Live Recording Too Loud

[JamesW]

I recorded a bunch of performances at SXSW last week but have found that the built-in mic on my camcorder (Sony HDR-CX7) could not handle many of the loud peaks. Some softer music recorded just fine but the louder stuff leaves a muddy, broken-speaker sound in the mix.

I tried several Effects in Audacity 1.3 (Win) to tone down the booms, including Noise filter, Normalizing, and Increasing Bass (which seemed to be the most effective).

Here is a sample of the noise I would like to remove from an otherwise fairly good sounding recording: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7d25NXPjRq0 The noise starts when the band gets a little louder at 3:26.

Any help is appreciated. I have many more recordings I'd like to share but don't want to turn people off with the peak noises.

(As a side note, can anyone recommend a good/cheap hot shoe mic for future recordings like this?)

Thanks,
James

[steve]

Unfortunately there's not much you can do about that. The camcorder microphone has been heavily overloaded and it's trying to shut down to protect itself. The damage is not repairable - the best you can do is to try fiddling with the Equalizer settings to try and minimize the harshness.

The problem with camcorder recordings is not only that it is easy to overload the microphone, but the camcorder will also try to compensate for variations in loudness (Automatic Gain Control - AGC). When recording music this can often be heard as the volume level going up and down. Most camcorders do not allow you to turn off AGC, but if the camcorder does, then AGC should be turned off and the recording level set low enough to handle the loudest sound without distorting.

An alternative approach is to use a separate audio recorder (either recording with microphones or directly off the mixing desk), then put the audio recording and the video together on a computer after the gig.

[JamesW]

Thanks, Steve. I was afraid that was the answer.

So it sounds like an external mic wouldn't really help if the camcorder is still using AGC.

I appreciate the reply.