Affordable digital recorder advice

[Keola Donaghy]

Aloha e Mia, I'd like to add a couple of thoughts, as some who as worked
in a recording studios, though lacking experience in field recording...

I've frequently heard the "warmth" of analog recording touted by some
artists and engineers, though when I recorded people in both formats
simultaneously and played them back, nearly all preferred the digital. For
me the added clarity of digital, as well as lack of hiss and the artifacts
added by Dolby and other noise reduction schemes, make my ears happier.

When looking at digital recording and frequencies, you also need to take
into account the Nyquist limit, which states your sampling rate must be
twice that of the highest frequency that you wish to record. While this is
less of an issue with spoken voice than music, you should try to locate
equipment that can record at a frequency rate twice that of spoken voice.
It's not really an issue these days; most will record up to 22k-44k,
though devices designed specifically for spoken voice may not. What you
will hear if you record something that is in the frequency range beyond
that limit is a flanging-like effect in those ranges. While frequencies
below the limit are not affected, and can be a bit annoying to hear that
effect hovering over the entire recording. 

HTH,

Keola



Indigenous Languages and Technology <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU> ma Monday,
January 30, 2006 ma 10:18 AM ua käkau ‘o -1000:
>First, and maybe this was discussed in the original thread, the sampling
>rate is more critical than the format. High sampling rates record more
>data and take up more space. Thus you can record less before you have to
>move the recordings to a more dense medium. Low sampling rates record
>less data, and take up less space. 
>
>The recorder direction is also important, with unidirectional being more
>forgiving for voice recordings than omnidirectional. A good
>omnidirectional mike will pick up the elks outside in the field across
>the road (guess how I know). 
>
>Then, if you want archival storage, you need archival media. Because I
>move my stuff around, from computer locations to website, I don’t worry
>about storing my stuff in an archive where only a few people will have
>access. Because I move digitally, I don’t have to worry about data loss
>due to multiple analog copies. The error correction is good enough so
>that there is no effective loss. 
>
>Has there been any discussion about the frequency of the human voice (I
>assume because Jan wrote the message we are talking voice & language
>recording, not music)? Human speech ranges from a low of about 100 HZ to
>a high of about 5000 Hz, with the most commonly cited range being
>300-3000 Hz. This isn’t to say that sopranos can’t make higher frequency
>sounds, nor bass voices lower frequency sounds, it just means that most
>people speak in that range, and so a recorder that is optimized for that
>range will be better for voice recording, especially Elders speaking . .
>. which I assume is what we are talking about here.  
>
>I also haven’t seen any discussion about sound editing. I always edit my
>recordings; usually there is more dead space than makes the response nice
>for people, sometimes not enough, so I add or subtract so the response
>feels nice. Sometimes I have volume issues; some people record too
>loudly, in which case I have usually lost the top end because of
>clipping, and sometimes it is too soft, and I can correct by digitally
>enhancing. 
>
>Finally, I haven’t heard any digital recording that has the warmth of
>analog recording, but small digital recorders are easy to carry around,
>and we found them to be unobtrusive when working with people. People tend
>to forget they are there (the little recorders) and so they are less
>stressed, and when they relax is what is now a comfortable situation,
>there is less stress and strain, and more richness in their speaking
>voices. 
>
>I think this takes us to FinallyPartB: If your goal is merely to record
>the spoken word and stash it somewhere, then probably you don’t care much
>about whether the speaker is stressed or not, because your goal is just
>to get THE WORD. On the other hand, if your goal is to use the recordings
>for language revitalization, like I do, and like Jan is working towards,
>then you care a great deal about richness, inflection, rhythm, and
>comfort. 



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Keola Donaghy                                           
Assistant Professor of Hawaiian Studies 
Ka Haka 'Ula O Ke'elikolani             keola at leoki.uhh.hawaii.edu 
University of Hawai'i at Hilo           http://www2.hawaii.edu/~donaghy/
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