Cool Tools for Streaming Production
If you need a little more muscle, particularly if you’re using multiple inputs to produce a high-quality podcast, the PreSonus Inspire 1394 and Firebox are FireWire interfaces that offer multiple input channels and a software mixer, so they’re mixing desks and audio interfaces all in one. Sort of. These devices are targeted at multitrack recording, and are designed to enable zero-latency monitoring. The software mixer allows you to monitor a stereo mix of all your inputs, but you can’t encode or record the stereo mix directly. Your inputs are recorded individually to your favorite multitrack application, which you then mix down to a master.
The Inspire 1394 offers four channels of input, the Firebox six. Both units offer phantom power, professional 1/4" XLR inputs, and outputs for speaker and headphone monitoring. If you don’t have multitrack audio software, these boxes ship with Cubase LE and a whole bunch of other cool audio software. Both units offer sampling up to 24-bit/96kHz quality, with the Inspire 1394 offering 95 dB of dynamic range, the FIREBOX 107 dB. PreSonus has a great reputation in the studio world for making very high-quality equipment at very aggressive price points. The Inspire 1394 and FIREBOX list for $229 and $299, respectively, but you should expect street prices about 20% lower.
Mixing Desks
For those of you who need more inputs or just like the feel of good old-fashioned knobs, the wonders of USB and FireWire have borne fruit here as well. It used to be that if you used a mixing desk to take advantage of the equalization (EQ), multiple inputs, pan, and level-adjustment features offered, you had to take the output of the mixing desk and plug it into your soundcard, or better, an audio interface like the ones described in the paragraphs above. This is no longer necessary, as mixing desks are now available with built-in USB and FireWire interfaces.
The Alesis Multimix series mixers come in both USB and FireWire models, and in 8-, 12-, and 16-channel versions. The eight-channel version has four mono channels that will take a mic or line-level input, and two stereo channels. Each channel has three-band EQ, so you can tweak your inputs to your heart’s desire. The USB versions offer 16-bit quality, with the FireWire versions offering 24-bit quality. The eight-channel USB version lists for $199, while the FireWire version lists for $599. But get this—you can pick ’em up for $149 and $299, respectively. I just bought a portable mixer this January. I didn’t buy an Alesis, much to my chagrin.
Cameras
The biggest news in the last year or so has been the arrival of the HDV format, which squeezes high-definition (HD) video onto a DV tape. The signal is compressed using MPEG-2. Additionally, the HDV format comes in two flavors, and different cameras offer support for different subsets of the HDV spec. Regardless, things changed dramatically last year when the price of shooting in "HD" dropped from $10,000-plus to under $4,000. Suddenly, "HD" is within reach of every video professional.
Sony’s entry into the HDV market last year was the HDR-FX1, along with the slightly more upmarket HVR-Z1. The FX1 shoots 1080 lines of resolution at 60 interlaced fields per second. It’s a three-CCD camera, with other features that a video professional will appreciate such as a manual focus ring, zoom ring, and iris/ aperture ring. This camera has been called the "VX1000 of the HDV world." Take that to mean a reliable workhorse with some shortcomings; 11 years after the camera’s introduction, there are still a lot of VX1000s out there. Street price is running around $3K. The Z1 adds stereo XLR inputs and DVCAM support.
It still remains questionable whether HDV (or any HD acquisition format) is of any use to a digital media professional working in low bit-rate applications such as streaming or podcasting. However, many of these cameras will shoot in both HDV and standard DV, so having the ability to shoot in HDV is basically a bonus, and an increasingly affordable one at that. Speaking of DV, one thing the HDR-FX1 lacks is a true progressive mode. Independent filmmakers consider this a serious omission, as they crave the "film-like" look of 24p. For this, you have to think about the the JVC GY-HD100 or Panasonic DVX100B.