Is the me66 good?

[Recordingstuff]

I need a good microphone for my camera and I've seen comparison videos showing that the me66 is really good compared to competition like rode.

But I have issues with it. I heard it's not good for recording indoors and it can only record in one direction. Is there something of the same professional quality that records sound indoors and all around?

 

[arcaxis]

- It's a 'supercardioid' patterned mic = picks up sound from mostly one direction.... primarily in front of the mic, but a lobe of the pattern extends to behind the mic.



- Not sure why it wouldn't be good indoors if properly used. Don't expect good results mounted on the camera at a distance. Boom mounted over the subject might be one preferred method.

- The ME66 is just the capsule of the mic. It appears to need a power supply to be used with phantom power
Sennheiser ME66/K6 - Super-Cardioid Mic Capsule with K6 Kit B&H

 

[rob aylestone]

The ME66 is a decent mic - the problem, if you call it that, is that it isn't the same polar pattern as a typical hyper - it's more directional, and uses an interference tube - so it's a short shotgun really. The problem people complain about with short shotguns indoors is that they need careful aiming, and of course the aim includes reflections bouncing back of the walls facing the mic, so they can if the aiming is poor, appear to have lots more room sound - and have a boxy kind of sound. Usually the advice for short shotguns is that they are BAD indoors, but they're not really, they just need a decent person to keep them aimed at people's mouth area. Get this wrong and people blame the mic! They sound a little like the standard 416 Sennheiser which is an all in one mic, while the ME66 is an interchangeable capsule mic. I rather like the sound better than the 416, to be honest.

 

[keith.rogers]

OP never checked back, but the problem I see is that people think they can put a shotgun mic on the camera and it's going to magically pick up distant sounds. As [MENTION=178786]rob aylestone[/MENTION] says, indoors, these mics can pick up reflected sounds almost as well as any cardioid mic, so their usage in those kinds of environments usually requires close(r) micing than you might be thinking about (or able to do) with a camera mount.

I have a RØDE NTG1 which works well in my treated room, but in one open mic venue I tried it in, which had a hard back wall (reflecting 90% of the room/crowd noise) plus a front aiming acoustic guitar amp, it was only marginally different from a SDC, i.e., neither really gave me what I wanted, and I had them just a few feet from what I was trying to record!

With that, the NTG2, which is the same mic but with a battery power option is also a good choice, though you'll be happiest with any mic if you plan to put it on a boom with a cable long enough so you can optimize its position. Or, continuing to beat my "optimal camera and mic position are almost never the same place" drum, better (IMO), use a field recorder and record audio separately so you can place the mic(s) where you'll get the best sound, and sync later.

 

[John Willett]

The ME 66 is NOT a hyper-cardioid - it is an interference tube microphone - a gun microphone.

The capsule itself is super-cardioid and the interference tube on the front makes it more directional as frequency increases.

As such, it is good for picking up sound and keeping the mic. out of shot.

Of course, the ME 66 is just the head, you also need the K6 powering module for it.

The super-cardoid head is the ME 65, the cardioid head is the ME 64 and the omni head is the ME 62.

As the ME 66 is an interference tube microphone you can get comb-filtering from some off-axis frequencies, so use it indoors with care as reflected sound coming in off-axis can sound a bit funny.

Oh - and a short gun, like the ME 66 is positioned at 2.2 times the distance of an omni to get the same sound, so:-

Assume an omni mic. at 1 metre from the sound source...
a cardioid mic. (or a fig-8) would be positioned at 1.7 metres
a super-cardioid would be positioned at 1.9 metres
a hyper-cardioid would be positioned at 2.0 metres
a short gun would be positioned at 2.2 metres

This is the relative distance to pick up the same sound.

Which is why a gun mic. is normally off the camera and on a fishople just out of shot.