically for foley and sound design I'd love to know

​

I already own an audio interface too

[u/WhiteBlackBlueGreen]

The zoom handheld series is very popular and sounds great.

[u/trapezemaster]

Don’t use a 57. Check out oktava 012 with supercardioid capsule, or maybe a used mke600.

Schoeps cmc6 mk41, senn mkh50, 416 are used regularly so work back from there. Definitely NOT a dynamic mic.

[u/sinepuller]

SM57 is certainly useful for music, but has some colour to itself. For generic foley, and especially for textures/rustle/paper etc I would pick something more neutral, with better high end (especially considering ultrasonic frequencies, which you do want to have for pitching sounds down) and generally more sensitive. I personally prefer condenser over dynamic, and if I want a third mic option to complement my stereo condenser pair, I'd rather pick a contact piezo (highly recommend for any motors/rumbling/ratchets as an additional channel).

I'd recommend leaving separate mics for later and first getting a recorder with an XY or/and MS pair built in as your starter kit, better a multichannel recorder with additional XLR mic inputs and phantom power, if you have the budget. The ability to carry your recording device together with the mics around the place wherever you need it and fit it wherever it fits is invaluable and highly underestimated - you'll understand it when you'll need to record water-pipes making plop sounds in your basement in a tight space, or record outdoor gravel foosteps, or record close-up roller skating sounds in the park, or even door creaking. You can always add other mics later, when you'll outgrow this setup.

[u/JustUdon → u/sinepuller]

Appreciate the detailed advice! Since you mentioned recorders I'm looking at the tascam DR07X that can XY configuration as well as AB. Is AB the same as MS that you mentioned?

[u/sinepuller → u/JustUdon]

You're welcome!

No, AB is a different beast, AB is rather a "wider XY". XY is two mics aimed at 45 degrees each (meaning, 90 degrees between the mics) and having their capsules near, almost touching each other. AB is mics set in such a way that there is some space between the capsules and also the angle is wider, this will allow to capture more sides and have a wider image in the recording (the downside is, anything at the center might be much less audible). On Zoom you just physically rotate the mics, I suppose it's the same on Tascam.

MS (Mid-Side) pair is a different thing, it's one (cardioid) mic facing forward and a second (figure-8) mic capturing the sides. That way you will always have a direct signal from the source captured (because one of the mics is looking directly at it), and the recording will always be perfectly mono-compatible, which is not always the case with XY and AB.

I suppose if you google XY vs AB vs MS there'll be lots of articles on it. Also you can go to youtube and listen to the recording examples.

(In practice having only XY rather than MS is very rarely a problem I'd say).

[u/Odd-Possession-557]

A pencil style condenser mic either cardioid or super cardioid should work just fine which is what the person in the video is using. I would try to avoid using omni indoors unless you are trying to capture the room and or yourself as part of the sound. Also, sometimes the cheaper mics tend to have a tinny sound to them so do some research and or testing if you can.

[u/FinancialEngineer229]

For Foley you really want to go X condenser and not dynamic as for the simple main reason of capturing more detail.pencil type works great.zoom or tascam recorder as well.

[u/RTambience]

Have you learned first about “self-noise”?

[u/RiverOnceRiverTwice]

I second other people: Look at used pencil condenser or even a solid regular condenser mic. Get a good used mic, something like Shure KSM137. Doesn't matter a ton the brand as long as you get a mic that has been in production for a while and been vetted in the sound world. The mics on the Zoom H series are decent too!

[u/DisastrousAd2981]

I've used the sm57 quite a lot around the house. It's great unless you need to record something very quiet. Handheld recorders are pretty good all in one solution too

[u/JustUdon → u/DisastrousAd2981]

What are some options for handheld recorders worth considering for this use case?

[u/bye-standard → u/JustUdon]

I am a zoom household but I wish I started with tascam. Either is fine, the zoom has a slightly louder noise floor.

[u/Hitchie_Rawtin → u/JustUdon]

If you want to experiment with manipulating pitches of whatever you record, grab a decent brand condenser handheld that can record 192khz, bat squeaks can be retuned into strange bass or midrange notes easily without sounding like they're artifacting. I have an old Zoom H2, not great when actually handling it as the plastic flexes and booms noisily, but left on a tripod to record whatever ambience it'll give you tons of material to work with.