Best affordable mic for recording a podcast?

Hi everyone,

Some friends and I are starting an automotive podcast which will primarily be recorded in my apartment. There will be three of us sitting around a table. I have a small mixer board with phantom power if needed. I could use my instrument mics in three stands and record the three channels separately of course. But that is a lot of equipment to leave set up all the time etc.

Instead, I was thinking about getting a condenser mic and putting it on a short stand in the middle of the table.

Is a condenser mic the correct kind? I need omnidirectional, right? Any suggestions for a solid cheap one? I mean REALLY cheap, not looking for overly professional at all as we first start out. Sub $75, the cheaper the better.

Thanks!

It depends on the quality of your room. If the acoustics allow for it, a condenser mic and a decent pre-amp will give your voice a bit more high-end. But condenser mics -- particularly when in omni mode, are the audio equivalent of a wide angle lens on a camera. Back in 2015, when I wrote a product review on the Reflexion portable vocal booth, I transcribed a quote from David Stewart of Sweetwater, when he interviewed Mitch Gallagher about how he built his product studio in an hour-long YouTube interview:

“It really is vital to [treat the room before recording in it]. Sometimes what I tell people who want to get a good recording sound with microphones, is to start with the player and that’s usually the most important thing, and then the instrument, and then the next thing is the acoustics. It’s sort of in that order, in my estimation. Look, I’m VP of sales at Sweetwater. I would love to sell everybody these really expensive great microphones -- and they are great -- and they do sound good. And they’re going to pick up your crappy room really well, and reproduce all that nastiness really well. So boy, I just can’t say enough how important it is to go ahead and tackle those acoustic issues right away.”

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If you're not prepared to treat your room to reduce reverb and slap, consider a dynamic cardioid mic. It won't have the same high-end bite, but it's a much more narrow-focused beam. I recorded hundreds of hours of shows for Sirius-XM and loads of podcasts using nothing but a Shure-58, or a pair of them if I was doing an on-location interview. Also, whichever mic you choose, a pop filter is very useful for reducing those popped-P sounds caused by gusts of breath into the mic. And loads of radio hosts swear by the Shure SM7B Dynamic Vocal Microphone -- Michael Jackson even recorded some of his lead vocals with one. And it's pretty affordable at about $400.

Yes. I just saw this and I totally agree with Ed. SM7b. go for it.

You'll probably have to bump up the mic pre a bit since it's dynamic, but it's a good mic.

The Broadcasters mic is an Electrovoice RE-20.

I have both and they will emphasize the lower, deeper frequencies as in a male voice. I use the RE-20 on bass a lot.

As always you can't go wrong with an sm57.

Make sure you stay away from noisy disk drives or get a foam baffle between your voice and noise pollution nearby.

J T said:

Yes. I just saw this and I totally agree with Ed. SM7b. go for it.

You'll probably have to bump up the mic pre a bit since it's dynamic, but it's a good mic.

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You could try a Cloudlifter on it -- it uses a mic-pre's phantom power to add an additional 25dBs of gain -- I was surprised at how good it made my ancient SM58 sound.

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/de...ones-cl-1-cloudlifter-1-channel-mic-activator

Make sure you stay away from noisy disk drives or get a foam baffle between your voice and noise pollution nearby.

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I was going to suggest a Reflexion-style filter, which can make a condenser mic sound good in some otherwise pretty crappy-sounding rooms, but it sounded like Moonweasel wanted to do a multiple-person podcast, and I wasn't sure how it would work in that situation. But if you go that route, make sure you also hang some duvets behind it. When I wrote my review of the Reflexion a few years ago, I stumbled over this YouTube clip of a similar product being tested in various rooms -- note the tests with and without the duvets behind it:

All good choices above...

However, in my mind, everyone needs a Rode NT2-A... At $399.00, it's an absolute "must have"... :salude

KennyF said:

All good choices above...

However, in my mind, everyone needs a Rode NT2-A... At $399.00, it's an absolute "must have"... :salude

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I'm sure it's a great mic, and it’s much more fun to talk about the best and sexiest microphones, but the reality is, as the guys from Sound on Sound magazine wrote in The Studio SOS Book: Solutions and Techniques for the Project Recording Studio, “As long as there’s not too much sound leakage from the outside world or from excessively noisy computers, it’s actually pretty easy to make good vocal recordings almost anywhere, but there’s more to it than simply buying a good mic and preamp. The acoustics of the recording space are massively more important than the precise make and model of microphone or preamp, yet they’re all too often not given the same degree of consideration. Fortunately, when you’re recording vocals you don’t have to treat the whole space, only the area around the microphone and singer.”

Or in this case, the people recording the podcast. I’d really try to get the room in order – which could be as simple as hanging some duvets or foam acoustic panels on the wall, before concentrating on which mic to use.

Also, if you're recording multiple people speaking, you might find that several cheap dynamic mics on tabletop stands close to the speakers' mouths will sound better than an expensive condenser set on omni in the middle of the space.

Ed Driscoll said:

I'm sure it's a great mic, and it’s much more fun to talk about the best and sexiest microphones, but the reality is, as the guys from Sound on Sound magazine wrote in The Studio SOS Book: Solutions and Techniques for the Project Recording Studio, “As long as there’s not too much sound leakage from the outside world or from excessively noisy computers, it’s actually pretty easy to make good vocal recordings almost anywhere, but there’s more to it than simply buying a good mic and preamp. The acoustics of the recording space are massively more important than the precise make and model of microphone or preamp, yet they’re all too often not given the same degree of consideration. Fortunately, when you’re recording vocals you don’t have to treat the whole space, only the area around the microphone and singer.”

Or in this case, the people recording the podcast. I’d really try to get the room in order – which could be as simple as hanging some duvets or foam acoustic panels on the wall, before concentrating on which mic to use.

Also, if you're recording multiple people speaking, you might find that several cheap dynamic mics on tabletop stands close to the speakers' mouths will sound better than an expensive condenser set on omni in the middle of the space.

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100% :salude

Hi, I guess you're just a beginner podcaster. Probably you are a student or even a schoolboy. I understand, there is no money yet, but I already want to create. I also once was in such a situation, only I am not a podcaster, I love to sing and I want everyone to hear my songs. Now I have a good microphone, dear, worth more than 200 bucks. Okay, I will not brag, let's get down to business. A year ago I decided to buy a microphone, I was given money for my birthday, of which I have 50 bucks left. I decided to find tips on buying a budget microphone on the Internet, I could not choose the best microphone for a long time, a month passed, a second, and I choose. Well, yes, I chose a microphone for 2 months and so what? I'm a student, leave me alone. So, I accidentally found this article https://bestazy.com/best-wireless-microphone/, in it I found out about various microphones and chose one for myself. Guess what? Of course, the cheapest. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0742H1BT2 I can’t say that this microphone can be called bad because it is budget. I used it, recorded the songs, I liked everything until I dropped it from the 10th floor. Do not ask how I did it, I do not know. Then they gave me the microphone that I have now. To be honest, it’s not much better than my old microphone, so don’t worry, buy a budget microphone and record podcasts

kitban12 said:

Hi, I guess you're just a beginner podcaster. Probably you are a student or even a schoolboy. ...

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l:rofll

kitban12 said:

Hi, I guess you're just a beginner podcaster. Probably you are a student or even a schoolboy. I understand, there is no money yet, but I already want to create. I also once was in such a situation, only I am not a podcaster, I love to sing and I want everyone to hear my songs. Now I have a good microphone, dear, worth more than 200 bucks. Okay, I will not brag, let's get down to business.

Click to expand...

That business being :2spam . :##