Marantz PMD671

Can't help you with the recorder but s for the second question I would ensure that the sound recordist was a blood relative of the shooter. That would encourage better aiming.

Either that or put a very thick metal plate between the mic and the gun and hope for the best. Id keep quite a distance between the plate and the gun to avoid comb filtering and an overloud ring if the plate gets hit. Personally I don't think you will need an expensive boom or specialised mic in there. A good quality instrument mic should get you your audio and won't hurt that much if it's hit by fragments.

I haven't used a PMD-671. The specs are very similar to the -661. The two biggest differences are the -671 is larger and has an internal microdrive.

Here's some info on recording weapons fire. The first two articles are by/about Charles Maynes, who is far and away the current Hollywood weapons recording guru. He's also a really nice guy.


http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1746/weapons_sound_effects_recording_.php

http://designingsound.org/2010/06/charles-maynes-special-gun-recording-thoughts-for-2010/

http://designingsound.org/2010/04/chuck-russom-special-gun-recording-guide/

http://thesoundmyheadmakes.blogspot.com/2011/06/west-texas-gun-recording-pt-1-prep.html
http://thesoundmyheadmakes.blogspot.com/2011/06/west-texas-gun-recording-pt-2-recording.html
http://thesoundmyheadmakes.blogspot.com/2011/06/west-texas-gun-recording-pt-3-post-and.html


BTW, it was also discussed here on IndieTalk.

http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=30776

The set up for the car shot is that I will have a couple of dozen guys shooting a car with upwards of 300 bullets fired from 9mm pistol, 9mm sub machine, .45 acp pistols, and .223 full and semi auto rifles. The shots will be concentrated on the driver's door area of the car, but will be coming from different shooters covering approximately 60 degrees field of fire. I considered a shot block inside the car, but thought that it would mute or distort the sound.

Why can't you replace the gunfire and impacts in audio post? There are quite a few very nice weapons libraries out there that include impacts, and you can buy by-the-sound from SoundDogs or Sonomic. You can also record your own impacts after the fact using a hammer and a car door & other surfaces.

If you just use a plate to sheild the mic from the shooting side you should still have an clear 'view' of the bullets as they impact and pass through. There is still a very real danger of the mic being hit by fragments.
I am kinda guessing you are looking to capture the effect of being in the car with these bullets passing through, both impacting the outer shell and passing through to the otherside via anything in the way. Foley is dfinately an option but with so many rounds fired quite an undertaking.

I could do the sound in post if I had a qualified sound guy (the one that I had set up get transferred). I am also wanting to capture the tearing of the metal as the rounds pass through. The sound from behind the gun is very different from what is heard down range and I would like to see (hear) what my destruction actually sounds like. I wouldn't mind sacrificing a mic that cost a couple of hundred dollars if I knew that it was going to keep capturing the sound properly until the last round. As far as recording the guns themselves, that will be done on a different day with the guns fired one at a time in the manner that they will be used on screen. As far as the sound library goes, that sounds like it would be considerably less expensive than live fire recording. Guns, ammo, ranges, shooters, these things I have. An experienced sound guy, not so much. Hopefully, I can find someone in my area that can handle the sound and will work within the budget of the project, which is yet to be determined.

Thank-you guys for the responses. Those links were very informative and illustrate how much I don't know. Now where did I put that checkbook?

Chrisk said:

If you just use a plate to sheild the mic from the shooting side you should still have an clear 'view' of the bullets as they impact and pass through. There is still a very real danger of the mic being hit by fragments.
I am kinda guessing you are looking to capture the effect of being in the car with these bullets passing through, both impacting the outer shell and passing through to the otherside via anything in the way. Foley is dfinately an option but with so many rounds fired quite an undertaking.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I was thinking that it would be easier to record the impacts live than to do them in post because of the number and variety of rounds fired. The down side to doing it live is that if anything hits the mike before the end of the shooting I won't get all of it and this is a one take kind of thing.