Mic too sensitive?

[Gabounk]

For those of you audio experts:

Recently I purchased a Sennheiser ME66 shotgun mic with the K6 power unit and a standard velour foam windscreen. I use it on a Philips 700 series DVCPRO camera. Overall it is a great mic. It is sensitive enought to pick up the sound of the camera humming if I mount it directly. My problem comes with very loud noises or wind. I have to turn the audio on the cam as low as possible and it still overmodulates or the sound "pops" off.

For the most part it has been great but I am concerned for when I have to do an important shoot in a noisy place like an airport or a loud factory.

Should I invest in a "Fun Fur" wind screen and set the camera to "line" instead of "mic" in loud conditions? Any help is greatly appreciated.

[dinosaur]

Get a Shure Switchable Attenuator.
Knock that hot ME 66 down 15db.
Switching to line input would be too much pad.
For wind noise get a Rycote Softie.
A Shure Switchable Attenuator is a good item for your run bag anyway. Perfect for the "too hot" PA or mult system feed that you may run across now and then.

http://www.shure.com/photos/bigones/a15as_large.jpg

[<try this>]

Get your engineering dept to make a 6db-10db pad inside one connector of your xlr cable. Works great for me.

[Dedline]

Easy fix. I've done it with the same mic.
In your engineering menu settings, you should be able to adjust your audio input level on that XLR input. I stepped my input level down 20db or so. the problem is your shotgun is outputting a higher level due to it being a condenser mic (powered either with battery or phantom power through cam). Only caveat to my setup is if I plug a regular mic into that frontside XLR, I've got to crank it to get a good level, unless I go back into the menu. try a different level and see which setting works best with your hook up. with our cams you have to hold shift while u switch the menu on to get to the engineering menu. good luck

[thru-the-lens]

Dedline is right on this one go into the engineering menu and make the adjustment there.

thru-the-lens.

"Racing is Life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting." --Steve McQueen

[<vididoc>]

Does anyone have any good tricks to cut down on the noise from the rolling camera? I have a Sony D30 with the on camera mic and it really picks up the hum from the camera. Outside of removing it from the camera (I have an ME-80 I use off camera) is there a way to cut down the noise. I've thought about adding padding to the mount etc...

[Dedline]

I happen to have a pricey expensive shotgun mount, which just seems to me to have a larger rubber insulation between the mic and the actual mount. Maybe try cutting up a piece of bike inner tube and roll it around ur mic under the mount? just an idea. Also if it's the ME80 try and make sure the front end is a little ahead of your viewfinder, not so far back that it can still pick up from the VF and head.

[Gabounk]

Thanks for the info. :D