EP 10: On Gear

NARRATOR: OK, so you've got your big idea. You've written a script and planned everything out to a T. You know what you're going to make. Now, let's talk about how you're going to make it. It's time to think about gear. CHRIS LAVIGNE: You want to talk about gear? Oh, we're going to talk about gear. DAN MILLS: Toys, toys, toys, toys-- ELENA BESSER: Don't sleep on sound quality. JEFF AYERS: I can't say enough good things about Sennheiser. MYKIM DANG: One piece of gear that I could not live without is a good lens. COLIN ROSENBLUM: At the end of the day, your audience is just looking for a good story. If the gear that you're using is keeping you from giving your audience that good story, you should probably rethink what you're using. NARRATOR: Let's get into the good stuff with resident video gear enthusiast, Chris Lavigne. CHRIS LAVIGNE: Are you seeing this thing-- interchangeable lenses. NARRATOR: And Wistia's lead producer and audio nerd, Adam Day. ADAM DAY: Howdy. CHRIS LAVIGNE: If you're about to make your first show, your timing could not be better. We are in the Golden Age of gear. And most of the cameras and microphones out there-- they are really, really good at very reasonable price points. So the most important point here is that you can make an amazing show no matter what your budget for gear is. NARRATOR: Still, there's a lot of gear out there. So let's cut through the noise and look at a basic, intermediate, and advanced gear setup for your podcast or video series. Adam over here has helped produce over 700 podcast episodes. ADAM DAY: A basic setup for recording podcasts is pretty basic. All you need is a USB microphone, a pair of headphones, and some free recording software on your computer. A USB microphone is a great choice, because they tend to be pretty inexpensive. They tend to sound good for the price. And they are easy to use. All you do is plug in a USB cable from the microphone to your computer, and you are up and running. One of my personal favorites is the Audio-Technica ATR2100X. This thing is like $80. And for the price it sounds awesome. And it is so easy to use. And as a bonus, it's got an XLR output, which is a professional-grade connector on an otherwise budget microphone. Now, when you're recording, you need headphones. You have to be able to hear yourself. And if you're in a remote interview situation, you're going to need to hear your guest. For a basic setup, just use whatever you have around the house. I pretty much always just use Apple EarPods. They work great. It's nothing fancy. And a lot of people already have them. When it comes to your recording software, if you're on a Mac, you're gold. You've got GarageBand built in. It's free. And it's super powerful. And if you're on a PC, there's plenty of free options too. Just search for a program called Audacity-- super popular, super functional. And it's awesome. CHRIS LAVIGNE: OK, video gear-- now, if you know anything about me, you know that I am passionate about helping people make videos using the tools and the gear that they already have. So if you're shooting video at home, one of the things you already have is a computer. And you can turn that into a video-making machine. Start by upgrading your computer's webcam to a USB webcam. Something like this Logitech Brio is going to help a ton to increase your image quality way higher than your built-in webcam. You've heard before, but I'm going to say it again. Your phone is an incredibly powerful video camera. Throw it on a tripod with this tripod adapter. This is a MeFOTO 360 tripod adapter. Don't have a tripod? No problem. You can pick up one of these cheap light stands, put it on your tabletop or put it right on the ground, and now you have yourself a nice stable shot. Now, for audio. I think that sound is arguably even more important than video. So if you're going to start upgrading your gear, start by purchasing a better microphone. I'm a big fan of this Blue Yeti microphone. It's a USB microphone. It plugs right into your computer, and it sounds remarkably better than your built-in microphone. Now, if you're shooting on your phone, you can consider picking up this. This is a RODE smartLav+-- plugs right into your phone. You clip this on your shirt-- instantly have a better sounding microphone. Now, if you don't want to be dealing with all these cords, you can go wireless with this little guy. This is called the Instamic. And this records right on itself or over Bluetooth to your phone. Last but not least is lighting. Now, fortunately for all of us, there are a ton of cheap LED lighting options out there right now. It's remarkable. One of my favorites is this LED light panel from Lume Cube. What's really awesome about this is that it's powered over battery. It's charged over USB. And it's dimmable, which is sweet. You could dim it down. You could dim it up. And get this, you can change the color temperature. So you can cool it off, or you can warm it right up to match whatever color temperature you're working with. NARRATOR: Well, thank you very much, Chris Lavigne and Adam Day. Now, let's talk about intermediate audio and video gear. ADAM DAY: When it comes to an intermediate setup for your podcast, you are going to upgrade every aspect of your signal chain. So when it comes to your microphone, you're going to jump into an entry-level professional-grade microphone like this Shure Beta 58A. With a professional-grade microphone, you're going to need a USB audio interface. So you'll use an XLR cable to connect to something like this, the Focusrite Scarlett 2i2-- awesome price, great audio quality. Let's talk about listening back. In my intermediate setup, I'm upgrading to professional-quality studio headphones like these AKG K240s. These are classic headphones. They sound great. And they're comfortable to wear over long periods of time. In an intermediate setup, you're going to want to listen back out loud to your podcast so you can make good edit decisions and good mix decisions. And a good entry-level professional pair of speakers are the JBL 3-Series MkII. When it comes to recording your podcast, you're going to jump up from the free stuff into professional audio recording software. On a Mac, you're going to graduate from GarageBand into Logic Pro. And if you're on a PC, you're going to step up into something like Pro Tools. Now, if you want to take this whole show on the road, you can. Pick up something like this Zoom H5 Handy Recorder. This is a professional-grade field recorder that pretty much gets the computer out of the mix entirely. It records straight to SD card. You just plug your microphones in, plug your headphones in, and you're good to go. CHRIS LAVIGNE: OK, intermediate video gear setup-- this is my playground. I love this price point. There are so many awesome options out there. So let's break it down. First off, the camera-- I'd recommend picking up a DSLR, like this is a Canon DSLR, or a micro 4/3s camera, a mirrorless camera. There are a ton of options out there. What's great about these cameras are that they let you have interchangeable lenses, which gives you a ton of creative freedom to make some really cinematic shots. If you've got yourself a nice camera, you're going to want a nice tripod to put it on. And one of the ones that we love here at Wistia are these-- Manfrotto tripod and tripod head. Now, what's really nice about this series of tripod is that it has a column adjustment. If you need to raise or lower the camera, you can do so by just adjusting that column instead of having to change the leg height every time. All right, so intermediate audio package. Start by picking up a shotgun microphone, something like this Sennheiser ME 66. This thing has seen some mileage here at Wistia. You point this thing at something, and it is going to pick it up like a laser. So you put this on top of a boompole, grab yourself an XLR cable, and run it into this. Yup, it's the H5 recorder again. This thing is like a portable audio studio. And it's going to be great for this quintessential audio package. For your lighting package, pick up enough lights and light stands that you can pull off that standard-issue three-point lighting setup. One of the nice soft lights that we use here at Wistia a lot is this 1x2 LED light mat. There are a bunch of these out there. We like the ones from Westcott. This is called the Flex light. It's a little bit pricey. But boy, does it look nice. NARRATOR: And finally, let's talk about some advanced audio and video gear. ADAM DAY: An advanced podcasting setup looks almost identical to an intermediate setup. It's just more expensive gear, which does mean better audio quality in the end. So for a microphone in our advanced setup, we've got the Shure SM7B microphone. This is one of the most famous vocal mics of all time, and it's only around $400. We're also going to upgrade our audio interface to something like this-- the Apogee Duet. It's a great two-channel USB audio interface. Now, when it comes to listening back, we're still using the AKG K240 headphones. These are an industry standard and they sound great. But when it comes to your speakers, I'm going to upgrade to a little bit larger speaker. It's going to have better bass response. And you're just going to get a little bit more detail when you're listening back and making mix decisions. In our studios, we use the ADAM A7X speakers. But really, any larger professional-grade speaker will do. Now, in an advanced setup, you might decide to build a recording studio in your office. And in that case, you'll want to pick up some acoustic treatment panels like these from Auralex. This is going to dampen the sound in your space and just make for a more professional recording environment. CHRIS LAVIGNE: OK, you have carte blanche to go hog wild building out a video gear package. Well, maybe not carte blanche, but you've got some money in the banana stand to start leveling up your video gear to some serious professional-grade stuff. It's time to start thinking about cinema cameras. Here at Wistia, we're big fans of the Canon Cinema line of cameras. This is a Canon C100 Mark II. We've used this camera a ton for Brandwagon, one of our other shows. It's a late-model camera. But it still holds up really well. Now, on to tripods-- believe it or not, it's not really that fun. We actually use the same tripod that we use in the intermediate setup. So we're using these same Manfrotto tripods. They're actually really great even when you put a nice cinema camera lens on it. One thing to consider, though-- as you're buying more cameras, you're going to need more tripods. So find a tripod brand and stick with it. That way, all of your cameras are going to have the same tripod head. So any camera can click into any tripod. A bigger budget opens up a whole new world of audio gear. And one of the things you're going to want to do with extra money is upgrade your shotgun microphone to something like a Sennheiser MKH 416. It's actually what we're using right here. It's what we've used for just about all of Show Business. And it sounds fantastic. If your production calls for it, too, and you've got a little bit of money to blow, consider picking up a wireless microphone package. These Electrosonic wireless packs are basically the industry standard. They're going to give you great range and really good sound quality. Now, on to lighting. Now, more money doesn't necessarily mean you need to go out and buy the most expensive lights you can. In my opinion, more money means you can get more specialized with the lights that you are getting. In the Brandwagon studio, we have a bunch of LED light mats mounted to the ceiling. And it's all controlled by a light board. We have a bunch of lights on the wall that let you blast all different colors onto the wall-- lets us do all kinds of different special effects in there. And we're rocking this. This is an Aputure 300D with a big old light modifier on it. So it lets us get a really nice focused beam of light. We've used it a ton during Show Business. Listen, when it comes to video lighting, more money buys you more options to really dial in the perfect look and feel for your production. NARRATOR: Yup, with this basic, intermediate, and advanced gear, you'll have what you need to produce that podcast or video series you've been writing. For more, here's Dan from Wistia Studios again to share how you can benefit by mixing and matching gear. DAN MILLS: If you're making a show that's going to use multiple angles, that means you're going to have multiple cameras. But don't feel like you have to invest in the same camera for each angle. What we like to do is invest in one really high-quality camera for our A camera. So that's what I'm looking into right now. And then for our B camera or C camera, it's OK to use something less expensive or an older model, like this. As long as you've got some decent lighting, it's pretty easy to match the lower quality B camera image to the A camera just with color correction in post-production. So save your money. Don't buy three expensive cameras. Instead, invest that money in better microphones and better lights to bring the overall production of your show way higher. SYDNEY RUTMAN: Another great thing to do is try before you buy. NARRATOR: Sydney Rutman knows a thing or two about getting the best gear for your budget. SYDNEY RUTMAN: Yeah, I do. Renting is a great way to get your hands on gear that you might be curious about and test out which setup might be best for your show. There are so many gear reviews out there. And there's products coming out every single day. So renting gives you that flexibility before you have to invest in a full setup. Most cities have at least one gear rental house. And there's tons of online options that will ship right to you. So before you go out and buy a fancy lighting setup, rent something, try it out. You'll wind up saving money in the long run. And then you'll figure out what works best for you and your show. ADAM DAY: When it comes to making shows, the most important thing to remember is to get the gear that helps you create on a consistent basis. So if you've got a weekly podcast or video series, get gear that's going to make that process fun and easy. You need to invest in the gear that's going to help you make 20 shows, 30 shows, 50 shows in a year. That's the best place to start. NARRATOR: Whether you pick basic, intermediate, or advanced gear, or if you mix and match, you'll be ready to start producing pilot episodes and making your show. Head over to the Wistia Studios Resources page to download gear recommendations curated by Wistia show creators. See you next time.