Cheap Mic, Great Audio (Tips & Tricks)

[Kira.Yamaguchi]

Hi,
I just got a new mic for recording. It's pretty cheap. Cost only $7 on Amazon.

But I can't help to notice that there's still this ambient or wind sound on my recordings. So, after a bit of research, I found a good way to remove those pesky, annoying background noise on your recordings.

Voice Meter + VB Cable Driver

This program is like a virtual audio mixer. You can change the settings of your mic to fit the voice that you want easily. Thanks to Alphaa for the tutorial.

If you don't like his settings, you can use mine.

Audacity

Audacity has a lot of features and you are free to explore them. But the most famous one is the Noise Reduction effect/tool. With the right settings, your voice can actually sound clear and crisp.

Here are the settings I use:

Noise Reduction (can go 12-18)
Compressor (Makes loud sound softer and soft sound louder)
Equalization (Different output for each different microphone)
Normalize (Smoothens peak levels)

Special Thanks to KyleBlane for the other settings.

 

[Blunt Brittany]

Thank you so much for the helpful info! I've been looking into options as far as mics go and don't want to break the bank!

 

[Kira.Yamaguchi]

Thank you so much for the helpful info! I've been looking into options as far as mics go and don't want to break the bank!

Glad to help

 

[Keyser Reveal]

nice share..$7..wow that is affordable

 

[Kcomics]

Yep, Voice meter is awesome. I use that too VB meter seems a bit complicated to me though.

 

[Kira.Yamaguchi]

Updated the settings as I have found a better way to improve the mic quality

 

[MrDooney]

I use the same thing, it works amazingly!

 

[Teknickel 10]

Audacity is great but it takes a bit of "fiddling" to get the settings that work best with your setup and your recording room.

The only option I didn't see you mention was also adding a hard limiter. It basically cuts off any loud spikes like random yells or screams.

I personally use a Blu Snowball and for a USB mic it's pretty solid. I think I got it for $45 if I remember correctly. Stuff that is suspiciously low, like $7 low, sometimes worries me. Keep me updated though if the mic holds up!

I feel like solid audio is even more important than video. I'll sit through a 240p video shot with a potato if it sounds like a smooth jazz radio announcer.

 

[Kira.Yamaguchi]

Audacity is great but it takes a bit of "fiddling" to get the settings that work best with your setup and your recording room.

The only option I didn't see you mention was also adding a hard limiter. It basically cuts off any loud spikes like random yells or screams.

I personally use a Blu Snowball and for a USB mic it's pretty solid. I think I got it for $45 if I remember correctly. Stuff that is suspiciously low, like $7 low, sometimes worries me. Keep me updated though if the mic holds up!

I feel like solid audio is even more important than video. I'll sit through a 240p video shot with a potato if it sounds like a smooth jazz radio announcer.

I sold the $7 mic already. It was really good, however, it was omni-direction so picks up quite a lot of noise since my room isn't "filtered" as they call it. I bought a new one and it's unidirectional so it only picks up sounds directly at it so I'm getting a hard time on where to place it to get the best quality of my voice.

Also, I can't edit my post right now because I don't have VIP powers but I want to update the Noise Reduction settings and Limiter.