Thread by @QuinnyPig

I've been told that since enough has changed in how I do podcasts / video work, I should do another thread about my A/V setup (equipment and software) here at home.

Let's start with the audio path.

This is an ElectroVoice RE20 mic with a pop filter and a shock mount on it. I've been using it for a while; it's on a Røde mounting arm.

It plugs into the Cloudlifter mounted to the underside of the desk. Exciting. No buttons, so out of sight, out of mind.

Next there's a Rolls mute switch, because even I occasionally have to shut the fuck up. Some people are surprised to learn I realize that.

It then plugs into my Apollo audio interface. In addition to translating from XLR to USB-C, it also has plugins installed and configured to be an equalizer, de-esser, compressor, noise gate, and several other things.

The software interface looks like WinAmp just whipped a whole herd of llama asses.

From there I either record into Audition, or use it in various other apps. @RogueAmoeba has a suite of software that let me patch it into all kinds of things. I use Loopback + GarageBand to play my own hold music when people are running late.

When I care about sound quality, I use these DT 770 Pro headphones.

When I don't care about the sound (read as: one of you blathering at me in a meeting) and/or I don't want to have giant headphones on my head, I use these Jabra bluetooth things.

Now let's talk video. This is a Z Cam E2 M4 cinematic camera with an Olympus lens on the front. It's got advantages and disadvantages to it.

On plus side, it spits out 4K video at 120fps raw via HDMI. I don't use HDMI; it instead spews 4K over gigabit ethernet.

It can be completely controlled via the network. This is the browser on my iPad:

The autofocus is however complete crap. The point of cinematic cameras is that a camera operator focuses by hand. I gave up trying to get it to work, realized as long as I stay within a 3 foot span manual focus Just Works, and got along with my life.

We pause here to marvel at @bequinning's latest drink creation.

So the camera is mounted into a Glide Gear teleprompter. I used to have an iPad as the screen there, but replaced it with a 4K monitor. It's way better. I can fix overscan issues, have it mirror the display, and it hangs off of my main computer.

I used to have an ATEM mini pro handling camera nonsense; OBS on Mac has improved to the point where I just do it in software now.

My team makes me hold this thing up when recording for later color correction. Eventually we'll get it dialed in for this environment.

Two Elgato key air lights and the Elgato ring light are all controlled (along with OBS) via the Streamdeck. Other folks will be better resources for figuring that thing out than I will.

I really can't stress how overpowered this camera is for my pedestrian use case. It can livestream direct from the camera itself.

It has a freaking REST API:

github.com/imaginevision/…

I use remotely.fm for my interview podcast recordings; video and audio at both ends, then stores in a Google Cloud Storage bucket. I wish it spoke webhook / other storage API / let me give it my own storage bucket for the files.

Past that it rocks.