{"id":139,"date":"2015-08-23T14:36:18","date_gmt":"2015-08-23T14:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fsannicolas.com\/?p=139"},"modified":"2018-01-02T20:36:50","modified_gmt":"2018-01-02T20:36:50","slug":"recording-the-bike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/?p=139","title":{"rendered":"Recording the Bike"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/136446100?byline=0&amp;portrait=0\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nIt was about two years ago that I started to think about how to record the bike. From time to time, I ride a Commencal Premier HD4\u00a0myself and was pretty interested in the interaction between the bike, the different ground surfaces and the speed from a first person view perspective.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nDuring this time, I looked for convenient places and times to record so once &#8220;rolling&#8221; I would get less noise interference (i.e: traffic, other cyclist, noisy groups of people etc&#8230;). As I was aiming for a good amount of variation in the recording, I thought La Casa de Campo in Madrid was a pretty good match. It is a large park not far from home that has a good range of different surfaces like sand, grit, pavement and cycle\u00a0lanes. It also has quite an irregular terrain, so I would get recordings both in flat roads and slopes. However, being one of the most popular parks in Madrid among families, runners and cyclists I would have to consider\u00a0what would be the\u00a0times with less affluence. After discarding nights and winter, I went for an unbearable summer time with temperatures close to 40\u00baC. That would definitely give me some wanted\u00a0quiet space.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nWhile scouting, and having pretty clear that I needed gear mounted on board to better capture the first person view, I investigated on suitable ways to have the microphones in place. Having in mind\u00a0techniques to mic on different types of vehicles I\u00a0identified some\u00a0of the factors that would impact the recording such as the amount of\u00a0weight supported, wind and microphones location. Besides, I began on looking ways to attach the microphones to the bike in a safe way, something reliable enough that I wouldn&#8217;t regret on using with some of my beloved mikes and that wouldn&#8217;t pose a risk to other cyclists in that particular order. That&#8217;s where a combination of a Manfrotto Superclamp 035\u00a0and a\u00a0Manfrotto 026\u00a0adaptor\u00a0came just handy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nI planned for a first recording day with the purpose of exposing anything that I could have overlooked. For security reasons, one of the first things I decided was about leaving the headphones at home. Then, to ensure the recorder would not clip and due to the impossibility of monitoring\u00a0levels at real time while riding, I set the gain and sensitivity to low.\u00a0I mounted a\u00a0Sony PCM-M10 handheld wearing\u00a0a windjammer, connected through a Rycote extension handle into the seatpost and pointing out to the back wheel; then started riding&#8230; and\u00a0the Manfrotto adaptor slid down shortly afterwards. I stopped to fix it up and went on happily riding&#8230; On high speeds the battery lid from the M10 would open and rattle. Other than that, everything felt great!.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/bike_m10_back_wheel-e1440319026333.jpg\"><br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-164\" src=\"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/bike_m10_back_wheel-e1440319026333.jpg\" alt=\"bike_m10_back_wheel\" width=\"1024\" height=\"785\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nA\u00a0few kilometers after, I changed the microphone&#8217;s location into the head tube pointing out to the front wheel. I angled the mic so that it would face the wind backwards, which proved to be the right thing with wind resistance\u00a0hitting the microphone capsules at high speeds.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/bike_m10_front_wheel-e1440319045419.jpg\"><br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-165\" src=\"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/bike_m10_front_wheel-e1440319045419.jpg\" alt=\"bike_m10_front_wheel\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nLater, once in post I came with some\u00a0learnings for further improvements:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\">1. Even if you set the gain at a low setting, you&#8217;ll need to watch out\u00a0depending on where you place\u00a0the microphone. I was getting a pretty high level so any bumps or transients would still clip. In next recordings I would need to put the microphone farther from the wheels.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\">2. Remember to remove any noisy objects you have in the bike. I had a couple of keys in the saddle bag and they were constantly hitting each other. That bled into the recordings. A shotgun microphone, thanks to the off-axis rejection would help on\u00a0damping other\u00a0unwanted noises.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\">3. The suspension for the M10 was not enough to prevent the worst of bumps etc depending on the ground type. I would need to place\u00a0a better suspension system.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nOnce finished, and aiming for the next week I started planning for a\u00a0second recording session. This time around I was ready to set a\u00a0Sennheiser MKH60 within a Rycote windshield and windjammer.\u00a0As the setup was going to be a bit bulkier I tested and mounted everything at home before going\u00a0out. I tightened the XLR\u00a0with cable ties placed\u00a0along the frame into a rucksack where I fit a Sound Devices 702.\u00a0In this occasion, besides the extension handle from Rycote, I screwed the\u00a0pistol grip\u00a0into\u00a0the Manfrotto adaptor to make up for more distance between the microphone and the wheels.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/bike_MKH60_front_wheel-e1440319072276.jpg\"><br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-166\" src=\"http:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/bike_MKH60_front_wheel-e1440319072276.jpg\" alt=\"bike_MKH60_front_wheel\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nIn the field I checked out different positions and angles pointing out the MKH60 to the cassette, brakes and the crankset. Then, once biking\u00a0I captured both pedaling and freewheeling in all ways possible and all ground surfaces available.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nThings that I plan on working out some time in the future include other perspectives like stereo recordings of pass bys either in M\/S or ORTF. Furthermore, there is still some\u00a0to get recorded even at closer perspectives on the crankset and brakes along with the brake levers and changing gears. I am still thinking about\u00a0using a couple of DPA4061s or wait some months for the release of the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.indiegogo.com\/projects\/instamic-the-smart-small-gopro-of-microphones#\/story\">Instamic Pro<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><br \/>\nWhat\u00a0other factors do you consider when recording bikes?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p class=\"excerpt\">It was about two years ago that I started to think about how to record the bike. From time to time, I ride a Commencal Premier HD4\u00a0myself and was pretty interested in the interaction between the bike, the different ground surfaces and the speed from a first person view perspective. During this time, I looked for convenient places and times&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/?p=139\">Read more &rarr;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[19],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=139"}],"version-history":[{"count":54,"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":287,"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions\/287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/samplingtheworld.fernandosannicolas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}