Microphone Levels
- Thread starter morvynf
- Start date
Self-taught sound guy here. Front-of-House Engineer for many years, Broadcast Engineer for a couple. I'm not entirely sure what you're asking for here, but this is what I got:
If that's the case, then I think what you really want is (historically) called a Dugan Automixer, after the guy that built and sold the first ones. The original version is entirely analog circuitry, and consists of a level detector for each input, followed by a VCA (voltage-controlled amplifier, used as a volume control) for each input. All of the detectors are cross-connected to all of the controls, so that a loud signal on one of them turns itself up and everything else down. All of them running that same logic at the same time, results in automatic mic selection based on the loudest at each moment.
The analog version is rather hard to find, but a lot of digital mixers - even some cheap ones - have an emulation of it. OBS does not.
OBS has a compressor, as an audio filter, but it's hard to use. Technically, it works, and sounds fine if you set it "right" for what you're actually doing, but you're doing it all blind. No metering or indication at all of what's going on, that you might use for aids in setting it up.
If you use a digital mixer for the automix, then it'll also have a more visible compressor. You can compress each individual mic separately, before the automixer, and/or you can compress the mix, all before leaving the console.
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So you probably want to look at a small, relatively cheap, physical digital mixer to run ALL of your audio stuff through, and output the final, finished soundtrack from that (probably over USB) to OBS as its only audio source at all, to pass through completely unchanged. Even the broadcast mastering is done in the physical mixer, so that OBS's meter is slammed full all the time (or nearly so), and may even tell you it's clipping, but it never does and mathematically can't because of the mastering settings that you put in the mixer.
I like this one, and it has all that, but do your own shopping too, and pick one that you like:
www.behringer.com
The control app is required for that one - no physical controls at all - but the app is free and runs offline too, so you can get a feel for it. Expand "Software" on the right side of that page, scroll down to X-AIR-Edit, and pick the version for your system. (Win, Mac, Linux, etc.)
You mean like a conference table or panel, where each person has a mic but only one talks at a time? Thus, only one mic should be active at a time, and that selection is obvious enough that a machine can do it.
If that's the case, then I think what you really want is (historically) called a Dugan Automixer, after the guy that built and sold the first ones. The original version is entirely analog circuitry, and consists of a level detector for each input, followed by a VCA (voltage-controlled amplifier, used as a volume control) for each input. All of the detectors are cross-connected to all of the controls, so that a loud signal on one of them turns itself up and everything else down. All of them running that same logic at the same time, results in automatic mic selection based on the loudest at each moment.
The analog version is rather hard to find, but a lot of digital mixers - even some cheap ones - have an emulation of it. OBS does not.
That sounds to me like a compressor. It has a detector and a gain element, just like the automixer, except it's entirely limited to just the one signal. When the input gets loud, it turns itself down.
OBS has a compressor, as an audio filter, but it's hard to use. Technically, it works, and sounds fine if you set it "right" for what you're actually doing, but you're doing it all blind. No metering or indication at all of what's going on, that you might use for aids in setting it up.
If you use a digital mixer for the automix, then it'll also have a more visible compressor. You can compress each individual mic separately, before the automixer, and/or you can compress the mix, all before leaving the console.
---
So you probably want to look at a small, relatively cheap, physical digital mixer to run ALL of your audio stuff through, and output the final, finished soundtrack from that (probably over USB) to OBS as its only audio source at all, to pass through completely unchanged. Even the broadcast mastering is done in the physical mixer, so that OBS's meter is slammed full all the time (or nearly so), and may even tell you it's clipping, but it never does and mathematically can't because of the mastering settings that you put in the mixer.
I like this one, and it has all that, but do your own shopping too, and pick one that you like:
Behringer | Product | XR18
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